Museikon_1_2017

The Icon Exhibition “Kissed again and again” | 173
architectural context, and create closeness between icon
and visitor. In this way we wanted to avoid what often
happens when the museum institution approaches
religious phenomena, namely ‘museification’. 11 Instead we
asked: How could the sacred values inherent in the icons
be maintained in our setting, and the intrinsic religious
meaning of them be preserved – or even restored? 12 How
could the relational dimension be given a visual presentation?
If the Romanian icons were just hung on the walls
like paintings in an art museum, they would appear as a
number of rectangles, one little distinguishable from the
others. The design had to avoid that, in some way separating
each icon from the others. Furthermore the exhibition
design intended to restore some measure or reminder
of the original context, by and large wooden churches or
houses. Finally the design wanted to promote closeness to
each icon, since the idea of the exhibition was not simply
to display a number of icons, but to emphasize the relational
dimension by making it easier for a visitor to relate
to each icon separately. The risk was that designing for
an immediate relation to the icon might be viewed as
promoting a certain religious practice – and, indeed, it
turned out to work this way – for Orthodox believers.
To house the exhibition, three rooms were chosen, two
for the icons, and one for the photographs of church interiors
and exteriors. The icon exhibition proper was displayed
on some 165 sq. m. While the photographs were
displayed directly on three walls in the third room, it was
from the beginning the idea to break up the straight walls
of the two other rooms. This was done by a “carpet” of new
walls creating a variety of forms and receding small
“chapels”. (Fig. 8-9) In some ways, the inspiration was a
disciplined late Baroque. The new walls was made in 19
mm mdf plates, using the height of each plate, 244, but
breaking the walls up in a multitude of various planes,
between 25 and 122 cm wide, creating various levels,
some receding, some protruding, some places marked by
a concavely curved “apses”. An additional bonus was the
fact that the walls would block most of the windows, and
making it possible to avoid mounting any icon directly
on the outer walls of the rooms. (Fig. 10) In two instances
special features were introduced: a chapel for the miraculous
icon from the Dragomireşti monastery in the
county of Maramureş, and an iconostasis for the icons by
Iacov from Răşinari. Both were made as abstract stylized
features in accordance with the overall design concept.
The mdf walls were left unpainted, the brown of the
material giving associations to the timber walls of Transylvanian
churches and homes. As background for each
Fig. 9: A small section of the wall system mounted on the 18 th
of September 2015.
Fig. 10: In October 2015, the museum carpenter was busy
assembling some 250 pieces of 19 mm mdf plates in order to
produce the exhibition walls.
icon, the mdf was coloured blue in a dusty and transparent
colour which left the fine structure of the plate itself visible
underneath. (Fig. 11) No other colours were introduced
than light brown and dusty blue. The floor was oiled pine
wood, some 20 years old, and it worked well with the mdfwalls.
It was considered to render the painted 17 th century
drapery of the katholikon of Lupşa, (Fig. 12-13) but in the
end it was decided to ensure an abstract character of the
walls without copying any specific kind of decoration.
To serve the focus on the icons, and avoid a certain
‘schoolbook character’, the texts were made on transparent
acryl to make them fit in better, the background of the text
lines being the light brown of the mdf walls. There were
two kinds of texts, one which gave factual information,
and one which explained the relational aspect. The factual
texts were in dark red brown Tahoma font, and the other
in beige Papyrus font, size 60 pcts, in order not to appear
intrusive, but respect the contemplative atmosphere.
(Fig. 14) The letters were transferred onto the plate from
behind, so as to be protected by the plate itself. In order to
make it easier accessible, each text was centred, and each
text line stopped where you would usually pause.
The necessity to keep a low lux level supported the contemplative
mood which was enhanced by covering the
windows behind the walls, thus creating a black box like
interior. In a few places oil lamps were hung with electric
flickering candles (due to safety regulations), and other
larger such candles placed on low tables to act as references
to the original context as well as contributing to the
contemplative mood. Unfortunately, the photos cannot
render the actual light adequately, it was softer, more
refined and with more fluent transitions between lighted
and shadowy areas. In addition three videos were shown
continuously, all of them having the enhancement of the
contemplative or prayerful atmosphere as their objective.
At the entrance we had made a small film with a video
where an icon was shown in a dark nondescript room in
front of burning candles, persons then coming in an even
rhythm to bow down and kiss the icon. The persons were
dark, really only shadows, but the video at the entrance
rendered visually the very title of the exhibition.
In another part of the exhibition burning candles were
shown in a video, the flickering flames in the dark adding