Vitebsk museum workers and archivists have published an unusual book about the history of Vitebsk
The Vitebsk Regional Museum of Local Lore, the Marc Chagall Museum, and the State Archive of the Vitebsk Region have for the first time pooled their extra-budgetary resources and published an unusual book, its author, director of the Marc Chagall Museum Lyudmila Khmelnitskaya, told a BELTA correspondent.
The book is titled "A Walk with an Old Map," and its concept was inspired by a 1904 plan of the city of Vitebsk, which is kept in the regional archive. "A Walk with an Old Map" is a guide to the provincial city of the early 20th century, a collection of essays on the history of its streets and architectural monuments, and excerpts from archival documents and memoirs of its famous citizens. Thanks to these recollections, it is known that during the visit of Tsar Nicholas II to Vitebsk, a traffic jam of cabmen formed in the central square, and the emperor and autocrat had to wait in his car in a traffic jam. And then Nicholas drove past the photo studio of Goloshchekin - the brother of the very same Filipp Goloshchekin, who later became one of the organizers of the execution of the royal family.
A separate chapter of the book, "The Theater Presents Opera," is dedicated to the cultural life of Vitebsk at that time. By the way, traveling artists gave 28 operas a month in the provincial city, and all of them were sold out. Shortly after the premiere in St. Petersburg, Vsevolod Meyerhold brought to Vitebsk a performance based on Alexander Blok's play "The Puppet Show," but the public did not accept the aesthetics of the new art, and the production failed.
Of course, the book mentions Marc Chagall, Ossip Zadkine, and other equally famous personalities associated with Vitebsk at the beginning of the last century. Photographs of the city from that time, postcards, and pictures of modern Vitebsk are used as illustrations. "I wanted to write not a pseudo-scientific work, but, based on scientific and archival sources, to create an engaging read," admitted the author.
The book was published in an edition of 500 copies and saw the light thanks to the joint financial resources of three institutions. This is the first experience in the region, and as museum workers and archivists hope, it will be continued. Such publications, based solely on reliable sources, well-illustrated, and written in an easily understandable style, maintain interest in the history of their city and homeland, attracting not only local historians but also tourists. Along with bookstores, the book will be sold by its publishers – the regional museum and the Marc Chagall Museum.