ЗАХАРИ ЗОГРАФ КАТО НАЧАЛО НА ПРОСВЕЩЕНИЕТО МЕЖДУ ИКОНАТА И ЧОВЕКА.

Zahari Zograf is one of the most important figures in the Bulgarian Revival fine art. However, he was often criticized for breaching the church icon canon laws, and his art was considered by certain scholars to be poorly made and decadent. This article will present and discuss the connecting links, the environment, and the painter’s era. Precisely, they are of extreme importance for understanding the new creative processes and currents that nourish the nascent Bulgarian Revival in the field of visual arts. We will examine his oil portraits in detail and present drawing parallels from Western authors and their influences. In his iconographic work, we have focused on several icons that show the changes and the reasons they have occurred in the environment and society, as well as how they influence the further development and enrichment of the images. After the presented arguments and analyses, it is appropriate to reject the allegations of decadence against Zahari Zograf, as he is an exponent of the revivalist aspirations of the Bulgarian society, which are aimed at enlightenment and its upward development. All his activity and creativity are subordinate to these new ideas and should not be considered bad and decadent. Zahari Zograf is the bearer of the new philosophical understanding of the world, the progress in it, and the idea of continuous self-improvement, as these main lines will be and are the driving force of the new successful Bulgarian Revival society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]