Reviewing Art in Norman Sicily. From Creation to Communication

In the context of the Normans' expansion in Europe and the medieval Mediterranean, the events in southern Italy represent a peculiar case of the construction of a new cultural identity. Like the new Kingdom of England, the Norman Kingdom of Sicily, founded in 1130 by Roger II of Altavilla, is an accomplished project of establishing a new political entity. In Sicily, the Normans also had to deal with a multicultural and multireligious environment, adopting strategies of cultural mediation that were singular in the Mediterranean and European context. These strategies-having political and propagandistic purposes-are explicitly manifested in the arts and aesthetic languages, characterized by the use of multicultural elements from the Byzantine, Latin and Islamic worlds. The art and architecture of Norman Sicily, in which it is possible to recognize the most obvious features of Norman-Sicilian cultural syncretism, thus played an identity role in the history of Sicily from the 12th century onward, with an epigone in the 19th century. The enhancement of this cultural heritage culminates recently with the inscription of Arab-Norman Palermo on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Taking into account the most recent research findings, the article analyzes the artistic phenomenon through some exemplary cases to understand the genesis of Norman-Sicilian aesthetic syncretism. Some milestones of local revivalism are also traced, which from time to time reaffirmed the expressive and communicative power of Arab-Norman art.