The Volotovo Church or the Assumption Church in Volotovo (russian: Церковь Успения на Волотовом поле, Tserkov Uspeniya na Volotovom Pole) in the village of Volotovo in

Novgorodsky District Novgorodsky District (russian: Новгородский район) is an administrativeLaw #559-OZ and municipalLaw #400-OZ district (raion), one of the twenty-one in Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It is located in the southwest of the oblast and borde ...

Novgorod Oblast Novgorod Oblast (russian: Новгоро́дская о́бласть, ''Novgorodskaya oblast'') is a federal subject of Russia (an oblast). Its administrative center is the city of Veliky Novgorod. Some of the oldest Russian cities, including ...

, Russia was built in 1352. The church was notable mainly for the frescoes presumably made by a disciple of

Theophanes the Greek Theophanes the Greek (sometimes "Feofan Grek" from the russian: Феофан Грек, Greek language, Greek: Θεοφάνης; c. 1340 – c. 1410) was a Greeks, Byzantine Greek artist and one of the greatest icon painters of Grand Duchy of M ...

, one of the foremost Russian artists. The church was destroyed to the ground during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

and restored in the 2000s. Fragments of the frescoes were reconstructed. The Volotovo Church was designated an architectural monument of federal significance (#5310105000).

History

The church was built in 1352 by Moisey, the archbishop of Novgorod. The church survived the

Time of Troubles The Time of Troubles (russian: Смутное время, ), or Smuta (russian: Смута), was a period of political crisis during the Tsardom of Russia which began in 1598 with the death of Fyodor I (Fyodor Ivanovich, the last of the Rurik dy ...

, when many Novgorod churches were destroyed or damaged by the Swedes. During World War II, the church was basically at the front line between the Soviet and the German armies for three years and was destroyed. In 1955,

Leonid Krasnorechyev Leonid (russian: Леонид ; uk, Леонід ; be, Леанід, Ljeaníd ) is a Slavic version of the given name Leonidas. The French version is Leonide. People with the name include: *Leonid Andreyev (1871–1919), Russian playwright an ...

performed conservation of the monument. The church was standing as a ruin but was not decaying further. The frescoes were destroyed as well, but the debris were still on the site, and the restorators started work on recovering fresco fragments from the debris. In 2003, the building was reconstructed, The author of the reconstruction project was

Ninel Kuzmina Ninel is a given name. It is feminine in the former Soviet Union and masculine in Romania. In many Soviet cases, it is often considered to be derived from reversing the surname Lenin. It may refer to: *Ninel Aladova (born 1934), Belarusian archite ...

. In 2004, Krasnorechyev and Kuzmina were awarded the

State Prize of the Russian Federation The State Prize of the Russian Federation, officially translated in Russia as Russian Federation National Award, is a state honorary prize established in 1992 following the breakup of the Soviet Union. In 2004 the rules for selection of laureates ...

. The work on frescoes continued, and these were being mounted on the walls after the completion of the church. As of 2007, over a hundred fresco fragments were on restoration. The works were funded by the German company Wintershall Holding AG.

Frescoes

The chronicles mention that in 1363 a part of the church was painted, but presumably the frescoes in rest of the interior were created later, around 1380. The whole interior of the church was covered by frescoes, which was common for that time, but almost all fully painted churches were eventually destroyed or lost the original frescoes, and so far the only intact church with the fully painted interior is preserved in the

Ferapontov Monastery The Ferapontov convent (russian: Ферапонтов монастырь), in the Vologda region of Russia, is considered one of the purest examples of Russian medieval art, a reason given by UNESCO for its inscription on the World Heritage List ...

. The Volotovo frescoes were extensively studied, and black and white photographs of every detail, as well as coloured copies, survived and considerably simplified the restoration. In 1977, the frescoes became the subject of a book of Mikhail Alpatov. The name of the painter is not known. For a long time, the frescoes were ascribed to

, however, it was decided later that the 1380 frescoes did not belong to Theophanes and were essentially more dynamic that all the works of Theophanes. At the time of creation, this was a novel style in Russian art.

References

Notes

Sources

* * Dörthe Jakobs, Helmut F. Reichwald: ''Die Mariä-Entschlafens-Kirche (Uspenskij-Kirche) in Wolotowo bei Nowgorod. Dokumentation – Kriegszerstörung – Wiederaufbau und Restaurierung.'' In: ''Denkmalpflege in Baden-Württemberg'', 32 (2003), pp. 338–344
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{{Authority control Buildings and structures completed in 1352 14th-century Eastern Orthodox church buildings Churches in Novgorod Oblast Medieval Eastern Orthodox church buildings in Russia Russian Orthodox church buildings in Russia Cultural heritage monuments of federal significance in Novgorod Oblast