"Saved Frescoes of the Christ Transfiguration Cathedral of Mirozhsky Monastery" film considering during the Presidential Library cinema club

The Presidential Library hosted a meeting of the cinema club took place, where the first part of the documentary "Saved Frescos of the Christ Transfiguration Cathedral of Mirozhsky Monastery" was presented. The authors of the fim are Oleg Fedorov, the head of the excursion department of the Pskov State Museum-Reserve, and Taisiya Kruglova, the main keeper of the frescoes of the Christ Transfiguration Cathedral. The film's director is a member of the Presidential Library Tatyana Dyakonova.

The tape lasting about an hour tells about the Christ Transfiguration Cathedral of Mirozhsky Monastery, which is the most ancient monument of Christian culture in the territory of Pskov. The cathedral was erected and decorated with frescos at the turn of 1130-1140-ies at the initiative of the Novgorod archbishop Nifont. One of Nifont's main goals was the Christian enlightenment of North-Western Russia. The cathedral paintings created by Byzantine masters have a unique iconographic composition, the highest artistic level and rare preservation. More than 80% of the painting of the XII century was preserved on the walls. All this makes the cathedral of Mirozhsky Monastery one of the most outstanding and most important monuments of world culture in the history of Orthodoxy.

According to Valentin Sidorin, acting Director General of the Presidential Library, this event opens a new cycle dedicated to the Pskov land. He also noted that the Presidential Library created more than ten films about the antiquities of Veliky Novgorod, the decoding of its temple graffiti and three films about Staraya Ladoga, the first capital of Ancient Rus’. 

A new film of the Presidential Library "Saved Frescoes of the Christ Transfiguration Cathedral of Mirozhsky Monastery" reveals the theme of the biblical message to people through the painting of the church made by a team of talented Balkan masters of the XII century. In the center of the narrative is the chronology of the salvation of the painting and the methodology for its restoration. According to the authors of the film, the Transfiguration Cathedral is an enlightening temple.

Specialists of the Pskov Museum-Reserve tell the story of the appearance of the cathedral, explain why it was erected precisely in this place. Here Oleg Fedorov, carefully laying his hand on the model of the white-stone church, explains "why Mirozh stands apart from other churches, having in the architectural plan of the cathedral a Byzantine cross". The specialist offers his own curious version of reading the historical and aesthetic components of the temple. Taisiya Kruglova, candidate of historical sciences, associate professor of the Pskov State University, gives the decoding of the compositional structure of the Christ Transfiguration Cathedral and via video-conferencing from Pskov tells about the traditions that were served by the temple customer, Archbishop Nifont. It is in the record about the construction of the cathedral that Nifont first mentions that "the Church of the Savior created behind the Great River".

At the meeting of the cinema club, it was noted that the second part of the film about the frescoes of the Christ Transfiguration Church of Mirozhsky Monastery has now been prepared, and soon the film will also be presented to a wide audience.

About the desire to get a copy of the film "Saved Frescos of the Christ Transfiguration Cathedral of Mirozhsky Monastery" as soon as possible in order to start showing it to everyone, spoke on video conference calls from the Reserve Center of the Presidential Library in the capital Nikolai Klykov, director of the Pskov community in Moscow.

Mikhail Sharomazov, director of the Kirillo-Belozersky Historical, Architectural and Art Museum-Museum, who was invited to the meeting of the Library of the Presidential Library, noted the artistic merits of the film and a great musical score selected by the conductor Vasily Zvariychuk. "I hope that sooner or later we will see the same detailed and talented film about our reserve", - he said.

The event was attended by representatives of museum complexes and higher educational institutions of Pskov on the site of the Vasilev Historical and Local Lore Library via video conferencing from Pskov, as well as the Pskov community in Moscow and St. Petersburg, students of the Stieglitz Center for Innovative Educational Projects, students of the "School of Folk Art of the Empress Alexandra Feodorovna" and the Russian Gymnasium at the State Russian Museum, specialists of the Russian Institute of Art History.