An Encounter of Generations. A Few Words About the Book “Russian Icons from the Mid-17th to the Early 20th Centuries: The Collection of Oleg Kushnirskiy”

We are glad to share with you a review of our book by Sergei Pavlovich Brun, head of the excursion and methodological department of the Moscow Kremlin Museums and curator of the exhibition “The Heavenly Host. Image and Veneration” (March 17 — August 20, 2023).

An Encounter of Generations. A Few Words About the Book “Russian Icons from the Mid-17th to the Early 20th Centuries: The Collection of Oleg Kushnirskiy”

This is marked by a joyous event for any person who is partial to Russian iconography: the publication of the book Russian Icons from the Mid-17th to the Early 20th Centuries: The Collection of Oleg Kushnirskiy. The New York-based collector Oleg Kushnirskiy is best known as a master of reproduction photography and one of the best photographers of the final “golden era” of Russian icon collecting (1970s — 1980s). The book publishes 46 icons that have formed into a collection, which Oleg Kushnirskiy has been collecting since the early 1990s when he first arrived in New York. The earliest of the published icons dates back to the second half of the 17th century, the majority — to various periods of the 19th century, and some — to the early of the 20th. I will allow myself to be extremely unoriginal by repeating the maxim: the collection, if it is truly the fruit of a single collector’s efforts (and not the efforts of a generously sponsored “creative team”) inevitably becomes a reflection of the collector’s soul. A reflection of the collector’s passion. Or the collector’s understanding. In this regard, the collection of Oleg Kushnirskiy is a manifestation of a single collector’s sincere commitment to the intricate, largely forgotten masterpieces, rejected for the sake of ancient monuments, regularly sold as souvenirs “à la Russe” to the art of the icon painters of Mstyora and Palekh, Vetka, a galaxy of Old Believer workshops that preserved traditions in the period when icon painting was on the verge of its “evolutionary death”, being completely replaced in the minds of the ruling Synodal Church by painting on religious themes. Love for the miniature style of painting, love for the abundance of the finest details, for endless border scenes. These icons truly illustrate the words of Pope Gregory I the Great about the icon as “the Bible for the illiterate” (and, allow me to add, for the literate too). Love for the icon, intended primarily for domestic prayer and contemplation; love for the icon, which, from the ruined home prayer rooms, from the “red corners” of Russian houses, from a plethora of family iconostases of the Russian Empire, found its way, either into the suitcases and boxes, going overseas, or which was doomed en masse to be destroyed by the fires of Soviet “utilization”, or by gradual decay, rotting in the faithless and dying Russian villages. The collection published in this book is the fruit of years of a collector’s effort. For many years, Oleg Kushnirskiy searched for these icons in antique shops and in the markets of New York, in collections scattered throughout the United States.

A real breakthrough in the “reclamation” of late Russian iconography was the purchase — at the initiative of M. Y. Abramov, N. V. Zadorozhny, and I. A. Shalina — of a collection of masterpieces of Mstyora and Palekh iconographers, stored in Beirut and returned to Russia in 2011, finding a new home in the Moscow Museum of Russian Icons. Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, Oleg Kushnirskiy spent many years bringing together his own collection. In this regard, it is fateful that the first presentation of the book Russian Icons from the Mid-17th to the Early 20th Centuries: The Collection of Oleg Kushnirskiy took place in the Museum of Russian Icons, near the masterpieces of Palekh and Mstyora returned to Russia (and to the world of museums and catalogs) by M. Y. Abramov, I. A. Shalina, and N. V. Zadorozhny.

Sergei Brun at the book launch of Oleg Kushnirskiy’s icon collection catalog (Museum of Russian Icons, Moscow)

A separate feature of this book was the bringing together of two academics, very different in meaning and spirit, but brilliant (and dear to the author of this small essay) each in their own way: Anna Ivannikova and Alek D. Epstein. Alek Davidovich Epstein, an Israeli-Russian sociologist and art critic, author of several dozen books, is one of the most painstaking (I’ll dare to use the word “meticulous”) and principled researchers of our time, a man truly in love with art. Few people know and understand the very phenomenon of 20th-century art collecting the way he does. Anna Ivannikova, still a young scientist, had a rare opportunity to gain a well-deserved reputation as one of the leading experts in the field of Russian 19th-early 20th-century Russian iconography. A.P. Ivannikova has already earned her place in the history of Russian art: for more than 10 years, she has been a key member of the Museum of Russian Icons in Moscow, coordinating its scientific and exhibition work of this unique and trailblazing private museum, before moving on to the State Hermitage. This year, connoisseurs of the Russian icon (including the author of the essay) are looking forward to the exhibition The Artistic Heritage of the Old Believers of Pomorye in the State Hermitage Collection, curated by her, which is due to open on October 18th. The texts of these two outstanding scholars, who brought together Jerusalem and St. Petersburg in one book, lend undeniable scientific and, I will not be afraid of this word, literary value to this catalog. All the more noteworthy is the fact that the book is coming out in 2023, at a time when it is becoming less and less common in the West to talk about Russian art or to generally speak of Russia in a positive way. And at a time when bridges are collapsing in the literal and figurative sense, the publication of the collection of Oleg Kushnirskiy is intended to emphasize the unwaning beauty of the Russian icon, the fragility, and at the same time — the eternity of art that can bring people together.

The Resurrection — The Harrowing of Hades, with twelve Church Feasts. Icon: last quarter — end of the XVIIIth century. The Russian North (Vologda region). Oklad cover: last quarter of the XIXth century. St. Petersburg. The Collection of Oleg Kushnirskiy

In one of the parts of the Pirates of the Caribbean, there is a brief but very meaningful dialogue between the two leading characters. Captain Barbosa (Geoffrey Rush) tells Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp): “The world has gotten smaller.” To which Captain Jack Sparrow sadly replies: “The world is the same. It’s just there’s less in it.” And in this phrase, there is a very deep sense of genuine nostalgia, or what is called in Portugal “saudade”; the bright and piercing longing for the departed, for those who have departed into the past or across the sea. Our world – for all the joy and usefulness of discoveries – does lose the aura of mystery, and every year there is less and less opportunity for genuine discovery. And the same “saudade” begins to manifest more clearly when you realize that you are lucky to catch a precious glimpse of the passing era, that it passes by, striking you and all those who remained on the shore watching with the brightness of their sails and the uniqueness of their accomplishments. For any person involved or not indifferent to the history of Russian art, Russian iconography, this is certainly true. All the more significant are the connoisseurs and collectors, who a few decades ago were the first to collect and study such fragile Russian icons, smoldering in devastated villages or leaving in suitcases for the world market. We are indeed very lucky to become witnesses of the work, to talk to, and sometimes — even to become the co-workers of the last generation of outstanding collectors of the Russian icon. And in this regard, the book Russian Icons from the Mid-17th to the Early 20th Centuries: The Collection of Oleg Kushnirskiy serves as the meeting point of different eras, a bridge where it is possible to marvel at the artistry of the Mstyora and Palekh iconographers, who have gone forever, to encounter the legacy of the outgoing generation of collectors who discovered and saved the Russian icon, to delve into the works of a new generation of Russian academics. It is another gift to everyone who appreciates the beauty of the Russian icon and the work of all those who created, preserved, searched for, and studied it for generations. 

S. P. Brun