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Title of the article: The reliquary of St. martyr Barbara and St. Mitrophan bishopof Voronezh from the church of St. John Warrior that is in Moscow on Yakimanka street.The problems of attribution and dating
Author(s): MAXIMOVA G. A.
Section: Theory and History of Art
Year: 2014
Issue: №1 (31)
Pages: 170-179
Index UDK: 74.01/.09+739.2+247.3
Index BBK: 85.1
Abstract: The article is devoted to the rare works of jewelry art - the silver reliquary, storing the finger of St. Barbara, the piece of the Robe of Lord and the particles of the holy relics of St. bishop Mitrofan from Voronezh. The reliquary was constructed from the reliquaries of different times of reliquaries and various decorative details, and it’s preserved in the Moscow Cathedral of St. Martyr John the Warrior as one of the most respected relics, but it’s completely unknown in the scientific world, there are no any studies and publications. At the present time we can get an idea about the reliquaries just on the few examples, as its were almost completely destroyed during the period of Bolshevik terror. Moreover the churches collections of antiquities are not always available for researchers, so the processes of formation, existence and migration of the sacred subjects, which are saved in the churches, remain unstudied and this is theirs fundamental difference from museum and private collections. Reliquaries, like special and unique works of arte sacra, need careful study and further research. According to the results of research, and due to the dismantling and the full-scale inspection of the ark, it was possible to discover and decrypt the hidden marks and inscriptions, to identify the manufacturing techniques and materials, to reveal on the basis of formal-stylistic analysis the dating features, style and time when the reliquary was created, and also to specify the stages of its forming, filling and existence, to reveal the names of masters-jewelers. And thus, it has allowed to attribute and to introduce into scientific use the precious work of jewelry art which was created both by famous and unknown artists at the late XVIII - early XIX centuries.
Keywords: ARTE SACRA, THE FORMATION HISTORY, THE TIME AND STYLE OF CREATION, MANUFACTURING TECHNICS OF RELIQUARY, JEWELRY ART, THE NAMES OF THE MASTERS-JEWELERS, SACRAL ART
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