The Museum of Russian Icons is the first in Moscow and the second in Russia’s private museum of Russian icons. It was created on the initiative of an entrepreneur and philanthropist, the owner of the Plaza Development company Mikhail Abramov (1963-2019).
Opened in May 2006 in Moscow.
Currently, the museum is in the center of Moscow on Goncharnaya Street. The collection has about 5,000 items.
The museum exists only at the expense of its founder and does not conduct any commercial activities. Visits, excursions, as well as lectures and concerts are exclusively free of charge.
Since its opening, the Museum of Russian Icons has earned broad public and professional recognition. For example, the Museum of Russian Icons became the first Russian private collection accepted into the International Council of Museums at UNESCO (ICOM).
The collection includes about 5,000 exhibits, of which almost 1,000 are icons (as of 2022).
The basis of the collection is the monuments of Russian icon paintings of the XIV-XX centuries (up to and including the beginning of the XX century). In addition to enough ancient works that were once created in the largest centers of Rus’ (Moscow, Novgorod, Rostov, Tver, Ryazan, in the Volga region – Yaroslavl, Kostroma, Nizhny Novgorod, in the Russian North), a special pride is a whole complex of ancient Pskov icons of the XV-XVI centuries.
Icons with an architectural background (XVII-XX centuries) represent a separate direction in the formation of the museum collection.
In addition to the monuments of Russian icon painting, handwritten books, and objects of arts and crafts (sewing, carving), the collection of the Museum of Russian Icons includes the following sections:
- Late Antique and Early Christian Monuments.
- Collection of Byzantine applied art (V-XIV centuries).
- Collection of Greek post-Byzantine iconography (XV-XVIII centuries), including a whole carved iconostasis of the turn of the XVII-XVIII centuries. With a complex of 19 icons.
- The largest in Russia and one of the largest collections of Ethiopian Christian art in the world, which includes more than 2,500 monuments (processional, pectoral and priestly crosses, icons, handwritten books and scrolls, liturgical utensils, vestments, weapons, musical instruments).
Working days:
Saturday – Tuesday: from 11:00 to 19:00
Thursday, Friday: from 13:00 to 21:00
Wednesday – day off
The entrance is free.
Address: Goncharnaya street, 3, building 1. Moscow. Metro: Taganskaya (ring), Taganskaya (radial), Marksistskaya.
