The plaque has been installed on the façade of the local historical museum, before hundreds of city residents. Meanwhile, the eighteen participants of the open-air workshop, from seven countries, were honorary guests. The Deputy Chair of the Slavgorod District Executive Committee, Svetlana Yezerskaya, tells us, “We’re happy to see the name of this great artist, who lived and worked in our local area, immortalised for our heirs.”
‘Place’ and ‘time’ captured during open-air workshop
The years spent by Fiodor Tulov in Propoisk (the former name of Slavgorod), living at the Benkendorfs’ homestead, are seen as the most productive of his career. He arrived in 1830 and died 20 years later, being buried in the local cemetery. Over sixty of his works are kept at the Hermitage and at the Tretyakov Gallery, as well as at the Russian Museum and other Belarusian and Russian museums. Some of Fiodor’s pictures are currently on show at Mogilev’s Pavel Maslenikov Art Museum, and one of his earliest works — a portrait of his brother Konstantin — has been presented to the city by the Russian Museum.
There are many mysteries in our knowledge of his life, with some believing that he was bound to Duke Benkendorf and later freed; others are convinced that he was of noble birth himself. All agree on his talent.
Artists from Armenia, Israel, Serbia, Russia, China and other countries are now brightly painting the suburbs of the district centre — where the artist lived two hundred years ago. Their works will become part of the traditional final exhibition of the open-air workshop, held under the slogan: Image of Motherland in Fine Arts.
By Svetlana Markova
