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However, the cathedral became famous for is
fresco decorations after two most prominent Russian iconographers, Andrei
Rublev and Daniil (Daniel) Chernii were sent in 1408 by the Grand Duke of
Moscow, Vassilii I to redecorate it. With their assistants, they repainted all
frescoes anew, and preserved existing subjects on the same walls, obeying the
already established regulations and practice of how to decorate the inside of a
Russian church, but they did it their own way and did not just follow the lines
that previous painters did. Not many of these frescoes survived and those that
we see today were many times retouched and in some cases repainted almost each
time the cathedral was renovated. With considerable certainty we can say that
several images of angels and apostles of the Last Judgement, painted on the
wall under the west side gallery, were done by Rublev. His soft pastel-like
colors did much to soften the severity of the Judgement, and so did the faces
and their expression of his saints and apostles, who look just like simple
Russian peasants, far from seeming frightened by the episode. Rublev also
painted several icons for the old iconostasis. Those of the Deisus Order are
about ten feet high and executed with great skill. They were removed and taken
to the church of the village of Vasilevskoe when the cathedral received a new
iconostasis in the second half of the 18th century. After the revolution the
icons were taken from the church, cleaned and most of them are now in the
Tretiakov Gallery in Moscow. Decoration of a large cathedral must had been a
great challenge for Rublev and his companions and they did a marvelous job. At
the same time they must had learned much from the existing frescoes,
particularly in terms of drawing and composition if not in coloring.
It was in this cathedral that the Vladimir Chronicle was written and
stored. Prince Andrei, his brother Vsyevolod and several other princes and
bishops were buried there, and it was in front of this altar that Princes
Alexander Nevski and Dmitrii Donskoi were crowned. The cathedral soon became
one of the most important monuments of Russian architecture and it was not
surprising that Aristotle Fioravanti was sent there to see it and study it
before he drew the plans for the construction of the cathedral of the
Assumption in the Moscow Kremlin.
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