I have been painting sacred icons for three to four years, having spent most of my career in the film and television industry as a designer, editor and director. Sacred Art, or Byzantium Art, is an artform I find supremely blissful and absorbing.

I love the way that they are free from my ego - they are beyond myself. I love that they are a truly ecological artform using Nature's pure elements - egg, wood, lime, natural pigments, gold. And I love that they are ancient and eternal, allowing us mere humans to depict a sacred heritage, a timeless Heaven, and an all powerful Creator.

Gaylene Anne Barnes
Dip.F.A., B.A. (Art History)

"The saints are not visible to mankind, just as a blind man cannot see the light. The saints may only be seen in the mind's eyes and these are the eyes an icon is addressed to. An icon itself is not so much a painting as it is a prayer, hence it's majestic simplicity and peacefulness. All that is depicted in it reflects divine orderliness."