Design for the mural 'Acclamation of the Byzantine Emperor and Empress'

One of the commissions for members of the Greek community of Cairo for decorative panels and frescoes. Bilibin and his family had arrived in Egypt in March 1920 settling in Cairo in May of that year. In a letter of 1921 he wrote 'I am painting a large decorative panel, five and a half metres long by two and a half meters wide, which is to hang in the Byzantine-style room of a rich Greek. As you will see, the size is unusual for me, but very interesting. we have been working on it for eight months now ...'; see S. Golynets, Ivan Bilibin, (London, 1981), pp.195-197, and reproducing a photograph of the artist and assistants standing in front of the mural; and S.V. Golynets, Ivan Iakovlevich Bilibin, (Leningrad, 1970), p.323.