Prokopii Chirin

Died in the mid-17th century. Russian painter of the Stroganov school.

In the 1620’s, Chirin was a favorite artist of the tsar and a master of the Oruzheinyi Prikaz (State Armory). His works are noted for a refined, yet somewhat dark and monochrome, palette and for delicacy and precision of line. Examples of his icons are Si. Nikita (early 17th century, Russian Museum, Leningrad), St. John the Warrior (early 17th century, Russian Museum, Leningrad), and The Tikhvin Virgin (late 16th-early 17th century, Tret’iakov gallery, Moscow).