Editing Icon (section)

===Russia===
{{main|Russian icons|List of oldest Russian icons}}
{{see also|Novgorod school|Moscow school|Stroganov school}}

Russian icons are typically paintings on wood, often small, though some in churches and monasteries may be as large as a table top. Many religious homes in Russia have icons hanging on the wall in the {{transliteration|ru|krasny ugol}}—the "red" corner (see [[Icon corner]]). There is a rich history and elaborate [[religious symbolism]] associated with icons. In Russian churches, the [[nave]] is typically separated from the [[sanctuary]] by an ''[[iconostasis]]'', a wall of icons.

The use and making of icons entered [[Kievan Rus']] following its conversion to Orthodox Christianity from the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire in 988 AD. As a general rule, these icons strictly followed models and formulas hallowed by usage, some of which had originated in Constantinople. As time passed, the Russians—notably [[Andrei Rublev]] and [[Dionisius]]—widened the vocabulary of iconic types and styles far beyond anything found elsewhere. The personal, improvisatory and creative traditions of Western European religious art are largely lacking in Russia before the 17th century, when [[Simon Ushakov]]'s painting became strongly influenced by religious paintings and engravings from Protestant as well as Catholic Europe.

In the mid-17th century, changes in liturgy and practice instituted by [[Patriarch Nikon of Moscow]] resulted in a split in the [[Russian Orthodox Church]]. The traditionalists, the persecuted "Old Ritualists" or "[[Old Believers]]", continued the traditional stylization of icons, while the State Church modified its practice. From that time icons began to be painted not only in the traditional stylized and nonrealistic mode, but also in a mixture of Russian stylization and Western European realism, and in a Western European manner very much like that of Catholic religious art of the time. The [[Stroganov school]] and the icons from [[Nevyansk]] rank among the last important schools of Russian icon-painting.

<gallery widths="155px" heights="200px">
File:Descent into Hell by Dionisius and workshop (Ferapontov monastery).jpg|Muscovite Mannerism: ''[[Harrowing of Hell]]'', by [[Dionisius]] and his workshop.
File:rublev's saviour.jpg|[[Christ the Redeemer (icon)|Christ the Redeemer]] (1410s, by [[Andrei Rublev]])
</gallery>