The old churches of the Nadrossia region (the area over the river Ros’) are astonishing in their beauty and harmony. Although not all of them have survived to this day, photographs and drawings give an idea of what the world of Orthodox Christians looked like in the last and the century before that. Our exhibition “Orthodox Churches of Bohuslavshchyna” is housed on the territory of the St Nicholas Monastery of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, on the premises of the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, which was destroyed during World War II and is now being rebuilt.
The fates of famous Ukrainians are linked to the monastery, where the exhibition is on display. In the 19th century, when the monastery housed a theological school, Ivan Nechuy-Levytsky, Oleksandr Koshyts, Pavlo Koshyts, Stepan Trezvynsky, Yevhen Krotevych, and Pavlo Klebanovsky studied here.
Our exhibition presents copies of old photographs of the most famous surviving Orthodox sacred buildings of the Bohuslav region: The Holy Trinity Church (Bohuslav city), the Church of the Intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Borodani village), the Church of the Apostle John the Theologian, 18th century (Rozkopantsi village), the Church of the Assumption (Vilkhivets village), and ruined churches: Intercession Church (Savarka village), St Nicholas Church (Chaiky village), Trinity Church (Yatsiuky village), St Nicholas Church (Shcherbashentsi village), and the Church of the Resurrection (Synytsia village). The photographs of Ukrainians from the 19th and early 20th centuries in festive costumes give an idea of how our compatriots used to dress when going to church.
The exhibition aims to highlight the importance of preserving the sacred architecture of the Bohuslavshchyna and draws attention to the need to complete the restoration of the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the related need for funding.
The exhibition is part of the project “Religious Communities of Old Bohuslav” created by the “Around Us. Ua” NGO. “Religious Communities of Old Bohuslav” includes three thematic exhibitions, the development and presentation of which were made possible due to the implementation of the project “Traditions of Ukrainians. Folk Calendar of Bohuslavshchyna” with the support of the “Partnership for a Strong Ukraine” Foundation.
The array of exhibitions aims to provide information about the churches of the late 19th and early 20th centuries in the Bohuslav community and show the images of people from old photographs who could have been their parishioners. Another essential purpose of the exhibitions is to draw attention to the restoration of lost, partially destroyed, and abandoned cultural monuments. The exhibition consists of three blocks: “Orthodox Churches of Bohuslavshchyna”, “Engravings by Napoleon Orda: Roman Catholic Churches”, and “Synagogues of Bohuslav. Forgotten History”.
