The Icon Museum and Study Center

This two-sided pendant diptych was likely worn around the neck. Pendant diptychs were popular among the nobility and elites. The warm reds and bold yellows are typical of Ethiopian panel painting and manuscript illumination. One side of the diptych features Saint Basil (Fasilides in Ge’ez), emperor of Ethiopia from 1632 to 1667, riding on horseback as a warrior saint. The scenes across from Saint Basil are the Resurrection with Christ liberating Adam and Eve from Hades and the Crucifixion with Mary and John. Below are three Ethiopian saints: Abba Takla Haymanot, Abba Ewostatewos, and Abuna Gabra Manfas Qeddus, who are accompanied by the priest Abba Kiros. This combination of figures is found on older diptychs from the Gondarine School, which flourished in Gondar, the capital founded by Emperor Fasilides, in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. The other side of the diptych features another warrior saint on horseback and the Mother of God with Christ accompanied by two sword-wielding archangels. We invite you?to visit "Skin, Script, Spirit: Ethiopia",?a unique research installation that?will conclude on December 1. Plan your visit today by visiting https://lnkd.in/eQzn6fKq. Images: Two-sided Pendant Diptych with Feasts and Saints, late 17th or early 18th century, tempera on wood, Ethiopia

Icons on the page, ?? book printing, and icon painting formed an unlikely partnership, pushing the boundaries of tradition. But with great innovation came great controversy. The mass distribution of prints raised questions about icons. Were paper icons, whether loose-leaf or in a book, worthy of veneration? Was the page an appropriate support for a religious image? Did the affordability of print, which catalyzed the icon's distribution, subtract from its holiness?? "Printing Icons: Modern Process, Medieval Image" explores the many benefits of printing in the production and study of icons. This book of clichés from the Pochayiv Monastery in Ukraine classifies icons almost like an encyclopedia or dictionary. Images are arranged by subject matter, inspiring comparisons between related types and furthering the study of icons and their meanings. Plan your visit: https://lnkd.in/eQzn6fKq ? Image:? Book of Clichés, compiled by Hierodeacon Feodosiy in 1912, Holy Dormition Pochayiv Lavra, Ukraine, RUSSIAN HISTORY MUSEUM, Jordanville, NY??

Join us for an evening scholarly lecture with art historian Waldemar Deluga. This is a free event, but registration is required through the link provided.

This late 19th or 20th-century Ethiopian goatskin is the centerpiece of the "Skin, Script, Spirit: Ethiopia" research installation. The upper half of the goatskin is a copy of a fifteenth-century triptych at the Institute of Ethiopian Studies Museum in Addis Ababa. Painted in the Moon-like Faces style, it shows Mary flanked by Gabriel and Michael, as well as Peter and Paul. While the painter includes the detail of Christ holding the dove, he omits the customary sprig held by Mary. The figure of the Ancient of Days dominates the upper right section, while rows of apostles, prophets, and angels populate the other registers. The painter has added a lower row of founders and a central figure of a turbaned man who, besides the Ancient of Days, is the only individual to stare out at the viewer. The text in the lower half opens with the first words of the Gospel of John and continues with a prayer. The repetitions in the text may suggest that the goatskin functioned as an amuletic device. Skin, Script, Spirit: Ethiopia will conclude on December 1, so be sure to visit if you have the chance! You can also visit the online page for this installation by visiting this link: https://lnkd.in/e45wkEjM Images: Mary with Selected Saints, late 19th or 20th century, paint on goatskin, Ethiopia 1. The top portion of the goatskin with Mary and the Christ child encircled by archangels and saints. 2. The lower portion of the goatskin featuring the Gospel of John and a prayer written in Ge'ez.

This week WSBE Rhode Island PBS visited The Icon Museum and Study Center for their series 'Treasures inside the Museum' which will be aired in Spring 2025. In addition to filming our galleries and collection highlights, they also shot 'behind the scenes', our storage facilities and icon conservation in action, thanks to Anthony Moore of Northeast Painting Conservation. We're excited to see the results and want to thank their crew, especially Mary K. Steele and Jim Karpeichik for spending the day at our Museum.

The first exhibition of our new curator Justin Willson is open to the public now! 'Printing Icons: Modern Process , Medieval Image' is on show at The Icon Museum and Study Center in Clinton MA. This innovative exhibition explores the impact of printing on orthodox art. We are very grateful for the support of the seven US institutions who contributed to the exhibition with some extraordinary and rare loans. A big thank you to: Princeton University Library, The Ohio State University (Hilander research Library), Mead Art Museum, Hillwood Estate, Museum & Gardens, James Madison University, Wheaton College Massachusetts and the RUSSIAN HISTORY MUSEUM, as well as to the private collectors who generously lend their objects to the Icon Museum for this exhibition. The exhibition is on view until March 30, 2025.

Join us for an evening scholarly lecture with art historian Waldemar Deluga. This is a free event, but registration is required through the link provided.

Join us for an in-person Teatime Talk with Dorota Zapralska.

This week we visited the Harvard Art Museums Study Center facilities in Somerville and Cambridge with a group of 'Friends of the Icon Museum' to see and study some of the extraordinary icons in their collections. A great opportunity to catch up with fellow icon enthusiasts and see some treasures that had been buried in storage rooms for decades!

In the fall issue of Print Quarterly I published a set of icon prints from the collection of Pimen Sofronov (d. 1973). Sofronov was from a Russian-speaking family in Estonia, and he belonged to a sect of the Orthodox Church known as "Old Believers" which adhered to medieval painting styles. Sofronov's papers and studio archive are housed at Hilandar Research Library at Ohio State University. A dozen of prints from Sofronov's archive will be exhibited in our fall exhibition, "Printed Icons: Modern Process, Medieval Image," at the Icon Museum and Study Center, opening October 18, 2024. The method of printing icons was indigenous to Eastern Europe, Russia and the Balkans. It was closest to a monotype. The painter cleaned the old icon, traced its outline, and then pressed a moistened page onto the wet surface to transmit the image to the paper. A more complicated way involved what manuals call a “roe-sack window” (pausnaia okonnitsa), which consisted of a frame stretched with a dried sturgeon uterus (the sack for caviar). The material hardened to form a transparent film like a “window” when dry. The painter placed the window over the icon, traced its lines, and used it like a matrix to make prints. The exhibition explores the relation between these methods and woodcuts and engravings, revealing how print transformed the reception of sacred images.