The Art of the Oklad Wendy Salmond Chapman University, [email protected]

Chapman University Chapman University Digital Commons Art Faculty Articles and Research Art Fall 1996 The Art of the Oklad Wendy Salmond Chapman University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/art_articles Recommended Citation Salmond, Wendy. "The Art of the Oklad." The Post 3.2 (1996): 5-16. Print. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Art at Chapman University Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Art Faculty Articles and Research by an authorized administrator of Chapman University Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Art of the Oklad Comments This article was originally published in The Post by the Hillwood Museum, volume 3, issue 2, in 1996. Copyright Hillwood Museum This article is available at Chapman University Digital Commons: http://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/art_articles/82 ~ AUTUMN 5 n 1904 a team of restorers A similar story could be told embarked on preserving the of countless other oklads that I celebrated icon of the Old once a dorned Russian icons Testament Trinity, which had but were removed in the 20th been painted by Andrei Rublev century in response to a mod- between 1422 and 1427.l The ern aesthetic that saw the .---lhe- 'Po7f- project, initiated by the noted painted icon as a work of art, collector Ilya Ostroukhov, the metal oklad as merely a 3cz.. ) involved removing layers of dirt vulgar display of wealth. --Au,~MV\ \qq~ and olifa (linseed oil), and the Today, it requires an act of if :1 THE ART OF THE OKLAD f• ·I by Dr. Wendy R. Salmond, Visiting Curator !1 I areas of repainting that imagination to appreci- Detail. Okladfrom had accrued over the ate the integral role Jeon ofSt. Nicholas centuries. Before that Ok} ads On Ce ofVelikoretsk, see fig. 6. work could begin, played in the mean- however, the icon ing of medieval had to be separated icons such as Rub- from its oklad,2 a cov- 1e v' s Trinity. To ering of beautifully visualize what the chased solid gold majority of early through w hich only Russian icons must the faces, hands, and have looked like feet of the three with their covers angels were visi- \ intact, we must ble (fig. 1). With turn to the pri- its precious bur- vate devotional den of jeweled icon of the haloes, necklaces, 18th and 19th and collars, the centuries, a Trinity's oklad source that exemplified a cen- is only now turies-old tradition of honoring attracting the notice of scholars important icons with donations and collectors. Usually small and adornments, a tradition images reserved for private use that expanded the icon's role as in chapels or bedrooms, lovingly "a w indow onto heaven" by. preserved in special cases (kiots), ·building "a kind of fragile an9. passed down through gen- bridge which aspired to unite erations, these devotional icons heaven and earth."3 When the have miraculously survived with restoration was completed, the their covers intact, either oklad was not replaced. Instead, . because they continued to be it was permanently retired to the used for religious purposes until museum of the Troitse-Sergieva quite recently, or be.cause they Lavra, where it remains as ended up in private collections 'a sumptuou s example of the where the oklad was appreciated jeweler's craft, its original func- as highly as the icon. This is par- tion and meaning more or less ticularly true of the icons that forgotten. Mrs. Post acquired during her I ~ I ' 6 AUTUMN I I ! ' ' ~ : ' I I Ffg. I more than thirty years as a col- Russian culture is almost as old l· Ok/ad from the Old lector of Russian art and now as that of the icon itself. The j Testament Trinity icon, form a significant part of the . first painted .icons were 16th- 18th centuries. Hillwood collection. Over half brought from Constantinople l Painted by An drei of these are personal icons that to the city of Kiev around 988, Rublev. Gold, silver retain the metal covers with the year in which Grand Duke gilt; pearls, precious which their former owners Vladimir of Kiev converted to stones, 140 x 115 cm. sougl).t to express their reli- Eastern Orthodoxy, the religion Sergiev Posad Ml gious piety and, frequently, of the Byzantine empire. As and History Museum their awareness of changing physical embodiments of the I : I artistic fashions, particularly central Christian mystery-that i the western European styles Christ was both divine and i introduced into Russian art in mortal, spirit and flesh-icons the 18th and 19th centuries.4 acted as intermediaries between !i The history of the oklad in the earthly and the heavenly { AUTU MN• 7 worlds. Their painted images of the background