01 Jun 2007

Buddhist Temple 'Datsan Gunzechoinei' in St.Petersburg, Russia
www.marhotin.ru, St.Petersburg, Russia
Supplied note: "My name is Andrei Marhotin, I am a photographer from St.Petersburg (Russia). In 2004-2005 I did photography in the Buddhist Temple 'Datsan Gunzechoinei' in St.Petersburg, which resulted in exhibition 'The Buddha's Temple on the Neva Banks'. I am writing to inform you that exhibition on-line is on my personal website: www.marhotin.ru - am."
Self-description: "The Buddhist Temple in St.Petersburg was constructed by Agvan Dorjiev (1853 -1938), Buryat lama one of the XIIIth Dalai Lama's teachers [...] In 1909 A.Dorjiev set up the Building Committee which members were: Academicians V.V. Radlov and S.F. Oldenburg, Prince E.E.Ukhtomsky, professors of St.Petersburg University V.L.Kotvich, A.D.Rudnev, F.I.Stcherbatskiy, artists N.K Roerich and V.P.Schneider. G.V. Baranovskii worked as an architect. His other famous works in St.Petersburg are the Eliseyev Trade House and the Geographical Society's building. [...] The first act of worship was conducted on 21 February 1913, on the 300th Anniversary of the Romanov Dynasty when the Temple was still in its scaffolding. In August 1915 the Temple was consecrated to 'The Source of the Holy Teaching of the Buddha, Compassionate to All Beings'. ('Gunzechoinei' for short). In 1919 the Temple was vandalized by the Red Army. In 1927 public worship in the Temple was resumed but for a short time only. In 1935-1937 lamas were arrested and the Buddhist community ceased to exist. In 1938 the Temple buildings were municipalized and then used as youth physical training centre. In 1941-1960 the Temple housed a radio station, and some laboratories of Zoology Institute later. In 1990 the Temple [with own web site at http://www.dazan.spb.ru/ - ed.] was returned to the city's Buddhists."
Site contents: * Part I [photographs] * Part II [photographs] * About the Temple * About the [photo] exhibition * Guestbook
[A bi-lingual site (RU, EN) - ed.]
URL http://www.marhotin.ru/marhotin-datsan-eng/
Internet Archive (web.archive.org) [the site was not archived at the time of this abstract]
Link reported by: Andrei Marhotin (andrei--at--marhotin.ru)
* Resource type [news/comments - documents - study - corporate info. - online guide]: Documents
* Publisher [academic - business - govt. - library/museum - NGO - other]: Other
* Scholarly usefulness [essential - v.useful - useful - interesting - marginal]: Useful
* External links to the resource [over 3,000 - under 3,000 - under 1,000 - under 300 - under 100 - under 30]: under 30