Kizhi Museum
Federal State Budget Institution “Kizhi State Open Air Museum of History, Architecture and Ethnography”

The World Heritage Site «Kizhi Pogost» (Kizhi Pogost, С544), the object of Federal ownership, is in day-to-day management of the Kizhi Federal Museum of Architecture and Cultural History, which is subordinated to the Ministry of Culture of RF. All kinds of management of Kizhi Pogost are controlled by the Russian Federal Surveillance Agency for Compliance with the Law in Cultural Heritage Protection, and Russian branch of the Committee of the World Heritage UNESCO.

The site is managed according to the legislation in force and the recommendations of the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) for the preservation of cultural and natural heritage on the basis of strategic and current planning to be undertaken by the Kizhi Federal Museum of Architecture and Cultural History.

The «Risk reduction plan for the Kizhi Pogost architectural ensemble» has been developed in the museum. The plan and a tourism development programme will be an essential part of the complex plan for World Heritage Site Management which is under way now.It will be presented to the Committee of the World Heritage of UNESCO for approval and correction.

«Plan of measures for maintenance and protection of Kizhi Pogost monuments (Kizhi Island, the Republic of Karelia) and development of infrastructure of the Kizhi Open-Air Museum of Architecture and Cultural History» was approved by the order of the Government of the Russian Federation №1633-р on the 7 th of November in 2008. This order guarantees government financing of programmes for protection, restoration, and development of infrastructure of the site during 2008–2014.

On the 1st of July 2009, the Russian Federal Surveillance Agency for Compliance with the Law in Cultural Heritage Protection officially permitted (by license №05–4/141) to start works of the first stage of complex restoration of the Church of the Transfiguration. In 2009, a series of legislative instruments that assure orderliness in maintenance and protection of Cultural Heritage sites were approved in Russian Federation, and namely:

• «List of special Cultural Heritage Sites which must be protected exclusively by the Federal organization „Rosochrankultura“ („Росохранкультура“) «was approved by the decree of the Government of the Russian Federation as of 1.06.2009, №759; Kizhi Pogost monuments are included in that list;
• «The condition of the unified public register of Cultural Heritage Sites…» and «A standard of the registration certificate of a Cultural Heritage Site» were accepted by orders №37 and 38 of the Russian Federal Surveillance Agency for Compliance with the Law in Cultural Heritage Protection as of 27.02 2009;
• «Regulations for information and inscriptions made on the Cultural Heritage Sites…», by order of the Russian Federal Surveillance Agency for Compliance with the Law in Cultural Heritage Protection as of 07.08 2009, №142.

The above-mentioned documents will come into force since the 1st of January, 2010.

«Programme for maintenance and protection of Kizhi Pogost monuments and development of infrastructure in 2008–2014» was approved and secures state budgetary financing for the following needs:

• complex restoration of the Kizhi architectural ensemble — 334 mln.RUB, and 24.0633 mln.RUB of this amount was spent in 2009;
• complex protection of Kizhi Pogost monuments — 62,2 mln.RUB, and 3.23 mln.RUB of this amount were spent in 2009;
• preservation of Kizhi Pogost surroundings — 166,3 mln.RUB. ;
• documentation development for the town planning and site boundary — 4,0 mln.RUB, and 360 thousand RUB of this amount were spent in 2009.

The Kizhi Museum has 34 persons as full-time employees for preservation and restoration of the Kizhi Architectural Ensemble. Their duty is monitoring, preservation, maintenance as well as preparation and implementation of restoration works on Kizhi Pogost monuments. The museum spent 11,92 mln.RUB for the upkeep of these personnel in 2009.

The resolution of the Government of the Russian Federation № 315 as of 26.04.2008, namely «The approval of regulations for protected zones of Cultural Heritage sites (monuments of history and architecture) of the peoples of the Russian Federation» came into force, which made it possible to estimate the boundaries for the protected zones of Cultural Heritage sites of the Kizhi Museum (the decree of the Government of the Republic of Karelia № 280-II as of 07.12.2009). The boundaries and territory of protected zones were fixed as well as the regulations for land use and town planning within the protected zones assigned to the museum.

The Kizhi Museum contracted «LAD» design engineering firm to develop a project of protected (buffer) zones of Kizhi Pogost and presented this project for consideration and confirmation to the Russian Federal Surveillance Agency for Compliance with the Law in Cultural Heritage Protection. The project was developed in accordance with the effective legislation of the Russian Federation and the approved project of protected zones of Federal and Local Cultural Heritage site.

Besides, the museum has begun the procedure of granting the whole island of Kizhi a legislative status of a Heritage Site, which will also secure preservation of architectural and landscape integrity of the island.

