Holy Mother Gracious Heaven | Quality lithograph print mounted on wood | Size 16 x 13 x 2 cm

The Holy Mother Gracious Heaven as an iconographic type is based on John the Theologian’s vision. According to legend, the Virgin Mary appeared before him in an oval-shaped sunny halo, mandorla. In such icons, the Holy Mother is portrayed whole-length with the infant Christ in her left arm and surrounded by oval-shaped radiance called “mandorla”. Russia’s first Gracious Heaven icon dates back to the 14th century. It was brought to Moscow by Sophia, the wife of Grand Prince Vasily I and the daughter of Vytautas, Grand Duke of Lithuania. The icon was kept in Smolensk, and in the 17th century royal icon painters made a precise replica. Since then, Holy Mother icons and variations of that iconographic style were often painted in monastery studios and peasant workshops.