Church of the Holy Mandylion, Eastern Orthodox church in Sochi, Russia.
The Church of the Holy Mandylion is a Neo-Byzantine Orthodox church near the Olympic Park in Sirius, Sochi. It is a tetraconch: a central drum rises above four conchs, crowned by a conical copper dome, with a small bell tower on the west and the altar apse on the east. Porticoes with short columns and half-pediments frame the north, west and south portals. The building is about 43 metres high; the project was by Fyodor Afuksenidi.
This house of worship was built between 2012 and 2014 as part of Sochi's Olympic development. Its first service took place on January 7, 2014, coinciding with Russian Orthodox Christmas.
The church is named for the Mandylion, the cloth bearing Christ's face that, according to tradition, King Abgar of Edessa received. Its foundation stone was laid on August 29, 2012, the feast of the translation of the Mandylion from Edessa to Constantinople. The interior frescoes, painted by 25 artists from the Ilya Glazunov Russian Academy of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture over four months, show biblical figures and angels with large, expressive eyes.
The church stands at the entrance to the Olympic complex, surrounded by a park, in the Imereti lowland near Sochi. The lower hall beneath the church, on a two-tier stylobate, is used for conferences and exhibitions. Services follow the Orthodox calendar, and modest dress is expected inside.
The foundation stone, laid on 29 August 2012, came from the ruins of a 9th-century Byzantine church excavated in Sochi in 2010, known in scholarship as the Byzantine church near the village of Veseloye. The date marks the transfer of the Mandylion from Edessa to Constantinople.
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