The Fogg Museum's icon "The Virgin and Child" captures and venerates the mystery of the Madonna in a way that powerfully awes even the modern viewer. The work entrances the viewer with mesmeric textures and shapes while removing him from the holy and unknowable religious space it creates. The resulting tension creates a powerful and dynamic contradiction that engulfs the viewer and evokes the eternal devotional mystery. Immediately upon encountering the icon, The Virgin's eyes come piercingly to the fore. Exactly centered under a protruding gilded arch and spanning the vertical axis, the eyes are the center of sets of inter-linked spirals. The intensity of the frank and direct gaze