The international scientific conference “Ornament and Sacred Space” was held in Kirillov over the last weekend. Russian and foreign specialists took part in the event organized by the Kirillo-Belozersky Museum-Reserve and the Ferapontovo Society of Preservation and Study of the Russian Cultural Monuments.
In spite of the fact that the subject of ornament is many-sided, the leitmotif of the conference was ornament in icon-painting. However, some of the reports were about monumental painting in the churches and wooden houses. The most outstanding sites among them are the Nativity of the Virgin Cathedral in Ferapontovo and the private house in Kunar (the Sverdlovsk region) that was abundantly decorated by its owner – smith S.I. Kuznetsov.
One more topic of the conference was ornament in textile articles of the Russian people, including the towels of the Altai Old-Believers. But embellishment of the household items included not only towels or ritual clothing. A lot of attention was also paid to the chests that referred to furniture. One of the reports was about it.
The program of the conference also included presentation of several specialized editions, for example the fourth issue of the magazine “Antikvariat, Predmety Iskustva i Kollektsionirovaniya” about the Kirillo-Belozersky Museum-Reserve.
The exhibition “Ornament in Icon” was opened in the Treasury Chamber of the Museum of Dionisy’s Frescoes within the framework of the conference. Unique articles from the private collections are displayed there. Mikhail Sharomazov, director of the Kirillo-Belozersky museum-reserve, underlined that the idea the exhibition was based on, was presented in a very interesting and broad way. Other participants of the event also addressed the meeting: V.V. Petrakov, adviser of the Minister of Culture of the RF; Mayor of Yekaterinburg Y.V. Royzman; famous Russian scholar G.I. Vzdornov; and culture expert A.V. Lipnitsky.
Some reports were given about the displayed exhibits. For example, collector Mikhail Chernov told about different variants of the ornament in the cast copper icon “The Fiery Ascent of the Prophet Elijah”. You can see the mentioned samples in the Museum of Dionisy’s Frescoes till the middle of August while the exhibition that has become the main subject of the round table discussion is open.