of the icon, or, Christ, the Mother of God, and less frequently, by complete the saints provided a visible metal covers that revealed only presence through which the the faces, hands, and feet of the faithful could gain access to the holy personages depicted. invisible realm of the spirit. A Certainly, by the 16th century clear distinction was drawn, the practice of adorning icons _however, between the worship with a multitude of gifts had of icons (i.e., idolatry) and their become firmly established as an veneration, since all honor essential component of icon directed towards the painted veneration (ikonopochitanie). On image was actually intended a daily basis the veneration of for the holy personage repre- holy images took the form of sented. In the words of St. Basil lighting candles and icon lamps the Great, "The homage paid to before the icons, purifying the image is transmitted to the them with incense, bowing original." 5 and prostrating before them, The custom of honoring and especially kissing them icons with covers made of pre- (lobzanie). The donation of an cious materials (gold and silver, oklad or other adornmept to a pearls, and precious stones) particular icon was considered was introduced to Russia as an act of special piety, one that early as the 11th century.6 brought favor to the donor and Initially, such costly embellish- honor to the holy image. In ments were reserved for only addition to commissioning an the most venerated icons, such oklad for a previously un- as those that performed mirac- adorned icon, a pious donor ulous cures or protected the could refurbish or add to an Russian people from their ene- icon's existing oklad in many mies. Thus, the icon of the ways. In the case of Rubiev's Vladimir Mother of God (so i con of the Old Testament called because of its role as pro- Trinity, for example, by the tector of the city of Vladimir) mid-18th century the icon's was covered with a gold and adornments included haloes jewel-encrusted oklad soon donated in the 16th century by after it was brought to Kiev Boris Godunov, a panagia (a from Constantinople in 1136. bishop's pendant with an After this initial cover was image of Christ or the Mother stolen by the Mongols in 1237, of God) given by Fedor three more were made for the Godunov, and crescent collars icon in the course of the next (tsatas) given by Tsar Mikhail four centuries, thereby empha- Romanov in 1626, all embell- sizing the central role that the ishing a gold cover given by the Vladimir Mother of God played monks of the Troitse Lavra in in the political and religious life 1754.8 Although including the of medieval Russia.7 ·donor's own image on either Judging from the mesh icon or oklad apparently was of tiny nail holes that scar the frowned upon (unli~e in the surface of many Russian religious art of Italy and icons from the "Golden Age" Byzantium), oblique personal (roughly the 13th to the early references to the donor were 16th centuries), a surprisingly permitted with the inclusion of high number of icons were at personal sa'ints on the icon's one time covered, either by borders (see fig. 6). thin metal strips stamped with The oklad also protected the ornamental patterns (bas'ma) holy image beneath in both a and nailed to the borders and literal and a symbolic sense. On ~ 8 AUTUMN a purely physi cal level, it 17th-century image of the h elped to m itigate the Kazan Mother of God (fig. 2).10 inevitable side effects of daily Here, the symmetrical scrolls of veneration, such as oils and foliate ornament on the bas'ma abrasion from the constant border carry over onto the kissing of the icon's surface, attached haloes, diadem, and and soot and grime from the collar, all of which are studded .candles, lamp oil and incense. with cabochon paste stones set Equally important, it helped to in toothed cages. The ground of define the boundaries between the icon (the svet, literally, the this world and the one beyond, "light") is also covered with serving as "an intermediary metal bas'ma strips, leaving free j between God or the Saints only the bust-length figures of 'i installed in their paradisiacal the Mother of God and the sojourn, and the faithful offer- Christ Child. Evidently, this f ing up his prayers to them."9 icon was covered as a single At its peak in the 16th and commission, and its rather 17th centuries, the art of the modest "off the shelf''. adorn- oklad-and of icon adornment ments remained undisturbed in the broadest sense-had over the intervening centuries. expanded to include the ele- In addition to these basic ' t' ments of an entire "wardrobe" adornments, the central figures ! Fig.

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