Description in Icons, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 2004, cat. no. 57 a-g:
Portable Deesis tier
First half of 16th century, partly repainted c. 1870, Moscow
NMI 55

Wood: Linden (Tilia sp.), egg tempera.
Seven panels each made of single board
without splines, back painted red (cinnabar);
central panel reinforced by
new wood.

Inscriptions a t.: On central panel,
hand-written in black ink in Cyrillic
letters: SEMU SVYATOMU OBRAZU
KHRISTA SPASITELYA MOLITSIA
MNOGOGRESHCHIVYI MAKSIM
FEDOROV GAZETOVOY c 1873 goda.
MOSKVA (The great sinner Maxim
Fyodor Gazetovoy prays before this
sacred icon of Christ the Saviour,
Moscow 1873 )

PROVENANCE: Olof Aschberg;
Gift of O.Aschberg 1933
EXHIBITIONS: Gothenburg 1970, no 19;
Helsinki 1970, no 19
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Kjellin 1933, no 55; Kjellin
1956, pp 156, 171; Felicetti 1972, pp 44, 147
CONSERVATION: Restored prior to entering
NM: central panel repainted about 1873;
wing panels partly restored at the same
time; at a later stage all panels cleaned,
remains of old repainting left on the figures
of apostle Peter, the archangels and lower
parts of icons on the right wing; remains of
dark overpainting left on Saint John’s
hands; NM 1961: refilling of nail holes,
retouches and varnishing (B. Titov). Abrasions
on background; ground and paint
layer losses along the bottom edges of the
panels

During renovation in about 1873, the
face of Christ was probably repainted
in a dark colour to conform with the
other faces in the series. When, later
on, these were cleaned of the darkened
varnish, the face of Christ alone retain -
ed its dark colour. Visible traces of the
darkened varnish have been left on the
hands of John the Baptist. The renovation
was in all probability done in
a studio with Old Believer traditions.
That very year, incidentally, saw the
publication of Nikolai Leskov’s short
story “The Sealed Angel”, which
describing how an old believer painter
copies an earlier icon and in doing so
produces a perfect likeness right down
to the damage and craquelure.
This group may have been used
as a Deesis in a private chapel, hermite
(skhit) or suchlike.
[slut]