An icon once belonging to Nicholas II joins Paris' Louvre Museum collection
The 'Amis du Louvre' (‘Friends of the Louvre’) association has donated an Orthodox icon that once belonged to the last Russian emperor to the world's largest museum. Inlaid with precious stones and pearls, the triptych made of Karelian birch cost the association 2.2 million euros.
Created by Mikhail Perkhin for the Fabergé firm, the icon was presented to the imperial couple in 1895 by the aristocrats of St. Petersburg on the occasion of the birth of the monarch's eldest daughter, Grand Duchess Olga Nikolayevna. The fold depicts the four evangelists and St. Nicholas, St. Alexandra and St. Olga.
After the Bolsheviks came to power, the icon ended up in the collection of the A la Vieille Russie gallery, based first in Paris and then in New York. It was presented to the public only once, in 1977, in an exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.
In the Louvre, it will be part of the collection of the Department of Byzantine Art and Christianity in the East, which is scheduled to open in 2027.
