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summary
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:
THE
ARCHANGEL CATHEDRAL
Has
executed
:
student of group
2ЭК-01
Zaporojez
O.V.
The
teacher
:
Razumovskaya
L.A.
Moscow, 1999
year.
At the very edge of Borovitsky Hill
there rises one of the finest edifices of the Moscow Kremlin. This is
the Archangel Cathedral. As legend goes, back in the 13th
century a wooden church stood in its place, one dedicated to the
Archangel Michael, the recognized patron of the Russian princes in
their military affairs. In 1333, a whitestone church was erected on
its site to become the main princely cathedral. In 1340, Grand Prince
of Moscow Ivan Kalita was buried here. From that time on, the
cathedral served as a necropolis.
In the late 15th
century, Moscow, now the capital of a powerful centralized state,
underwent another round of reconstruction and embellishment. In
1505-1508, a new Archangel Cathedral replaced the old one. Its
erection marked the completion of the ambitious construction project
in the late 15th-early
16th
century Moscow Kremlin. Built to the design of Alevisio Novy of
Italy, the Archangel Cathedral combines typical features of the
architecture of Venice of the Renaissance period, Byzantium and Early
Russia.
The Archangel Cathedral, a five-domed six-pillared
edifice, is built in brick, while its sockle and splendid decor are
laid in white stone. It was for the first time in Russia that
elements of the classical system were employed so extensively and
consistently in the design of the facades. The intricately shaped
cornices produce the effect of a two-storeyed structure, while
double-tiered pilasters topped with carved capitals articulate the
facades vertically, each articulation ending in a traditional Russian
zakomara enclosing a carved whorl typical of Venetian architecture.
The architect paid special attention to the western wall, accenting
with whitestone portals the main cathedral entrance which recedes
into a deep loggia. The portals were decorated with carved ornament
running over a blue painted ground. In 1980, the carved ornament was
cleaned and the original colour was restored.
The cathedral interior is austere and
simple. Six cruciform pillars divide the space into three naves
illuminated by two rows of slit-like windows and magnificent brass
chandeliers made by Moscow masters specially for the Archangel
Cathedral in the late 17th-early
18th
centuries. Built into the western wall are additional four-storey
premises, a chapel with wide windows looking out into the cathedral
interior.
The Archangel Cathedral had a
considerable impact on the further development of Russia
architecture. Many buildings were modelled on it in the 16th
and 17th
centuries.
The Cathedral was first decorated
with frescoes in 1564-1565. Some fragments of those painting have
survived in the loggia of the western portal and in the chancel. In
1652, Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich gave orders that “the Church of
the Archangel Michael be painted up anew and the old paintings be
scraped off”. The work was completed in 1666. Taking part in it
were nearly a hundred artists from Moscow, Yaroslavl, Kastroma and
other cities, supervised by the renowned masters Stepan Rezanets and
Simon Ushakov. For many years the frescoes of the Archangel
Cathedral remained obscured by the 18th-19th
century overpaint and a thick layer of dust and soot. It was only in
the 1950s that restorers happened to uncover the well-preserved 17th
century paintings. One can mow see that the vaults and upper tiers of
the southern and northern walls of the cathedral are traditionally
decorated with frescoes illustrating episodes from the Gospel. An
appreciable part of the frescoes feature miracles worked be the
Archangel Michael who helped people in their efforts to establish and
consolidate Christian faith and in their strivings towards goodness
and justice. The composition are majestic and monumental, while the
radiant festive colour gamut gives one a feeling of jubilation.
Particularly vivid are the battle scenes reminding one of the
nation’s long and hard struggle for the liberation and
unification of the Russian lands. A distinctive feature of the
Archangel Cathedral collection is a vast gallery of idealized images
of historical personalities comprising over sixty conventionalized
portraits of Russian princes. Painted on the pillars are the images
of Vladimir Kievsky (died in 1015), Andrei Bogolyubky (apr.
1111-1174), Alexander Nevsky (apr. 1220-1263) and other princes
included in the pantheon of Russian saints. The images of the princes
buried in the Cathedral are places directly over the tombstones.
The Cathedral’s four-row carved
wood iconostasis dates back 1680-1682. The icons of the upper three
rows and several icons of the bottom row were painted by Armoury
artists under the supervision of the “favoured”
icon-painter Fyodor Zubov. They are done in the ehiaroscuro manner
typical of the late 17th
century with certain elements of perspective arrangement. A vast
amount of restoration and research work carried out here in
1979-1980.
The oldest and most noteworthy
fresco in the Archangel Cathedral is “The Archangel Michael and
His Acts” painted in the late 14th
or early 15th
century. The unknown artist show the Archangel clad in armour with a
raised sword in his hand. The dynamic swing of the figure, the
powerful wings and the stern visage create the image of a warrior
prepared for battle. The ideas of eternal struggle between the good
and the evil, spiritual perfection and the defence of the native
land, so popular in Early Russian art, have found expression here.
For several centuries the Archangel
Cathedral was one of the most revered churches in Moscow. The princes
and tsars came here to play their respects to the ancestors before
starting out on military campaign. The Cathedral holds forty-six
tombs of members of the families of the Russian grand princes and
tsars, covering the period from the 14th
century to the first third of the 18th
century. Crucial stages in the history of the Russian state are
associated with the names of many of those entombed here, such as the
unification of the Russian lands under the aegis of Moscow undertaken
by Ivan Kalita in the 14th
century; the stubborn struggle against the Tartar-Mongols and the
victory won over them in the Dmitry Donskoy and Vladimir Khrabry; the
consolidation of the Russian state and the growth of its
international prestige in the 15th
and 16th
centuries under Ivan the Third and Ivan the Terrible, and also the
Russian people’s heroic liberation struggle in the 17th
century in which the name of troop commander Mikhail Skopin-Shuysky
figures prominently. The interments are under the cathedral floor. On
the surface are the burial monuments, white tombstones engraved with
fine ornament and memorial inscriptions. In the beginning of this
century they were enclosed in glazed metal casing.
Resting by the south-eastern pillar
under a carved white-stone canopy is Tsarevich Dmitry, Ivan the
Terrible’s son who perished in Uglich in 1591. After routing
Pseudo-Dmitry the First’s troops in 1606,the remains of
Tsarevich Dmitry were moved to the Archangel Cathedral. The tombstone
is surrounded with an openwork grating, a remarkable monument of the
casting art of the first third of the 17th
century. Preserved in the altar are the relics of the holy martyrs
Prince Michail of Chernigov and Boyar Fyodor who perished in the in
the Golden Horde in 1245.
In
1963-64, on the decision of a special commission, the graves of Ivan
the Terrible and his sons Ivan and Fyodor buried in the chancel
section of the Cathedral were opened, and anthropologist M.M.
Gerasimov created sculptural portraits of Tsar Ivan the Terrible and
Fyodor Ivanovich on the basis of the skeleton remains.
At
present the unique monument of Russian history and culture is a
museum where optimum conditions are provided for keeping the icons,
frescoes and diverse church attributes in a good state. The museum’s
research personnel are studying both the history of its construction
and the works of art preserved here. At the same time, the Archangel
Cathedral continues to be one of the most revered sanctuaries are
help regularly several times a year.
The
Archangel Cathedral will remain forever a living witness of the
history of the Kremlin, Moscow and the Russian state and immortal
evidence of the talent of its builders and artists who were able to
express in architectural forms and painted images the people’s
boundless love of their mother country.
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