Church of St. Annunciation Kereka village

Overview

Until recently, the Church of the Annunciation in the village of Kereka was one of the insufficiently studied monuments in Bulgaria from the first half of the 19th century. It was built in the middle of the village, located 8 km from the town of Dryanovo. The church is not completely painted. Only the south and north walls of the nave are covered with paintings. Now there are no icons and the wooden base of the iconostasis is broken into pieces. It is difficult to reconstruct the iconostasis in the church entirely due to lack of information and archival photos. In the early 70's it was fully preserved, as evidenced by a scientifically based proposal prepared by the National Institute for Immovable Cultural Heritage. The frescoes in the Church of the Annunciation in the village of Kereka are unsigned, but their iconographic and stylistic features connect them with the painters of the Tryavna school. A number of painting specifics point to Krastyo Zahariev and his sons Georgi and Petar Krastevi, painters from Tryavna, who graduated in 1835-1837.