Louvre sheds western light on Russian icons, past

PARIS — Russian icons, with their somber tones and gold-framed visages, perplex many western art viewers. The Louvre Museum is seeking to lift that mystery by throwing its influential spotlight on the icons, and nearly 1,000 years of Russian history and art.

In an exhibit unlike any ever mounted and tinged with diplomatic ambitions, the Louvre has pulled together artworks that have never left Russia and from around Europe, from carved cathedral doors to gold-woven robes and precious iconostasis panels. “Holy Russia” opens to the public Friday.

“My hope, and the Louvre’s hope, is that people coming to the exhibit and visiting it can catch the specificity of Orthodox Russian art. Because it’s not Byzantine art, it’s not Christian art, it’s not oriental art, it’s Russian art. This is the heart of the matter,” curator Jannic Durand told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

Irina Lebedeva, director of Moscow’s Tretyakov Museum and a key contributor to the Louvre exhibit, agreed. “We would like to offer the possibility to western viewers of understanding our mentality. We are distinct,” she told AP.  Read Article

By Angela Charlton