Project “The ‘Heavens’ of Zaonezhiye”
The project consists of several parts designed especially for everyone to have a chance to choose individually the easiest way to learn about the unique world of northern ‘heavens’:
- Virtual tour “The ‘Heavens’ of Zaonezhiye”.
- “The ‘Heavens’ of Zaonezhiye”, this is a CD that includes an electronic catalog of ‘heaven’ icons and amazingly beautiful and emotional slide-show in addition. This CD is of special interest to multimedia users.
- “The ‘Heavens’ of Zaonezhiye”, this is a publication meant especially for those willing to obtain the most complete and accurate information about ceiling-icons. This publication is available in the museum souvenir shops.
- “The ‘Heavens’ of Zaonezhiye”, this is an exhibition that gives an opportunity to see genuine icons from the museum collections and feel deeply these amazing works of art and become aware of their uniqueness. Information about this exhibition is available on the museum web-site.
One of the main project objectives was attracting attention to ceiling paintings in wooden churches of Karelia and explaining their meaning clearly not only for experts and all persons concerned, but for various strata of society as well. “The ‘Heavens’ of Zaonezhiye” can well become a visiting card of the “Kizhi” Museum and Republic of Karelia.
Project “The ‘Heavens’ of Zaonezhiye” was fulfilled in 2008 by the Kizhi Federal Museum of Architecture and Cultural History with program support of regional museums of the Arts with the assistance of the public corporation ‘Siverstal’. The project for the first time represents the most complete review of the unique ‘heaven’ icons found in northern churches, all of them from the Kizhi Museum collections.
The “Kizhi” Museum is ranked top in the north – west of Russia amongst the museums of traditional peasant culture in Karelia, and this is one of the first open-air museums of architecture and cultural history in Russia.
Alongside the wooden architectural monuments, the museum preserves a considerable collection of items that reveal the centuries-old culture and rich history of Karelia. The collection of Old-Russian paintings includes almost 1000 items and demonstrates the uniqueness of northern icon-painting tradition. The collection of ‘heaven’ icons, which is a part of the whole collection of icons, consists of 285 items. The icons feature non-traditional shapes: ‘medallions’, ‘facet’ icons, ‘pendentives’, and similar details of design: soffit cusps and transoms.
Analysis of the ‘heaven’ icons dating from the second half of the XVIII century in the Church of Dormition of Virgin Mary in the town of Kondopoga became a prominent addition to the research of the iconographic collection in the “Kizhi” Museum. The Church of Dormition of Virgin Mary is a monument of the Cultural Heritage under federal protection, the only active church in Karelia in which icon-panels of the ceiling are located in their original place.
The ‘heaven’ icons, i.e. ‘medallions’, ‘facet’ icons, ‘pendentives’ from the “Kizhi” Museum collections were included in the project programme. These are ‘heavens’ from 12 monuments of architecture. Most of them (9 out of 12) were created in the XVII – XIX centuries for chapels and churches of Zaonezhiye, a peninsular located in the north-west of Lake Onega.
Although this collection is a very prominent event in the culture of the North of Russia, it is not well-known. Certain icons were exhibited earlier abroad. Today northern ‘heavens’ attract more and more interest and, it is needed quite acutely to exhibit them. However, iconography is a rather difficult topic which is hard to understand for the majority of people. Standard practice of exhibiting icons in exhibition halls does not enable visitors to get an idea of ‘heaven’ icons in the northern churches in full. The answer to these problems could be modern information technologies in use. This is the reason why provision of multimedia was among the project priorities.
Project “The ‘Heavens’ of Zaonezhiye” was fulfilled in 2008 by the Kizhi Federal Museum of Architecture and Cultural History with program support of regional museums of the Arts with the assistance of the public corporation ‘Siverstal’.
“The ‘Heavens’ of Zaonezhiye” project design team:
Idea and conception:
- Titova O.,
- Frolova G.
Photographer:
- Semenenko O.
Image data preparation:
- Tsivakina M.,
- Schilov P.,
- Bezruchko S.
Design:
- Kazakova I.
Story is written by:
- Frolova G.,
- Stepanova L.,
- Vostryakova H.,
- Schilov P.,
- Kasyanov S.,
- Bodyonov D.
Copy reader:
- Radchenko T.
Internet and programming:
- Schilov P.,
- Bodyonov D.
In the design were used the images from the “Kizhi” Museum collections and museum digital recordings.
We express our gratitude for the photographs sent:
- Novgorod State Museum (photographs of Novgorod churches);
- Museum of Dionisy’s Frescoes (Cyril-Belozerski Museum of History, Architecture, Art and Culture Preserve) (photographs of the Cathedral of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary in St. Therapontus Monastery);
- Y. Permyakov (photographs of the Church of St. Prophet Elijah, Lake Vodlozero);
- S. Potechin (photographs of the Church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker in the village of Vegoruksa).
The following sources of information have been used for the project preparation:
- ‘Heaven’- paintings in wooden churches of the North of Russia’ by Koltsova T.M. (published in Archangelsk, 1993);
- articles from Wikipedia.ORG;
- other materials available in the Internet.
