Historic Russian Orthodox Cathedrals and Churches from the 11th to the 20th Centuries

The photographs of sacred Russian Orthodox sites displayed on this wall and available for digital viewing at the adjacent media station were taken during research trips by Professor A. Dean McKenzie, who retired in 1988 from the University of Oregon’s Department of Art History (today’s Department of the History of Art and Architecture). Presented here are cathedrals and churches built from the 11^th to the 20^th centuries in a vast array of architectural styles in locations as diverse as St. Petersburg, Russia, and Unalaska, Alaska—a small city 800 miles southwest of Anchorage in the remote Aleutian Island chain. Structures such as the Cathedral of Saint Vasily the Blessed (popularly known in English as St. Basil’s), located on the Red Square in Moscow will be known to many, while others, such as the Church of Saint Nicholas in Juneau, Alaska, will likely be less familiar. St. Basil’s represents the culmination of a national style that reached its peak during the 16^th century, while the more contemporary Saint Nicholas indicates the extent to which aspects of that style were disseminated on a global scale. Examples of native Russian wooden churches, known as kokoshniki, from which the more grand constructions of later centuries evolved, are included here as well.  Despite the multiplicity of sites represented in these photographs, design details closely associated with Russian Orthodox architecture, like tent-shaped roofs, tiered gables, and onion domes, appear frequently.

Professor McKenzie, who received his MA from the University of California, Berkeley, and his PhD from the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University, taught Medieval art for over twenty years at the U of O before he and his wife, Lucile, generously donated funds to endow this gallery.