Monday, June 29, 2009

Icon of Peter and Paul

Icon of St Peter and Paul, I found this in a London shop, it was almost split in two. It is 18th century Russian, interestingly the clothing is very finely painted (click to enlarge) in the traditional manner, the faces are slightly crude, the landscape and the city of Rome in the background are very westernised, it seems to have been worked on by three different hands, at least, which was quite typical of Russian icon factories. Many small towns in Russia produced icons on an industrial scale.

3 comments:

Crux Fidelis said...

Fr Ray, did you know that a considerable number of icons have been looted from Russian churches in recent years?

Fr Ray Blake said...

Yes, Church icons tend to be bigger than this one, this is domestic.
Icons from an iconastasis or shrine tend to show signs of their origin. I have never seen any of these on the London market, unless they have been private hands since the 20s to 50s.

Crux Fidelis said...

Sorry, Fr Ray, I realise now that my phrasing may have been rather indelicate. I wasn't trying to suggest that you were involved in trading in contraband.

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