GUARDIAN ANGEL, done in egg tempera, natural earth pigments and 24K gold leaf, at St. Mary's Orthodox Cathedral school for iconography, NE Minneapolis, MN in October 2013.  The board is solid ash? imported from Russia measuring ca. 13" x 10" x 1 1/8" routed out and coated with marble dust gesso.  My instructor was Dimitri Andriev.  Est. time to write this icon is ca. 55 hours.  To get an idea of the price, call up your plumber or electrician and ask them how much a job lasting 55 hours will cost, then add ca. $200 for "parts" (gold, pigments, board, etc.) :-)   Then, call me or send me an email and we'll discuss terms - remember we have to allow for drying time so the total time from order to delivery is about six weeks.

This is a larger icon of The Annunciation, it measures ca. 20" x 16" x 1.25 " and is done on cherry plywood using acrylic paints.  Hopefully you can zoom in to see details.  The final lettering will be added when everything has dried some more, only the monograms of the Blessed Virgin Mary are in place right now.  Here the Archangel Gabriel greets Mary, who is holding her drop spindle in her left hand.  The red thread on it matches the canopy above her head, which symbolizes the veil in the temple.  I'm thinking I will integrate a silver "gilding" into the ray of light shining on Mary's head.  Everything is gilded in 24K gold leaf.

  So, another icon of the major liturgical events of the Incarnation of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, is now ready.  To purchase this icon, or to commission one similar to it, please contact me for details and prices.

This is a view of the icon corner in my home, front hall, first thing you see when you enter the house.  I moved the icon lamp for the photo so all the icons could be seen.  Normally it hangs right in front of the large icon of the Mt. Sinai icon of Jesus - which faces the front door.  Just below that icon is a new icon I've done of the Presentation In The Temple.  It's one of the few I've done using "silver" instead of gold for the background.  If I can get a good photo of that icon, I'll post it here.  Genuine silver quickly tarnishes, of course, so these days I use a non tarnishing metal instead.  I'll try and add some new icons I'm working on these days.

And, finally, here are a few close-ups of several of the icons ...

Of course, the angle of the iPhone has to be skewed in order to cut down the glare from the silver or gold, but at least you can see some of the details of the holy icons.  Enjoy!

Blessed Advent, and Merry Christmas!  This is my icon that I posted here last year!  I hope you can zoom in on this icon to see the details ... it's tricky to photograph gold (as I have complained before) because the reflections are not easily controlled ... so I apologize for the amateur photography.  

This icon is based on prototypes from the 13th and 14th centuries.  There are two common types of this icon - in this one Mary is facing and touching the baby Jesus.  In the other type, she is facing away from him and contemplating what will become of this child.  I prefer this one.  The midwives are in the lower right hand corner, Joseph and the nameless figure (The Tempter?) are in the lower left corner, the three wise men approach from the left side and the many shepherds and their sheep are startled by the three angels appearing in the gold sky.  The texture of the sky is deliberately different than the texture of the ray of light and the area of the sky it comes from as it shines on the new born Jesus.

The Incarnation of Jesus Christ, or The Nativity.   This is one of two traditional views in the Incarnation icon - one view (my favorite for theological reasons) is where Mary is facing and holding the infant Jesus; the other view is where Mary is turned away from Jesus who is sleeping in the manger.  I like all of the figures in the icon, the shepherds, the angels, the midwives, the visitors from the East bearing gifts, and Joseph and the "strange character" talking with him.  COME AND SEE THE ICONS at Bethlehem Lutheran Church, 4100 Lyndale Ave. South, Minneapolis, MN during Advent 2011.  The exhibit will open with an official announcement - expected to be just before the first Sunday in Advent, 27 November 2011.