Paints of Old Believer Carved Icons of the Lower Pechora: Technical, Technological, Historical, and Archival Aspects of Study

Abstract

This article considers the technical, technological, and archival aspects of the study of Old Believer carved works of art (icons and crosses) of the Lower Pechora, whose origin is associated with the Velikopozhensky Monastery on the Pizhma River (currently, Ust-Tsilma District of the Komi Republic). The reason for the study is the hypothesis about the local origin of the ochre used for painting the icons, as there are rich deposits in the vicinity of the village of Skitskaya (on the site of the former Velikopozhensky Skete). According to written sources, they were developed until the first quarter of the twentieth century. The article describes the methods of studying the composition of ochre samples from deposits in the vicinity of the village of Skitskaya, the colours of The Cross of Golgotha, a Velikopozhensky carved icon from the collection of the National Gallery of the Komi Republic (Syktyvkar). Also, the authors speak about the palette of F. O. Anshukov, a hereditary Old Believer spoon maker from the village of Skitskaya, research results, and their correlation with data from written sources. The study demonstrates that the white and other pigments of The Cross of Golgotha icon contain white lead. The red pigment is minium. The blue pigment corresponds to the composition of Prussian blue. Natural pigments (caput mortuum, ochre) are not used. In the spoon maker’s palette, red, brown, and blue pigments are mixed with lead white with an admixture of quartz, barite, and gypsum. Minium was used as a red pigment. The composition of the blue pigment corresponds to Prussian blue. The white paint in the palette is zinc white. The green paint was replaced with zinc white with an arsenic-containing pigment (Scheele’s green?). The brown paint contains iron oxides, which suggests the natural origin of the pigment (caput mortuum). The results of the research testify that in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the inhabitants of the Velikopozhensky Skete and their descendants, masters of “Pyzhem painting” on wood, used mainly imported pigments of artificial origin.