Painting Icons for Others to Use

Teresa Harrison, an icon class teacher, received a commission last year to create a series of 10 large icons for a church. Several people were invited by Teresa to assist with elements of this commission. I'd like to go through the steps in creating one icon, over a period of about 6 months. The icon is entitled The Resurrection, and shows Jesus breaking down the gates of Hades and freeing Adam, Eve and other saints and prophets.

So you won't have to wait until the end to see what it looks like, here is the finished product.

The general flow is the same as the previous blog post on painting a small icon for personal devotional use.  As you read through this, you can click on any photo to enlarge it.

PREPARATION

The icon boards were cut to shape, sanded many times, then coated with gesso. 

Then a layer of linen cloth was applied, then more gesso, and finally wet and dry sanding.

The boards may not seem too interesting to photograph, but here they are.
Pure white on black counter.

We transferred the image outlines onto the large board with the aid of carbon paper.
My glasses show the scale of this icon. It's approx 20 x 28 inches.
Next we started to fill in blocks of colors:

Carbon Black, Storm Blue, Iron Red Oxide, etc.

I worked on this icon for a number of days. This sequence shows my progress.

Here you can see some of the other icons that are also underway. 

Now I am starting to apply the lighter colors on the robes of Adam and Jesus. 

Notice that the coffins from which Adam and Eve emerge are mostly complete. 

Now the first layers of Jesus' garment are finished.

At some points, Barb stepped in and worked when I could not. 

Here she is painting the foreground and later she did the mountains.

This sharing of labor makes the project go more smoothly.

Here's what our Jo Sonja's paint looks like. It dries with a matte finish.

This is how it looks when we put the first blob on the pallette and begin to mix.
We then thin the paint with water - it is very translucent so takes many coats to cover the gesso.

You can see the blue arching around Jesus.

Red goes where the halos will eventually be gilded.

Red goes onto the background and edges. This is not going to be seen when the icon is finished.
The bright color shines through any gaps in the gold so we can see where any touch-up is needed.

I painted all the bolts and locks which Jesus broke when conquering Hades.

The foreground is getting detailed and shaded.

The coffins are detailed. The mountains have texture and definition. 

Some of the robes are finished. The faces have been started.

The mandorla has been painted over to improve the blues and whites.

I missed photographing the final painting which was done by Teresa.

The Resurrection was then gilded and labeled.

This is a another icon in the series but it shows you the gilding step.

Here's how it finally came out.

And here is a duplicate copy on canvas shown together with the Ascension Icon copy.

It's customary to have the icon blessed by a priest.

The iconographers should pray with the icon before sending it on to its custodians.

So we did these things.

Here we are in the garden after the blessing.

Icons are painted to glorify Jesus, the Word made Flesh.