If you're in the Chicagoland area, my friend Nikos Bakirtzis is 
giving a talk on Byzantine monasticism at the Wheaton College Art Department this Monday Feb. 4th at 4:30pm in Adams Hall (3rd floor).  And I'm giving one at the University of Chicago's Workshop on Late Antiquity and Byzantium on 
Tuesday, Feb. 5 at 4:30pm (Cochrane-Woods Art Center, Room 
156), where I'll demonstrate with overwhelming persuasiveness how Byzantine art solves all our contemporary problems.  Come on by to one or both.