Icons for St. Anthony's Dome, Part 03

I'm back at St. Anthony today, Thursday, to see the progress our 3 Russian iconographers are making in decorating the church's tower and dome.

It's not a very devotional environment to enter right now, with lots of steel bars, buckets of brushes, paint-laden tables and plastic sheeting. As you can see from this angle, the round images are coming right along.

These are going to be installed on the wall of the vertical portion leading up to the dome. They are Solomon (left), Daniel (center) and King David (right).

Elijah and Moses are down on the floor at the moment. These 5 life-size busts have been painted in 2 days.

 I climbed to the top to take a look at the process and progress in the tower. On each window sill I saw supporting materials for the ongoing work: scale drawings of the final product, sunglasses, containers of paint, pencils, etc.

You can see a long way from here but it's also very hot, even with the fan blowing.

Floral decoration has been penciled in, between the windows and the framing of dark red.

Here's the central image in the dome, known as the Pantocrator:

"In Orthodox Christian iconography, Christ Pantocrator refers to a specific depiction of Christ. 

Pantocrator or Pantokrator (Greek: Παντοκράτωρ) is used in this context."

At home I am working on a version of the Pantocrator, or as it is also known, the "Sinai Christ" (from an icon located on Mt. Sinai, at St. Catherine's Monastery). I still have a long way to go ...

PS - Here is a closer view of the Virgin Orans, painted behind the altar at St. Anthony (and indeed most Orthodox churches):

"Virgin Orans, or Oranta (Ukrainian: Оранта) is an Orthodox Christian depiction of the Virgin Mary in prayer with extended arms. The first icon is in the Saint Sophia Cathedral in Kiev, Ukraine, in the vault of the chancel. The icon was created there during the reign of Yaroslav I the Wise, in the 12th century."