Description in Icons, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 2004, cat. no. 73:
The Presentation of the Child in the Temple
From Festival tier of an iconostasis
Third quarter of the 16th century, region of Moscow
NMI 86

Wood: Spruce (Picea sp.), egg tempera,
gilded metal cover (19th century).
Panel made of two boards with two
new splines inlaid across the panel (the
old ones preserved on back); back
painted dark brown.

Inscriptions a t.: Paper label with handwritten
text in brown ink: 140 de large

PROVENANCE: K.F. Nekrasov, Yaroslavl;
Olof Aschberg; Gift of O. Aschberg 1933
EXHIBITIONS: Stockholm 1973, no 37
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Grabar 1913, pp 330, 333;
Kjellin 1933, no 86; Kjellin 1956, pp 64–65,
198; Reuterswärd 1973, p 36; Abel 1978:1,
fig. 13
CONSERVATION: Restored prior to entering
NM: crack in joint mended, all heads
repainted in the 19th century, losses of
paint coarsely retouched; NM 1964: scratches
in paint retouched, silver secured with
small nails; 1982: cracks mended with new
wood, heavy camber of panel planed, splines
replaced, painting cleaned, stopping
and light retouching; Scattered remains of
overpainting; nail holes from lost halos;
parts of metal cover on borders lost; panel
warped
In his ‘History of Russian Art’, Igor
Grabar writes of this icon: “It is not
often one encounters icons which to
such a great extent as the Presentation
in the Temple, from the collection of
K.F. Nekrasov, combine typical Muscovite
light and form with an idealised
Byzantine architecture.” The priming
contains several inscriptions in black
paint indicating the selection of col -
ours, e.g. [ref ]t [s praz]elenyu (black
with green) and [di]ts (reddish brown).
The dating is supported by these col -
our notes, which are recognisable from
other icons dated to the second-half
of the 16th century.1 These icons prob -
ably came from a somewhat larger
work shop employing several painters
where this kind of information needed
to be put down in writing.
1 For further references concerning this
phenomenom, see Kochetkov 1982.
[slut]