Management of the Site security system is accomplished by the personnel of the Security of the Kizhi Museum, Subdivision of the General Board of Ministry for Civil Defense, Emergency Management, and Natural Disasters Response of the Republic of Karelia, and Subdivision of Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Karelia.

A basic version of the complex plan for «Decreasing emergency situations on Kizhi Pogost» was developed in the Kizhi Museum in 2009, and this version is based on the «Guidelines» issued by the Center of the World Heritage of UNESCO.It is presented to the Center of the World Heritage for consideration and confirmation as a part of the plan for Site Management.

The committee of the World Heritage of UNESCO organized a seminar in the city of Akko (Israel) in November, 2009, and the Kizhi Museum expressed the willingness to participate in the programme of the Center of the World Heritage of UNESCO as a trial model of a Cultural Heritage Site to develop a standard version of a plan for controlling risks and emergency situations.

«Sever Stroy Project», Company, Co Ltd developed a project of the outdoor fire protection system for Kizhi Pogost and other monuments of wooden architecture under the contract with the Kizhi Museum in 2009, and this project includes the following:

• water supply point with a pumping station (water delivery is 200 liters per second);
• office of a centralized TV monitoring system which integrates all of the monitoring and control systems (alarm, video surveillance, remote control of the fire protection system, emergency power supply and others);
• circular water supply with fire robots;
• systems of video surveillance, alarm and control of Pogost monuments and engineering systems.

The conception of a fire protection system described in the project had been previously approved in the All-Russia Research Institute of Fire Protection Technologies. Upon completion of the expert examination of this project, the Kizhi Museum plans to start the construction of the outdoor fire protection system in 2011.

In 2009, representatives of the organization responsible for maintenance and service performed special maintenance of the diesel generator that serves as a backup power supply of Kizhi Pogost. They also inspected the internal and external power supply of Kizhi Pogost as well as the control system of backup diesel generator.

The system of Pogost power supply is equipped with an overvoltage-protective device, which is effective against the overvoltage that happens during emergency situations and lightning discharges.

Some measurements were performed in the components of the system of power supply of Kizhi Pogost, such as insulation resistance, cutouts control, test for «Phase-Zero» circuit, lightning protection and earthing devices.

The works on electrification of all the monuments on the main exhibition sector of the museum are in progress now, and these works are planned to be completed in 2010.

In October 2009, the Karelian subdivision of the General Board of Ministry of the Russian Federation for Civil Defense, Emergency Management, and Natural Disasters Response performed training which purpose was firefighting in cooperation with respective museum services and non-departmental security agency of Petrozavodsk and Medvezhiegorsk district. Museum employees received training and instructions for emergency situations and use of fire fighting equipment during the year 2009.

Scaffolds and timber flooring around the Church of the Transfiguration were treated with fire retardant agent.

The Kizhi Museum in cooperation with experts from the Forest Research Institute of the Karelian Research Centre, Russian Academy of Sciences (Petrozavodsk) and «Spetsprojectrestavratsiya» Institute (Moscow) organized a continuous complex monitoring of Kizhi Pogost monuments which consists of:

• a variety of land-surveying works for revelation of possible deformations on the monument;
• regular inspection of all the structural components of the monument including idle spaces, which is done to detect reasons and progress of deformations;
• creating optimal temperature-humidity conditions on the basis of everyday measurements taken with special devices;
• sorting areas with the risk of biodeterioration according to the moisture content of wood;
• estimating the rate of ‘in situ’ fungi propagation (this is made according to the dynamics of the moisture content in wood on the risk areas and author’s method as well);
• detecting structural elements damaged by wood-boring beetles (by outward signs and by the means of acoustic device);
• creating optimal operating conditions for the monument by the means of regularly done airing, dust collection, conservation of the monument during winter time, cleaning snow and immediate repairs of leaks;
• regular inspection of contemporary lightning, alarm and fire protection systems, regular mowing of the surrounding area.

As a result, heights and turns of the buildings never changed again, new focus of fungi did not generate, and wood-boring beetles disappeared from the structural elements that had been previously treated with heat.

A three-dimensional electronic model of the monument was developed on the basis of previously made laser scanning of the Church of the Transfiguration, and this model shows its today attitude position.

The Kizhi Architectural Ensemble is the main tourist sight of the Kizhi Museum; the Church of the Intercession is open for visitors. Total amount of tourists in 2009 comprised 161 557 persons.

Research workers of the Kizhi Museum developed two projects in 2009: «The History of the Kizhi Architectural Ensemble» and «Interiors of Kizhi churches».

