The traditions touched not just the iconography, but also the choice of materials used to paint the icon on, the materials for the base, the techniques used for the preparation of the surface to be painted, the technology of colors preparation, the sequence of painting. The process was strenuous and long. By antic tradition the icon should be painted on a well-seasoned piece of wood. After a long and patient preparation, the wood was covered by a piece of canvas glued together, coated by several layers of plaster, sanded until the surface was smooth and silky, the image was sketched. The outline of the drawing was engraved with a metallic pinch and a red tint (called bolo) was spread out, then it was covered with a golden foil.
The Byzantine icons were painted using the antic technique of egg-tempera which consists of a mixture of natural (powder form) pigments with an emulsion made of egg base following the ancient receipts. Finally a special kind of transparent varnish would protect the painting. On the back of the wood there were information concerning the icon.

The icon, illustrating an evangelical episode, represented it beyond time and space, in all its aspects; in the same time presenting all the connected events and a transfigured vision of it. The characters represented in the icons, were painted in a nonrealistic way, but with a transfigured face, which revealed the fact that they belonged to a celestial world and they were only sheltered in an incorruptible body. The body outline didn't respect the anatomic canons. There was a certain sobriety of the characters' movements and gestures, represented in a fixed hieratic attitude and usually frontal in which the movement is almost absent. The icons are authentic sacred objects. In the oriental churches it is an iconostas, a wall that separates the sanctuary and the rest of the church, which is covered with icons, and represents an angle of conjunction between the life after death world (it's the sanctuary where the divine mysteries happen) and the church central part that holds the praying believers.
The icons are also used in homes for the praying rituals of the family, placed in the oriental corner of the room and honored with candles and incenses, they create a small domestic sanctuary called by the Russians" the beautiful and precious corner." Long ago the icons were appreciated not just for their religious function, but also for their beauty and for their artistic and esthetic importance.

The Transylvanian peasant icons on glass

As part of the Romanian folk art, the peasant painting on glass represents the highest form of esthetic manifestation with ancestral roots. Materialized in the form of the icon, the peasant painting on glass took its thematic from the biblical legends, adapting them to the typology of the specific ambience. Born as a decorative expression and not just an artistic phenomenon, the icon was also a courageous testimony of an oppressed past of misery.

The icons on glass propose an incursion in an archaic, rural world, populated by fantastic legends, a world where the religion, the afterlife, the fable interlace the every day life made of hard work, but also made of joy, color, humor and hope. They represent the discovery of a technique unknown in the West, by people of which too little was known about their spirituality, history, culture and roots.

Transylvanian icons are original works, entirely hand made using the same traditional techniques as the peasant painter.

They are unique works of art, where the effects of the colors on the glass are unrepeatable. They are painted using natural pigments mixed with linseed oil or even with a yolk emulsion, according to ancient receipts, with respect for traditions. The glass surface is treated with a yolk emulsion to assure the best adherence of the colors.
The drawing is executed on the back of the glass, reversed, with a bubbled ink in order to render it indelible. Within the contours of the design the painting is begun, starting with the lights and the shadows, with the details towards the background. Layer after layer, as the painting continues, larger surfaces are covered, until the entire piece is covered with colors, or sometimes with golden or silver foil.
The painting is protected by a sheet of paper glued on the back that also gives information about the original.