Icons stolen 27 years ago, found in the private museum in Moscow

[Artem]

Icons from the distant past "Kommersant-Online", 19.12.2011 //20:00
     
from the exposure of the Moscow Museum of Russian Icons private confiscated ten planks holiday abroad rank XVII-XVIII centuries. The website of the Criminal Investigation reported that they were 27 years ago have been stolen from Velikoustyuzhskogo State Historical and Architectural Museum-Reserve. However, among the missing and stolen cultural objects in the database the Ministry of Culture, these icons do not appear. The details - TATIANA Markin and Maria SEMENDYAEVA.


Ten icons Feasts Range ("Meeting of Joachim and Anna," "Nativity of the Virgin," "Christmas" and others) were purchased for the Museum of the Moscow Private Russian icons, which is owned by businessman Mikhail Abramov, in 2007 in Switzerland, in Bern. At the same icons have been legally imported into Russia.


According to experts of the Museum of Icons, all ten planks belonged to a large iconostasis end of the XVII century, written in Kostroma lands. The origin of icons was defined as "undetermined", they were restored, seems to be abroad.


In 2008, the icons were presented together with other specimens of ancient painting on a large exhibition "Return property" in the Tretyakov Gallery and published in the catalog. At the beginning of 2011 a public (and free) Museum of Russian Icons has moved into a new permanent building on Goncharnaya street. Ten icons of the festival received the rank of a place in the permanent exhibition and have been published and described in detail in the catalog of the collection of the museum, they can be seen on the museum site.


Criminal investigator received information about the icons in October 2011 - someone saw them on the museum site. Together with the operatives came to the museum curator Velikoustyuzhskogo funds of the State Historical and Architectural Museum-Reserve, from which in 1984 had been stolen a large part of the iconostasis. The iconostasis was in the temple town of Dymkovo Demetrios, who at that time belonged to the museum-reserve. After inspecting the icons were removed and sent to the State Scientific-Research Institute for Restoration of art for the final examination.


«All these icons were checked at least twice on the basis of stolen property Rosokhrankultura (which has now taken over by the Ministry of Culture) - told" Kommersant "Director of the Museum of Russian Icons Nicholas Zadorozhnyi - for import into the country and before inclusion in the exhibition" Return property ". We are very attentive to the origin of antiquities - for example, when found in the West carved wooden cross that once stolen from a museum in Rostov, bought it and returned to the museum ».

«They were not with us in the search - confirmed" b "Victor Petrakov, Adviser to the Minister of Culture - apparently due to the fact that there were no pictures. We did not pass any information about what they sought. So while it's only a guess ».

Indeed, in the museum Velikoustyuzhskom no pictures or detailed descriptions stolen from them three decades ago, the icons. Apparently, the only way to prove that those icons or not those - a comparative analysis (soil composition and color, and manner of writing) of these icons, and those boards that were in the museum. Although in order to declare the stolen icons and delete them, the detectives had enough and that they recognized curator of the museum Velikoustyuzhskogo.