A contemporary art exhibition at the Russian Orthodox Cultural Center for Paris’s 2026 Heritage Days

You’ll recognize it by its landmark—the cathedral with golden domes that overlooks the Seine. The Russian Orthodox cultural and spiritual center invites you to the 2026 Heritage Days with a special program slated for the weekend of September 19–20.

Every year, the Journées du Patrimoine (Heritage Days ) are an opportunity for enthusiasts and the curious to fill up on cultural goodies through a rich program. The event usually takes place on the third weekend in September, when many cultural sites, establishments and institutions open their doors to reveal their secrets, sometimes in exceptional ways!

Whether you're a fan of history, art, fashion or much more, each edition of the Paris and Île-de-France festival offers a program so vast that everyone can find the event they're most interested in!

In Paris, it’s the chance to go after the city’s most iconic monuments or to venture toward lesser-known spots. On the 7th arrondissement, as you reach the banks near the Alma Bridge, you’ll glimpse a cathedral like no other, at the crossroads of modernity and tradition. Its five gold‑glowed onion domes draw the eye, and its architecture nods to both Byzantine and Russian styles.

This is the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity, also known as the Russian Orthodox Cathedral. Adjacent to it sits the Russian Spiritual and Cultural Center, to which the church building is closely linked. In celebration of the 43rd edition of Heritage Days, slated for the weekend of September 19–20, 2026, we’re in for a specially curated program!

The 2026 Heritage Days program at the Russian Orthodox Spiritual and Cultural Center & the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in Paris

Russian Orthodox spiritual and cultural center

Systematization. Nizhny Novgorod. Contemporary art exhibition
The exhibition Mise en système. Nijni Novgorod brings together more than a dozen contemporary artists from Nizhny Novgorod who are G invited to reside in local cultural institutions: Futuro Gallery, the Center for Contemporary Art “Terminal A,” the gallery “9B,” and the workshop “Tikhaya” (“Silent”). This project was initiated by Moscow gallery “Triomphe” and the government of the Nizhny Novgorod region in 2023–2024 and has already been presented in Moscow, Kazan and Perm.

The exhibition gathers a selection of works created between 2016 and 2026 across a range of techniques and genres—from traditional painting and drawing to textile objects, ceramics and video—that revolve, on the one hand, around reflections on place and, on the other, on integration into the global context of contemporary culture. The show tackles questions of the artist’s interaction with space, memory, the viewer and art.

Artists participating: Ilya Barabin Ivan Belov Vatsa Dmitri Joukov Lev Kais Alexandre Lavrov Nikita Mera Andreï Olenev Yuri Otinov Danya Pirogov Nikita Piroumov Sofia Pogoudina Provmyza Evgeni Strelkov Polina Strizh Evgenia Tut Nikita Etogde Evsti Bomse

Curator: Kristina Romanova • Assistant curator: Artur Knyazev
Participation terms: Free | No reservation required
Hours: Saturday, September 19, 2026 — 12:00 to 19:00 | Sunday, September 20, 2026 — 12:00 to 19:00

Holy Trinity Cathedral

Special opening of the Russian Catholic church
In 1934, the Russian mission, established by Russian Catholic immigrants, settled in the former workshop of painter François Gérard, which had been converted into a Byzantine chapel.

Its iconostasis and the sanctuary fresco (the apostles’ communion with the Body and Blood of Christ) were created by Father Egon Sendler, a Jesuit priest, icon painter, and world-renowned art historian who founded icon workshops in Meudon and Versailles. The iconostasis features several antique icons, typically Slavic in origin.
Participation conditions: Free | No reservation required
Schedule: Saturday, September 19, 2026 — 3:00 PM to 7:30 PM | Sunday, September 20, 2026 — 2:00 PM to 5:00 PM