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The most eminent fresco painters were Gurii
Nikitin and Sila Savin, both from Kostroma, "The last two masters of the
dying great style." Their talents were so highly regarded that they were
invited to decorate churches not only in the best monasteries but by the
Archbishop of Rostov, Iona Sisoyevich, and the Tsar. In 1662, assisted by the
members of their team, or as the chronicler says "With tovarishch,"
they started decorating the Trinity Cathedral of the Danilov Monastery at
Pereaslavl-Zaleskii, built in 1530-1532 by Vasilii III to commemorate the birth
of his son Ivan the Terrible. There is no information as to whether the
Cathedral was frescoed at that time. The price of the entire work was 300
Rubles. Then suddenly, Moscow invited them to paint the frescoes in the
Cathedral of the Archangel Michael in the Kremlin, and they left the Monastery
with less than half its frescoes done. They returned only in 1668 but after two
months Moscow called again and they had to interrupt the work a second time.
The decoration of the Trinity Cathedral was finished the following year by some
other painters from Kostroma. Here are illustrations of the work of Nikitin.
In 1669 and 1671 the two master-painters were in Rostov to fresco the interior
of the Cathedral of the assumption. They worked together with another well
known tsar's izugraf, Dmitrii Grigoriev, a native of Yaroslavl, and with Vaslii
Kuzmin, Sevastian Dimitiev, Iosif Vladimirov, two brothers named Ananin, two
brothers named Karpov and others. Their frescoes were restored several times
and in 1843 repainted with oil color. Attempts to strip the original frescoes
of subsequent layers of paint had failed with the exception of few fragments,
making it difficult to ascribe them with certainty to a particular master.
Nikitin, Savin and Grigoriev returned to Rostov in 1675 to decorate the Church
of the Resurrection. These frescoes were quite well preserved until present
times and masterfully executed. They were cleaned and restored in the nineteen
sixties. In most cases the compositions are well balanced, and the colors
beautiful and delicate, particularly the greens and he blues; the figures and
the faces communicate with ease their intentions and feelings. Those in the
galleries, which show subjects and scenes taken from the (book of Genesis), are
more intimate, and sometimes the subjects are approached more spontaneously ,
for example the animals in the picture of Noah's Ark and the scenes from the
Apocalypse.
In 1672 Nikitin and Savin painted the frescos in the Convent of the Theophany,
and in 1685 in the Ipatiev Monastery, both at Kostroma. Their most remarkable
work was done when under their guidance, the walls of the Church of Saint
Elijah at Yaroslavl were covered with frescoes. On the southern wall of the
church there is an inscription which says that in 1680 and 1681 isografs from
Kostroma, Gurii Nikitin and Sila Savin, a native of Yaroslavl, Dmitrii Semenov,
Vasilli Kuzmin, A. Timofeyev, Peter Averkiev, Mark Nazarov, Vasilii Mironov,
Foma Yermilov, Timofei Fedorov, Iva Petrov, Ivan Andryanov, Ivan Ivanov, Filip
Andreyanov, and Stepan Pavlov participated in this quite sizeable work which
was done in a relatively short time.
The frescoes of the Saint Elijah Church attract particular attention, not so
much because of their quality but for their unrestrained execution. More than
ever before they show the new approach, and the tendency of the painter to free
themselves from traditional forms and treat men and nature in a more realistic
way. They are also overcrowded with any details, people, animals etc. The
frescoes were painted in five tiers. The first from the top illustrates scenes
from Jesus' life after his resurrection; the second tells of his life and
ministry; the third shows the apostles and events from their lives; the fourth
and the bottom tiers depict scenes from the life of the patron of the Church,
Saint Elijah, and his successor and pupil, the prophet Elisha. In the first
three tows the painters did not depart much from the traditional canonized
schemes and presentations. A daring exception is the "Last supper,"
which they treated almost as a feast. In the bottom tiers there are several
scenes borrowed from the illustrations in Vissher's Bible. Here, obviously, the
painters let their imaginations loose and produced some of the most remarkable
frescoes of the entire Yaroslavl cycle. Such are the scenes from the life of
Elisha, on the southern wall, which Soviet art students now call
"Harvest," or "Tillage." Many details look as if they were
taken from a nearby Russian village. They are given a prominent place in the
frescoes at the expense of the religious trappings. These frescoes are also the
most colorful.
Similar tendencies appear in the frescoes in the Church of Saint Nicolas at
Yaroslavl (Tserkov Nikoli Mokrogo), which were also borrowed from Vissher.
Their execution has prompted some art historians to conclude that they were
also painted by Gurii Nikitin and his team, though there is no documentary
evidence to confirm this. The composition of the "Last Judgement" is
of considerable artistic merit. This theme became very popular in the churches
of Yaroslavl area; those entering paradise are often shown with Russian faces
and dressed in Russian costumes, while the sinners in hell or heading towards
it are obviously foreigners and of non-Orthodox creed.
Please go to the various sections on Periyaslavl, Kostroma and Moscow for
photos of these churches.
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