O. G. Belomoeva, T. V. Klimkina (Saransk, Russia). Features of development of Russian religious architecture at the turn of the 21st century (as for Russia and Mordovia)

Olga G. Belomoeva,
Doctor of Cultural Studies, Professor, Department of Theater Art and Folk Art Culture, Ogarev Mordovia State University
(Saransk, Russia), о_belomoeva@mail.ru

Tatiana V. Klimkina,
Post-graduate student (PhD), Department of Theater Art and Folk Art Culture,
Ogarev Mordovia State University
(Saransk, Russia), scientificmagazines@gmail.com

The article studies one of the main features of the development of the religious architecture of Russia at the turn of the 21st century. That can be defined as a powerful development of religious architecture, associated with the phenomenon of “spiritual rebirth”. The specificity of the church as a socio-cultural phenomenon consists in the unity of the sacred, historical and domestic factors, which is an important criterion to evaluate its architectural decision. The religious architecture at the turn of the 21st century is an object of the research. The subject is the features of its development at the present stage. The goal is to identify the main tendencies in the development of religious architecture in Russia considering the experience of the Republic of Mordovia.
The empirical material of the work is the contemporary religious architecture of Russia. It is provided by the use of traditional methods for the Humanities (typological and descriptive methods, etc.) as well as the research empirical base and its fair analysis which corresponds to the basic provisional of Arts and Cultural Studies.
The analysis of the monuments of modern religious architecture that allows concluding on two tendencies in the development of religious architecture: the restoration of churches and the construction of new religious buildings. Regarding the latter, there is a direct connection with the development of two stylistics views: the interpretation of architectural forms of the past and disregard of artistic traditions. This stylistic tendency is becoming the major one in the field of the contemporary religious architecture referring both to the historical heritage of Russia in the whole and the Republic of Mordovia in particular.
The turn of the 21st century represents a new stage of development of religious architecture in Russia within the break with tradition that occurred in the Soviet era. Its main trends are the restoration of the architectural structures of the past and the erection of new churches. Active searches for new artistic decisions are based on tradition, which is confirmed by examples of church construction in general in Russia, and in the Republic of Mordovia in particular.

Key words: religious architecture; church; reconstruction; tradition; interpretation; stylization.

For citation: Belomoeva OG, Klimkina TV. Features of development of Russian religious architecture at the turn of the 21st century (as for Russia and Mordovia). Finno-ugorskii mir = Finno-Ugric World. 2018; 2: 98–108. (In Russian)