the Empire. The wars of Alexios I Komnenos against the Seljuks of Asia Minor and the foundation of the
Latin kingdom
of Jerusalem on the Syrio-Palestinian coast turned the island into a key area for the control of developments in the region. Thus it was not coincidental that the dominant class of the island, namely the governors and the ecclesiastical officials, came from Constantinople. The most important monuments of the 12th century, works whose high quality reflects developments in the capital, were often commissions or gifts from this class. A high-level military official of the Byzantine court, Eumathios Philokales, who was doukas of the island between 1092 and 1103 and 1110 to 1118, financed the wall paintings of the chapel of the Holy Trinity in the Koutsoventis monastery, which today lies in the northern, Turkish-occupied part of the island. The excellent quality of the wall paintings and the high position of the founder in the state hierarchy justify the assumption that Philokales had brought to Cyprus a workshop from the capital.
The Koutsoventis painter introduced a new stylistic idiom and created an island school of painting. The most important oeuvre of this group are the wall paintings of Panagia (Virgin) Asinou in Niketari, commissioned by Nikephoros Magistros, who most probably belonged to the local aristocracy. The work is dated by an inscription to 1105/6. The artistic output of the island is represented by a great number of wall paintings from throughout the 12th century. Two of these stand out as among the most remarkable creations of Byzantine art: the wall paintings in the Enkleistra (cell) of St Neophytos in Paphos, by the painter Theodoros Apseudes in 1183, and the wall paintings in the Church of Panagia tou Araka in Lagoudera, painted in 1192, that is a year after the occupation of the island by the Latins. Due to their close stylistic affinity researchers have concluded that the two fresco cycles are by the same painter.