The exhibition of icons from Zaonezhye churches was represented in the Church of the Intercession; it included some icons from the Church of the Transfiguration of Our Savior on the island of Kizhi, and there was the exhibition dedicated to the history of Kizhi Parish. Two movable exhibitions started to work: «The wooden architecture of the island of Kizhi» and photo exhibition «Karelia in time perspective»; a special section of this exhibition is dedicated to the island of Kizhi and Kizhi Architectural Ensemble.

In 2009, the Kizhi Museum published five science and popular science books on the architectural ensemble of Kizhi Island.

The report «Architect A. V. Opolovnikov is the founder of the Kizhi Museum» was presented on the conference «The Founders of Museums of History» which took place in the Moscow State Historical Museum.

The system of complex preventive maintenance of Kizhi Pogost monuments was discussed during the international conference COST IE0601 «Wooden Cultural Heritage: the estimation of deteriorations and management of changes» (Hamburg, Germany, October 7–10, 2009).

The development and compilation of a complex information system to keep the records of all World Heritage Sites and museum collections is in progress.

World community and Russian public get news about restoration of the unique monument of architecture from numerous publications of press service of the Kizhi Museum, Republic of Karelia, Russian and international mass media.

The course of restoration works done in this year was described in six press releases which were sent to more than 500 addresses. The materials focused on the course of restoration works were published in republic (six publications) and Russian (five publications) printed matters.

Detailed information on restoration of the Church of the Transfiguration was prepared especially for Russian magazines «Architecture, Construction, and Design, «„Russian History“ and newspaper «Moskovski Komsomolets. «Monthly paper „Kizhi“ (published since 2004) covers the course of restoration works on the Church of the Transfiguration systematically. In 2009, they published 12 materials on the issue of restoration of museum monument No1.Besides that, a special four-lane issue „Our Heritage“ was published in April.

The restoration of the Church of the Transfiguration during the season is covered by electronic mass media. There were three broadcasts on this topic on TV channels of Russia and five on Karelian TV channels.

Journalists abroad show deep interest in restoration of the Church of the Transfiguration. The Museum press service prepared some materials on the request of the Austrian magazine «Zuschnitt».

The project on shooting a series of films about restoration of the Church of the Transfiguration «Kizhi. Living Chronicle of the Transfiguration» is in progress. The Kizhi Museum contracted the production of the third film in 2009.

The official web site of the Kizhi Museum is active; it is constantly updated and supplemented with new information. More than 410 000 users visited the web site in 2009. 62 000 users visited site sections dedicated to architecture and restoration. «Report on the complex restoration of the Church of the Transfiguration of the Kizhi Ensemble as of the 31st of December, 2008 «was presented on the web site this year as well as UNESCO documentation: the decisions of the Committee of the World Heritage of UNESCO, Convention of Protection of the World Heritage, guidelines on the Convention execution. Site section „Restoration News“ were supplemented with 19 new issues.

Info materials describing the restoration of the Church of the Transfiguration were distributed during the exhibition of Tourism «MATKA» (Helsinki, Finland, 2009), the All-Russia museum festival «Intermuseum-2009» (Moscow, May 2009), presentation of the Republic of Karelia in Moscow (August 2009) and the museum center for presentations during this year.

The museum has produced 20 kinds of souvenirs and 41 kind of published goods with the image of the Architectural Ensemble of Kizhi Pogost.

The Kizhi Museum experience in development of the Plan for decreasing emergency situations on Kizhi Pogost was discussed on The All-Russia scientific seminar «Problems of education on the World Heritage Sites», which took place 12–14 July 2009 on the island of Kizhi.It collected employees of Russian museums and representatives of institutes of higher education located within the boundaries of eight World Heritage Sites of UNESCO in Russia.

According to the program of preservation and development of historical landscape, employees of the Kizhi Museum have been cutting trees and bushes on the island of Kizhi every year during last five years. This work includes cleaning of the coastal line, meadows, and pass-throughs to the monuments of architecture from dead trees and verdure. In 2009, the coastal line was cleaned from the house of Yakovlev to the village of Yamka; meadows in the central and northern parts of the island and area to the east of the village of Vasilyevo were cleaned too; pass-throughs from the cemetery to the village of Vasilyevo and Kizhi Pogost were made. Felling area comprised 16, 57 hectares in 2009.

The environmental protection of Kizhi Island from the spillage of oil products has been improved: floating booms, i. e. sorbent agents for collecting oil products from water and soil have been purchased. The Department for operating and maintenance of waterside structures of the Kizhi museum performed testing of floating booms and is ready to act immediately in case of emergency situation.

The construction of loading terminal started on the northern point of Kizhi Island, and it is planned to be completed in 2010.

The project of administration center is under the expert examination at the moment. The construction and upgrade of electrical network for the main exhibition is in progress. The project of reconstruction of the electric network up to the island of Kizhi has been developed, and its implementation is planned for 2010.