In the private church of princesses and tsarinas (the authentic interior of the Assumption Church) a chamber exhibition "Magical Glass" opened today. The items on display from the collections of the museum-reserve "Alexandrovskaya Sloboda" introduce the development of the ancient traditions of enameling art, which originated in Russia as far back as the Middle Ages. These are mostly liturgical objects of the 17th–19th centuries, decorated using various enamel techniques.
This method was borrowed in the 12th century from Byzantium and became known as "finift", from the Greek word "fingitis" — "bright, shining stone." The multicolored palette used to decorate backgrounds imitated stones and mosaics, giving objects extraordinary beauty, radiance, and a mesmerizing sheen. Russian craftsmen quickly mastered the new material and technique, then went further, perfecting it and creating high-quality works of art. Orthodox items adorned with enamel represent an entire current in Russian culture and Christian art, whose traditions developed over the centuries.
Anastasia Lakiza, research associate of the museum-reserve "Alexandrovskaya Sloboda", explains: "Under Ivan the Terrible the technique of enamel on skan (openwork filigree woven from thin silver or gold threads) emerged. Decoration in this pattern remained a favored manner of embellishing reliquaries in the following centuries. A fine example of such work is a miniature crown for a 17th-century icon. 18th-century pectoral crosses are decorated with cast enamel. In the 19th century Old Believers widely adopted this technique to decorate copper icons and crosses. The leading centers of artistic casting production were the workshops of the Vyg Old Believer communities in Pomorye (the White Sea coast, settlements along the Vyg River) and the Moscow Governorate. The backgrounds of the items were filled with white and blue-turquoise shades that emphasized the relief of the images and imitated heavenly purity."
In the 18th century painted enamel emerged. Pictorial medallions bearing images of saints, evangelists, Jesus Christ, and the Mother of God were used to decorate church furnishings, liturgical books, and personal icons. The exhibition presents works by masters of the Spaso-Yakovlevsky Monastery from Rostov the Great. In the 19th and early 20th centuries this monastery was regarded as one of the main centers for painted enamel production both for the church and for believers' personal use. (It should be noted that the high skill of the artisans manifested not only in cult objects; it developed very quickly and became widely used in the manufacture of jewelry, accessories, boxes, etc.).
Many of the items on display entered the museum hall thanks to restoration. "Sloboda..." has a fairly large collection of enameled objects; consequently, restoring the entire collection to a presentable original state at once is very difficult — the work is carried out in stages and will continue. Nevertheless, both the level of craftsmanship and the enamel palette of the "magic glass" objects are impressive.
Report from the TV channel "Guberniya-33"
