A large-scale cultural project called “Europalia. Russia” was
presented in Moscow in February. Made up of two words – “Europe” and “opalia”
(opalia is a Roman harvesting festival), Europalia is a biannual arts and
culture festival, which has been held in Brussels, the capital of the European
Union, since 1969. Each festival represents some particular country. The
next, 20th, Europalia is devoted to Russia and will feature a vast cultural
program.
The personal patronage of the Belgian royal couple adds significance
to Europalia.Russia, which is scheduled to run from October 2005 to February
2006.
“On the one hand, Russia is an European country, but on the other
hand, it’s kind of a continent, considering its vast territory,” said the
festival’s general commissioner Pierre-Etienne Champanoi. “It has exceptional
traditions in the sphere of history, culture and arts. Our task is to show
the cultural diversity of Russia to the fullest possible degree.”
Europalia’s program is being drawn up by the Russian and Belgian
sides and will consist of nearly 130 events from exhibitions and film shows
to theatre productions and literary gatherings, as well as concerts and
disco parties. Much will be new to the Belgian public, for example, an
exhibition of the Russian avant-garde or a huge exhibition project entitled
“Five Centuries of Russian Culture on Its Way to Europe” and focusing on
the development of Russian statehood in the 13th-18th centuries.
The ballet troupe of Moscow’s Bolshoi Theatre will perform “Giselle”
at the invitation of the Belgian side. Staged by the outstanding choreographer
Yuri Grigrovich, this brilliant production of Adan’s unfading masterpiece
features Bolshoi’s ballet stars Svetlana Zakharova, Nikolai Tsiskaridze,
Maria Alexandrova and Andrei Uvarov.
St. Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theatre has also received a special
invitation from Europalia organizers. It will premiere Sergei Prokofiev’s
early opera “The Gambler” based on a novel by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. “Brussels
had an important part to play in Sergei Prokofiev’s life during his émigré
period. His boldest pieces were premiered there. It’s a great honor to
us to perform in Brussels, especially to premiere Prokofiev’s opera,” said
the theatre’s artistic director and chief conductor Valery Gergiev.
The Mariinsky orchestra conducted by Gergiev will give a concert
in Brussels.
Lev Dodin’s drama theatre from St. Petersburg will bring one of his
best productions – Anton Chekhov’s play “Uncle Vanya”, while the Moscow-based
Pyotr Fomenko troupe will show two adaptations of Leo Tolstoy’s works –
“War and peace” and “Family Happiness.”
Russian provincial theatres will be represented on a wide scale. “Along
with cultural developments in Moscow and St. Petersburg, much attention
will be given to Russian regions and promising cultural figures of Russian
provinces,” said Europalia’s chief organizer Christine de Mulder (???)
The talented youth will be represented by the Globus troupe from Novosibirsk,
the Provincial Dances troupe from Yekaterinbourg, and young soloists who
made a brilliant start, among them violinist Anastasia Chebotaryova.
The star-studded list of Europalia participants includes the
Russian National Orchestra directed by Mikhail Pletnyov. The Musica viva
chamber orchestra directed by Alexander Rudin, the Moscow Soloists orchestra
chamber directed by Yuri Bashmet, Viktor Popov’s academic choir, saxophonist
Alexei Kozlov with jazz avant-garde, the Folk Music Theatre directed by
Tamara Smyslova, Alexei Aigi’s 4’33 group and Tatyana Grindenko’s Opus
Post ensemble.
The movie program will offer retrospective shows of best Russian films
and special mini-fest programs featuring Russian films of the past few
years, which took prizes at various international festivals.
MODERN TRENDS IN RUSSIAN LITERATURE
The top five nominees for the Ivan Belkin literary prize were announced
in Moscow in February. Set up by the Znamya (Banner) magazine and Exmo-Press
publishing house, this annual prize is awarded to the best short novel
of the year. Ivan Belkin is the name of a literary character invented by
the famous Russian writer and poet Alexander Pushkin.
This year, the jury was chaired by contemporary writer Andrei
Bitov, who seems to know all about Pushkin. His novel “Pushkin House” is,
in fact, an in-depth research of Pushkin’s life and creation. Bitov is
the author of the Pushkin Jazz project – public readings of Pushkin’s diaries
accompanied by jazz music. Bitov’s novels such as “A Man in the Landscape”,
“Apothecary Iceland” and “The Flying Monakhov” have won him international
recognition.
Speaking during the awards ceremony, Bitov said the prize had enabled
him to get acquainted with young authors and understand what modern Russian
literature was like. He disagrees with those who claim that modern Russia
lacks talented authors writing really serious things.
“Quite a number of new literary works is being created in the provinces
and there are many authors aged under 30,” Bitov said. “The history of
Russia is no longer viewed from the hurrah-patriotic or ideological positions,
writers just take a look at our strange, enormous and constantly evolving
space. Russia is being regarded as a single whole. Most of the new books,
not just Belkin prize laureates, are attempts to understand who we are
and what is happening to us.”
