By Alexander Pimenov
The Vitebsk Art Museum is currently hosting an exhibition called Slavic Brotherhood, featuring works by artists from Belarus, Russia, Ukraine and Serbia. The initiative began in 2008, when Vladimir city painter Natalia Britova met an original Belarusian artist called Alexander Zakharenko, from Kostyukovichi, in Moscow; the pair decided to unite artists who shared the same spiritual outlook and have since held five exhibitions. This year’s is the most impressive, having 16 artists participating.
Each painting gives a different perception of the world, while sharing the theme of acquainting audiences with the regions in which the authors live. At the All-Russia Vasnetsov open-air competition, Natalia Britova was given a state award from the Kirov Region, called Inspiration. Svetlana Vrublevskaya, the assistant professor to the design chair of Vitebsk State Technological University, also displayed several canvases at the competition.
She tells us, “The organisers selected seven of my portraits; most are images of my fellow artists. Among them are Oleg Skovorodko and Gennady Faley, from Vitebsk, but there are also residents of places where I’ve worked in the open air — such as Mariyskaya village.”
Orel Region Olga Dushechkina’s expressive landscapes and the captivating graphics of Victor Belyukov, from Yekaterinburg, are also on display, alongside landscapes by Olga Boroday, from the Moscow School of Painting. You can see stunning views of the Carpathians, thanks to Lyudmila Borshosh-Letun, from Ukraine, while Serbian Mirjana Stojanovic shares views fanned by the winds and mists of the Adriatic.
The exhibition features more than 70 landscapes, portraits and still life works, displaying the national colour, life and culture of each artist’s homeland. The project moves to the Bogorodskoe exhibition hall in September, located in the Eastern Administrative District of Moscow. In early 2014, it will come to Grodno.
