The Reconstruction of the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour: Public Space and National Identity in Post-Soviet Moscow

Abstract

In 1997, during the city of Moscow’s 850th anniversary celebrations, the newly reconstructed Cathedral of Christ the Saviour was opened to the public. The original cathedral, built to commemorate the Russian victory over Napoleon during the ‘Patriotic War’, was completed in 1882, only to be destroyed by the Bolsheviks fifty years later to make room for the infamous Palace of the Soviets. The cathedral’s restoration during the 1990s was part of a greater attempt by then-mayor of Moscow Yuri Luzhkov to reconstruct a post-Soviet Russian national identity in the public space by culling pre-revolutionary Russian heritage. This paper considers the rebuilt Cathedral of Christ the Saviour within the context of identity creation in Moscow during the 1990s. Drawing on recent scholarship in cultural geography that examines the practices and politics of place making, I consider how the new cathedral embodies and narrates a distinctive national history and prescribes a particular collective memory. In addition, I question how the rebuilt Cathedral of Christ the Saviour formed part of a conscious effort on the part of the state to create a new Russian identity through a restructuring of public space. Public opinions and reaction to this new/old heritage space in the form of both opposition to and support for the reconstructed site are also taken into account. Broadly, this paper looks at how changes to public spaces feature in the process of identity creation, in this case forming the attempted means of gaining political legitimacy.