The Image of the Church in the Early 20th Century Russia (the Case of the Monumental Church Decorations Designed by A.Shchusev)

Since the Middle Ages, the appearance of Russian church has followed the leading architectural styles and ideas of epochs. At the turn of the 20th century, there was an upsurge of religiosity and the outstanding amount of new churches were built. Although many studies have focused on the architecture of those churches, very few researchers have explored their monumental decorations. The present paper intends to fill this gap with the investigation, devoted to the development of the church decorations, designed by the famous Russian architect Alexey Shchusev. The study addresses both the creation process and the social perception of the decorations. Using a substantial amount of the textual and graphic sources, the proposed research offers a new vision of the relations between the participants of the creation process, including lay or clerical sponsors, architect, artists, and the representatives of the intellectual elite. Such findings could have important implications for our understanding of some aspects in the cultural history of the late Imperial Russia.