Andrei Rublev’s ‘Holy Trinity’ icon is not subject to extradition from the Tretyakov Gallery on Trinity Day on June 4 “due to its complex and unstable condition”. This conclusion was drawn by the participants of the meeting held at the Tretyakov Gallery on May 23 transmits Interfax.
In this regard, the conditions for transferring the icon to the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) may be changed due to the need to prepare optimal storage conditions.
“At the moment the icon is in the restoration workshop undergoing urgent restoration of the monument,” the minutes of the meeting read.
Archpriest Leonid Kalinin, head of the Moscow Patriarchate’s expert council on art, architecture and church restoration, told Interfax that the issue of the sanctuary’s preservation should be at the forefront.
According to him, reliable conditions for storing the icon should be provided even in the Tretyakov Gallery, even in the Cathedral of the Trinity of Lavra. “It is not the place that is important here, but the quality of the capsule in which the icon will be placed,” he said, adding that today the dialogue between the church and the museum takes place “in good faith”, indicating that both parties understand the great responsibility of the “great monument of global significance”.
The clergyman allowed that, if Patriarch Kirill deems it necessary, on June 4 in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, one of Rublev’s Miraculous Trinity Lists will be exhibited for a while, and when the kiot is prepared, the original icon will take its place in the Trinity Lavra Cathedral.
The return of the “Trinity” of the Russian Orthodox Church
In July 2022, Rublev’s Holy Trinity icon was first transferred from the Tretyakov Gallery to the Trinity-Sergius Lavra in Sergiev Posad on the occasion of the 600th anniversary of the discovery of the relics of St. Sergius of Radonezh (celebrated on July 18). Conservators objected to transportation due to the high risk of damage to the exhibit.
In September 2022, art historian Ksenia Korobeynikova said that after sending the Trinity to Trinity-Sergius Lavra in Sergiev Posad, the restoration council found 61 “significant changes” to the icon, including five emergency sections.
On May 3, Moskovsky Komsomolets wrote that the Trinity had been removed from the display at the Tretyakov Gallery. The press service of the Russian media institution clarified that this was done for the next exam.
On May 15, the Moscow Patriarchate’s press service reported that the President of Russia, in response to “numerous requests from believers”, handed over to the Russian Orthodox Church the icon of the “Trinity”, which was kept in the Tretyakov Gallery. By order of Patriarch Kirill, the icon will be displayed ‘for public veneration’ in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow, and then returned to a ‘historic place’ – the Trinity Cathedral of the Holy Trinity Sergius Lavra, according to the report .
May 16 Patriarch said at a meeting of the Holy Synod, which appealed to the presidential administration with a request to exhibit the icon for two weeks in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior on the occasion of the feast of the Trinity. In response, Vladimir Putin took a “historic decision to return the icon” to the Russian Orthodox Church, the patriarch said. Press Secretary of Russian President Dmitry Peskov explain that this decision was due to the importance of the “Trinity” for a large number of believers.
Commenting on the order, Dmitry Peskov, the head of state’s press secretary, said the decision was made for “humanitarian reasons” and dictated by the significance of the relic to believers.
On the same day, the Institute of Art Studies announced that the Trinity may perish after being handed over to the Russian Orthodox Church. Honored Art Worker, head of the Department of Ancient Russian Art at the State Institute of Arts Lev Lifshits, in a conversation with Russian media, compared the icon to a seriously ill person who “cannot bear transportation” .
The following day, a source at the Tretyakov Gallery familiar with the situation told Russian media that as of May 16, the gallery had not received documents regulating the transfer of the icon to the Russian Orthodox Church. The editorial interlocutor noted that the museum does not know the grounds on which monuments could be removed from the public part of the Museum Fund of Russia and transferred to another owner.
The Russian media source added that the employees of the Tretyakov Gallery are united in their refusal to take the decision to transfer the Trinity to the Russian Orthodox Church. According to the interlocutor, during an extended meeting of the restoration council, with the participation of representatives of other museums and relevant institutions, their restorers, curators and leaders on May 15, its members also opposed the decision to issue the icon in the church.
Read the Latest Ukraine War News on The Eastern Herald.
