PASSION TIER

The Passion tier was the sixth and the upper one in the iconostasis of the Ascension Cathedral. In the Church of the Twelve Apostles, there are fourteen icons representing events of the Holy Week that came from the Ascension Cathedral in 1929.

The Passion tier of the iconostasis depicts events of Maundy Thursday and Good Friday. The Passion tier became a separate cycle in the iconostasis due to the reform of the Russian Church according to the Greek model. In the Ascension Cathedral, it was arranged above the iconostasis at the foot of the Crucifix, creating yet another mystical eternal empathy of the Passions by the bystanders. The singling out of the icons representing events of the Holy Week from the Festive tier to a separate one is a vivid feature of Russian painting in the last quarter of the 17th century.

The engravings from the Piscator Bible served as an iconographic model for painting icons on events of the Holy Week, which the icon painters simplified slightly. Those engravings were widespread in various segments of Russian society at that time. One of the features peculiar to masters of the Armoury Chamber was accurate coping of the engravings. The fact that Russian icon painters appealed to the Bible’s engravings reflects careful attention paid to Western European culture in the second half of the 17th century.