Press releases

MOGILEV, 21 February (BelTA) – Museum-based puppet theaters will come to Mogilev for the first international festival Maslenikov Carols that will take place at the Maslenikov Mogilev Regional Art Museum, BelTA learnt from Deputy Director of the museum Svetlana Strogina.

Maslenikov Carols will conclude the culture campaign “Mogilev - Cultural Capital of the CIS and Belarus in 2013” and will open the year 2014 that will mark the 100^th anniversary of the famous artist Pavel Maslenikov and the 100^th anniversary of the building that accommodates the regional museum named after him.

The festival will celebrate visual art, music and theater. “Thanks to the active theater movement in Belarus, theater is getting increasingly popular in the country. We decided to use this forum to highlight and promote puppet theaters. The festival will bring together both Belarusian and Russian theaters, including theaters from Saint Petersburg and Tula Oblast,” Svetlana Strogina said.

The Maslenikov Mogilev Regional Art Museum will present modern and traditional puppet theaters. The latter travelled across the region in the 19^th century. “During the Christmas time puppet theaters usually staged the Tsar Herod play. It is a medieval play that became popular at the end of the 16^th century. The other part of the performance dealt with life stories of people. We will try to make our performances as authentic as possible,” Svetlana Strogina said. Stories for the traditional puppet theater are written by research assistants of the museum using folk fairy tales. The performances feature characters children are familiar with.

Visitors to the festival will be able to see paintings of contemporary artists from Mogilev Oblast, antiquity items, New Year tree decoration sets created to the 19^th century designs and many other interesting exhibits.

Live music will be played at the festival. Christmas carols and classic music will be performed by the orchestra of the Mogilev City Choir, the choir of the Mogilev Branch of the Belarusian State Academy of Music and a music group Viola from Children’s Art School No. 1.