The icon is the main character of this book - the center of attraction for the actions of the authorities, museum workers, traders and buyers. One of the intriguing paradoxes of history is that the creators of the “non-market” Soviet economy made a significant contribution to the development of the world market for icon paintings. At the turn of the 1920s–1930s, through their efforts, a colossal export icon fund was collected, a grandiose advertising campaign was carried out - the first Soviet foreign icon exhibition, which presented to the world in all its splendor a new antique product - icons from the USSR, contacts were established with Western antique dealers and sales were organized collections of icons abroad. The search for currency for industrialization resulted in the development of world interest in the icon. The book tells about the history of museums and people (fate treated some of them favorably, others mercilessly), how the grandiose icon collection of the State Museum Fund was created and liquidated, who and how selected icons for export, how many icons were sold Russian museums, whether the sold icons were fakes, as well as what fate awaited the icons after the sale. The book is written on the basis of enormous material collected by the author in the archives of Russia, Europe and the USA. Elena Osokina – Doctor of Historical Sciences, professor, laureate of the Makariev Prize and the Enlightener Prize.