Several of the prize-winning books explore historical themes, among
them Vladislav Otroshenko’s “The Engineers’ Town”, Oleg Hafizov’s “The
‘Russia’ Flight” about the tragicomic adventures of a weapons designer
who tries to sell his super-weapon to the French Emperor Napoleon and then
to the Russian Emperor Alexander I. Although set in the past centuries,
these novels, in Bitov’s opinion, are closely connected with the present-day
realities.
Another positive trend in contemporary Russian literature is that young
writers are beginning to show more respect for literary classics. They
no longer scorn at them as hopelessly outdated but are learning from them.
“Young writers are inheriting traditions, which is a very good
tendency. For one, in Oleg Hafizov one notices the influence of such writers
as Andrei Platonov, Yuri Tynyanov and Nikolai Leskov, and it’s all very
harmoniously intertwined. These writers are good teachers for contemporary
authors. Vladislav Otroshenko has always been a good stylist, one feels
elements of Andrei Platonov’s style in his prose,” Bitov said.
1ST MOSCOW CRESCENDO FESTIVAL
In February, Moscow hosted the 1st Crescendo music festival organized
by well-known pianist, top winner of the 11th Moscow International Tchaikovsky
Competition Denis Matsuyev.
“We have many music festivals directed by renowned maitres, among
them conductors Vladimir Fedoseyev, Yuri Temirkanov and Valery Gergiev,”
said the festival’s general producer David Smelyansky. “As a rule, they
feature world celebrities and just a couple of young performers, while
we, on the contrary, decided to make young musicians the driving force
of our festival. Most of them won acclaim in the West but are virtually
unknown to the Russian public, which is unfair.”
Young stars are supported by their elder colleagues, including
Vladimir Fedoseyev and his Tchaikovsky Big Symphony Orchestra.
Among Crescendo’s participants was cellist Boris Strulyov. A
graduate of the Central Music School of the Moscow Conservatory, he now
in the United States where he made a sensational debut with legendary pianist
Byron Janis in the Carnegie Hall in 1999.
Violist Maxim Rysanov, a graduate of the Moscow Central Music
School and the New York Juilliard School and winner of prestigious international
contests, performs in Europe and America but rarely appears in Russia.
Crescendo’s star-studded list of performers included Japanese
violinist Akiko Suwanai, first prizewinner of the 1990 Moscow Tchaikovsky
Competition.
According to popular TV host Svyatoslav Belza, Crescendo heralds
the beginning of a whole movement representing a new generation of musicians.
The next Crescendo festival will be held in St. Petersburg, then
in other Russian cities and probably in Paris in 2007 to mark the 100th
anniversary of Sergei Diaghilev’s famous “Russian Seasons”.
1ST MOSCOW BIENNALE OF MODERN
ART: SPECIAL PROJECT
IMoscow’s Tretyakov Gallery is hosting a large-scale exhibition called
“Associates – Collective and Interactive Works in the Russian Art of the
1960s-2000s” as part of the 1st Moscow Biennale of Modern Art. More than
250 works on display give a retrospective insight into alternative Soviet
and Russian art by members of various art associations and individual art
figures.
The name “Associates” is not accidental: a certain crave for
unity, especially, informal one, has always been inherent in Russian artists.
In the 60s and 80s of the 20th century, art groups helped alternative Soviet
authors to survive.
“Here you can see works by a whole number of popular authors
who matured inside an artistic group, among them Vladimir Dumossarsky,
Alexander Vinogradov, Valeria Koshlyakova and others,” says the exhibition’s
curator, art critic Andrei Yerofeyev. “Without “Three Ponds” or “Medical
Hermeneutics” or “New Artisits” or other groups, many artists would have
found it hard to shape their individual style.”
The exhibition features a wide variety of genres and techniques
of the so-called actualist art: painting, graphics, sculpture, application,
objects, installations, photography and much more, which create a parallel
world challenging the official Soviet art.
It’s hard to imagine some of these works going on public display
back in the 1970-s when they were created, as, for instance, objects of
the “Nest” group, among them a rusty sheet of iron with an inscription
“IRON CURTEN” on it, which could not be perceived other than a political
action, or decorative fabric paintings by Georgy Litichevsky, now a very
popular artist, who was out of favor in the 1980s.
In Litichevsky’s “Blue Cities” cycle we see tiny panel apartment
blocks, peasant log houses, home cattle, dogs, cockroaches, household items,
a yellow butterfly-shaped bus and lots of other things on a checkered piece
of cloth.
Among the exhibits are colorful oil compositions on rock’n’roll
themes by the alternative art trio of Andrei Filippov, Konstantin Zvezdochetov.
Dmitry Prigov, a poet, musician and painter, whose works are
also on display, believes an artist creates messages: a message to oneself,
to friends and to the world. Regrettably, the middle part – a message to
the all-understanding friend whose evaluation means more than the opinions
of the world – has almost disappeared now, he says.
Already, critics have noted the nostalgic character of the exhibition.
For justice sake, it should be said that it also features ultra-modern
collective “graffiti” painted by members of the “Absurdmafia” group right
in the Tretyakov Gallery.
