This Christmas season, New York City’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, commonly known as “the Met,” is displaying one of the oldest Madonna and Christ Child icons in existence along with other pieces of early Christian art in its “Africa & Byzantium” exhibit. Although North Africa is primarily Muslim today, the region had a rich Christian history prior to the Islamic invasions of the seventh century. According to the Met, the depiction of the Virgin and Child is one of the oldest surviving icons in the world. “Africa & Byzantium builds upon the long legacy of the Met’s award-winning Byzantine exhibitions,” Achi said in the November press release. In this way, this long overdue study offers a more complete global history.”More information on how to see the Met’s Africa and Byzantium exhibit can be seen here.
