Eye motifs abound in Ethiopian art. According to true believers, angels working at night assisted in the hewing of the Lalibela churches. This celestial help is commemorated in the eyes often carved on interior pillar capitals. In later periods, as here in the 18th-century Debre Berhan Selassie Church in Gonder, heads and wings of archangels were painted on ceilings, their hundreds of individuated eyes reminding worshippers of the omnipresence of God. Girls attending a rural school between Gonder and Lake Tana bring the angels’ colors and patterns to life.
Lalibela eyes
Gonder Heads
Schoolgirls