#ARCTIC. #SIBERIA. THIS IS TAIMYR. Almost unprecedentedly – only original works and personal belongings of Euphrosinia Kersnovskaya, a writer and artist, a famous Norillag prisoner, who first took a brush in Norilsk and created her first imaginary garden. Euphrosinia Antonovna Kersnovskaya is known for her notebooks-memories of her stay in the GULAG. From 1944 to 1960, she spent six years in Norilsk in prison, and then worked in a mine.
She created hundreds of poignant drawings that became evidence of the trials she experienced. But her other creative legacy is much less known – about 130 paintings, including a series of postcards Flowers and Nature, albums with Caucasian and Crimean landscapes, illustrated children’s books. These works were created between 1950 and 1964.
The exhibition will feature a small part of this collection from the E.A. Kersnovskaya heritage preservation foundation – graphic and painting works and a series of postcards with flowers images.
After Norilsk, Euphrosinia linked her life with Yessentuki, where she grew her own real garden on a tiny plot of land. A special place in the garden was occupied by rose bushes – Euphrosinia’s favorite flowers. A special part of the garden was a gazebo called Indonesia, built in 1962.
In terms of materiality, that house of hers was more than an ordinary house in the sense that we understand it. Euphrosinia loved to be completely separated from the garden and nature, and tried to live in the open air. After her mother died in 1964, she moved from home to the Indonesia gazebo, where was a table she had made, her mother’s chest, and a bed covered with a fur coat brought from Norilsk. Only in very bad weather with a strong wind she returned to the house. In the gazebo, she wrote and drew, creating her main work – the famous 12 notebooks with memoirs.
The exhibition will open on October 29 in the main building of the Norilsk museum. Admission to the opening is free.
Earlier, the Norilsk museum hosted an exhibition of woodcuts. We also reported that an open-air GEOpark opened in Norilsk for everyone.
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Text: Anzhelika Stepanova, Photo: provided by the Norilsk museum