Clinton museum celebrates acquisition of massive icon.

Byline: Karen Nugent

CLINTON - When Sir Richard Temple was a young man, he attended a Russian Orthodox baptism in London. At one point in the ceremony, the priest, holding the baby, turned and walked up to the altar, showing the child an elaborate display of icons.

"The universe and the whole story of Christianity was laid out in this schematic format," Sir Richard told a standing-room-only crowd last night at the Museum of Russian Icons.

A few years later, in 1959 -at age 22 - he opened his own icon gallery in London - out of a love and enthusiasm for the painted religious panels that has lasted 50 years.

Sound familiar?

Gordon B. Lankton, the Clinton museum's founder, became fascinated with icons in the 1980s and 1990s during business trips to the Soviet Union. He eventually amassed a collection so large, he was able to open his own museum in 2006, across the street from Nypro, the injection molding company he co-founded in the 1960s.

Neither man is Russian, or belonged to the Orthodox Church. Sir Richard acquired his family's British baronage in 2007; Mr. Lankton is a Protestant from the Midwest.

Nevertheless, both men were at Mr. Lankton's museum last night for a lecture celebrating the recent acquisition of a large icon that was the centerpiece of a 1580 iconostasis - or wall of icons much like what Sir Richard saw in that London church.

The "Christ in Majesty" icon, which was on prominent display at the entrance to the lecture hall at the Union Street museum, was bought by Mr. Lankton from Sir Richard, an international art dealer and icon expert who has acquired icons for the British Museum and Louvre, among others. The icon, measuring 49 inches wide by 65 inches high, was at his Temple Gallery in London for eight years.

"As we say in England, `I got it from a bloke,'" Sir Richard responded when asked where he got it. "No, really, it was on the international art market. It is theoretically possible to trace it back to the original church, and it must have been a huge church - not some small village church."

Although it is now illegal to take icons out of Russia, during the Communist and Soviet eras - a total of about 70 years - the atheist government did not want them around. Sir Richard described a 1933 photograph of a bonfire comprising a pile of icons, drawing moans and groans from the audience, which contained several Orthodox priests and nuns.

"Josef Stalin would go to the Hermitage museum (in St. Petersburg) late at night with Andrew Mellon and others, and sell them anything," Sir Richard said.

Calling himself a "seeker of truth," he spoke on the history of icons, starting with comparisons to Greek and Roman statues and early Christian paintings. Many early icons, he said, were destroyed in the 8th century because they were considered idolatry.

He also pointed out the geometric aspects of icons, particularly of the "Christ in Majesty," which has circles superimposed in squares, and a rhombus.

"It is a very elaborate work. A piece of geometry with religious and philosophical meaning," Sir Richard said.

But, he said, icons, an esoteric discipline, do not fit into the academic study of art.

Because the images are considered sacred - the spirits of the figures are thought to be present in the paintings - real models were not used, and the paintings are never naturalistic. Religious images such as those used by Renaissance painters would be considered blasphemous, he said.

"I believe they (academics) fear their spirituality. There is usually no data, no artists' names, no dates, and no history of ownership," Sir Richard said.

"It's practically the only field of ancient art where people buy from the heart."

ART: PHOTOS

PHOTOG: RICH DUGAS

CUTLINE: (1) Sir Richard Temple, founder of the Temple Gallery of London, speaks about rare icons during a slide show last night at the Museum of Russian Icons. (2) The "Christ in Majesty" icon, which Gordon Lankton bought from the Temple Gallery