While the term "icon" generally brings to mind tempera on wood panel paintings made during the Byzantine and post-Byzantine eras, artists very much continued (and continue!) to create icons in the Byzantine style long after the humanizing influence of the Renaissance. I know, because I am a practicing iconographer associated with the Prosopon School of Iconology (www.prosoponschool.org), though my day job is as a museum registrar (and a pestlist "lurker"),
Maureen McCormick | Chief Registrar Princeton University Art Museum Princeton, NJ 08544-1018 Phone: 609 258 3766 Email: [email protected] http://artmuseum.princeton.edu From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Hugh P. Glover Sent: Wednesday, June 09, 2010 8:00 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [pestlist] Some icons are old, others will be completed tomorrow, or does icon imply age? On Jun 9, 2010 7:08 PM, <[email protected]> wrote: Here we go again - IS IT ACTIVE OR INACTIVE? Icons are so old, they've often lost their appeal to wood destroying insects. In time the sugars turn to starchs. What you're usually seeing is old damage, frass, and galleries; especially if some of the finish or surface has been scraped off in the past. Powdered frass can drift out of the piece as it is moved about. I have yet to see actual activity in ancient icons. If an "old" icon has activity, it may be a forgery and of more recent vintage. Even old statuary covered in gesso often has old beetle galleries and packed frass beneath the gesso, which is exposed when some removes (or a tourist picks off) the gesso. Tom Parker -----Original Message----- From: Appelbaum & Himmelstein <[email protected]> To: pestl...@museu...
