PressIcons on the Move Treasures from the Bode-Museum, Berlin

13 May – 30 August 2026

Collage of three icon paintings, depiciting several scenes of Christ's life and passion.
Graphic: Jasmin Kress

The first temporary exhibition at the Icon Museum since its reopening honours the museum’s nearly 30-year collaboration with the Bode-Museum in Berlin (Sculpture Collection and Museum of Byzantine Art). Set amidst the permanent exhibition, it presents selected icons from the post-Byzantine era from the Bode-Museum’s collection, which have been on permanent loan to the Icon Museum in Frankfurt am Main since 1999. The exquisitely crafted, predominantly small-format icons of the Mother of God, the life and passion of Jesus Christ, and selected saints – which were intended for private worship – enter into dialogue with the permanently exhibited icons in the exhibition space, many of which originate from ecclesiastical contexts.

The icons in the Berlin collection, which has been assembled since 1821, date from the 15th to the 18th century and were produced in Russia, Greece, Italy, the Balkans, as well as Syria and Egypt. They have travelled particularly long and eventful journeys before finding their way into the Berlin collection and the Icon Museum in Frankfurt. The exhibition focuses on these journeys of the icons, which can also be traced visually on their backs, usually hidden from view. Thus, the icons bear witness to religious practice in the form of dedications as well as to the complex paths they took from their place of manufacture, their acquisition, and their movement between storage facilities and exhibition venues.

The exhibition offers the opportunity to see these particularly precious sacred artworks once more in Frankfurt before they embark on their next journey: A research project in Berlin aims to fill gaps in our knowledge of their history and uncover new information about their true age, hidden layers of paint, and unknown paths of their provenance, acquisition and ownership.

Curator: Konstanze Runge

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