Traditional Iconography is the Gregorian chant of Western art: the score hardly varies, unlike the rendition which varies a great deal. Rendered without reverence or inspiration the Icon can seem hopelessly dead, resembling nothing more than religious kitsch. Forged, however, with faith, feeling and talent an Icon can make everything beside it look ordinary and dull. In great Icons there exists a numinosity, an extraordinary quality of light which pulses from the chromatic field. To paraphrase the Russian poet Osip Mandelstam, it flows from the Icon as a "bright haired wave" bearing a secret which "keeps us awake forever".