In 2010 the Volgograd Museum of Fine Arts celebrated its fiftieth anniversary. On the eve of the museum’s jubilee, two landmark events took place. At the initiative of the staff, the Volgograd Museum of Fine Arts was named after the celebrated artist Ilya Mashkov, and shortly before the anniversary date a new director came to the museum — Elena Vladimirovna Orlova. We met with Elena Vladimirovna to talk about her plans in her new position, about her own creative work, and about the museum’s anniversary, which became almost the main cultural event of the year.
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Elena Vladimirovna Orlova is an Honored Worker of Culture of the Russian Federation, an artist, a member of the Union of Artists of Russia, and a teacher. Twenty years ago she initiated the creation of a children’s art gallery in our city, nurtured it, and brought it to the level of the city’s leading museums. Elena Vladimirovna has educated more than one generation of artists — not only in the creative studios of her native gallery, but also at the Volgograd Institute of Arts and Culture and at Volgograd Pedagogical University. In February 2010, having entrusted her brainchild, the Children’s Art Gallery, to the reliable hands of her colleague Alla Nikolayevna Skorova, Elena Orlova took charge of the I. I. Mashkov Volgograd Museum of Fine Arts. Elena Vladimirovna admitted: “It was frightening, responsible and incredibly interesting. I was attracted by the prospect of immersing myself in new and very serious work. At the museum I came into an established team of true professionals, people with great experience and knowledge, and into a place that preserves a magnificent collection of works by great artists. A museum is a way of life, not just another workplace. It is an absolutely special world. I think that with the team working at the Museum of Fine Arts and with its unique holdings, one can carry out the boldest projects and embody any ideas. So I consider my first task to be helping every staff member reveal their potential as brightly as possible.”
Elena Orlova assumed leadership of the only art museum in Volgograd at a very important moment in its life: on the eve of its half-century anniversary, which began to be celebrated in April, on the day the museum was founded. Having barely taken up her new duties, Elena Vladimirovna joined the preparations for the museum’s 50th anniversary and for International Museum Day, traditionally celebrated on May 18. The events ran in parallel. In April the museum opened the exhibition “Many-Faced Mashkov,” which included painting, graphics, numerous original documents and photographs from Mashkov’s archive, as well as objects from his studio preserved in the museum’s holdings. The organisers devoted a major section of the exhibition to Ilya Ivanovich’s cultural and transformative activity in his homeland, in the village of Mikhailovskaya in Uryupinsk District.
A month later, in May, museum workers celebrated their professional holiday, and it became a true firework of vivid events. There was a master class in the museum hall for pupils of art schools, where they painted a still life in the spirit of the great master I. Mashkov; there was also an “open-air museum” on Lenin Avenue, where Volgograd artists held master classes in batik, painting and design for everyone who wished to take part. The celebration concluded with a cheerful theatrical skit involving Volgograd’s bohemia, and everything ended with a mysterious candlelit tour through the museum halls.
Having coped magnificently with this task, the team headed by the new director continued organising the museum’s anniversary events. This became Elena Orlova’s second serious test in her new post. But difficulties had never frightened her. One of the defining qualities of her character is the ability to work under any conditions. A long life in culture under conditions of limited financing allowed her to develop an optimistic attitude toward life and a deep conviction that became her motto: “One must live here and now.” Elena Orlova does not waste time waiting for better times; she simply works in the conditions she has, because she is certain that the more difficult the task, the more interesting it is to solve. And heading the Volgograd Museum of Fine Arts does not frighten her — it inspires her.
E.O.: “I do not know what I love more than my work, than the process of creation, the birth of something new. And if there is a cherished goal, difficulties do not stop me.”
Perhaps this is why Elena Orlova gladly takes on the new and unknown. Not long ago, for example, she responded with complete dedication to an invitation to participate in productions at Volgograd theatres. E.O.: “I have two works at the Theatre for Young Audiences: scenography and costumes for ‘Billy,’ based on Martin McDonagh’s play ‘The Cripple of Inishmaan,’ and scenography for Rostand’s ‘The Romancers.’ Both productions were staged by Albert Avkhodeev, director and chief director of the Theatre for Young Audiences. This year Otar Dzhangisherashvili, director and chief director of the New Experimental Theatre, invited me to work as costume designer on two of his productions. Work in the theatre, especially with such bright personalities, has captivated me deeply. I fell in love with theatre from the first production, finally and irrevocably.” Another secret love — or, one might say, another facet of Elena Orlova’s talent, known to few people, only friends and very close ones — is poetry. Elena Vladimirovna has been writing poems for a long time, and perhaps they will soon be published. This will help us understand her painting more deeply as well: like her poems, like everything she creates, it is full of love. To her students, to whom Elena Orlova taught painting and graphics, she used to say: “Graphics is asceticism, intellect, logic. Painting is love. So is poetry.” For Elena Orlova, love is her source of inspiration, her nourishing medium.
Pea soup on the stove
Softly breathes its heat.
We are all close in Christ
In this large, old house.
The dim light of a warm room,
Behind the wall someone laughs,
And onto a heap of old newspapers
I sweep the shards of a saucer.
I break them on the floor for luck,
Only where is it, this luck?...
But whatever Elena Orlova has worked as and whatever she has been drawn to, she is first and foremost an artist. Every two years she holds solo exhibitions, not only in her native Volgograd but also abroad — in France and Belgium. The heavy workload of a museum director leaves almost no time for painting, but whenever she has a free minute Elena Vladimirovna hurries to her studio. Time spent at the easel is not merely a professional necessity. It is a need of the soul, a way to rest from administrative affairs, a chance to gather her thoughts.
Her plans include the fulfilment of a long-standing dream shared by museum workers: to equip the museum with the most modern electronic technology and museum equipment, and to create a virtual branch of the Russian Museum, which would allow anyone to see masterpieces of fine art from one of the world’s largest museums. In particular, this would be a great help to people with physical disabilities in gaining access to world culture. While these projects are still being developed, the museum staff continue to offer Volgograd residents encounters with beauty in the traditional way — through exhibitions. Thus, the museum’s “anniversary set” included not only an encounter with the work of the famous fellow countryman Ilya Mashkov, but other no less interesting displays. On November 26, in honour of the anniversary, several major exhibitions opened at once. One was a solo exhibition by Zurab Tsereteli, People’s Artist of the Russian Federation and the USSR, President of the Academy of Arts and UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador. The second was the international Russian-German exhibition project “The Path to Perfection,” including “The Museum of Insomnia” by designer Leonty Ozernikov and “In Search of Perfection” by German artist Ingo Thalmann. In addition, the exhibition “50 Years — 50 Masterpieces” opened in the museum’s main building on Lenin Avenue. The title speaks for itself. It presented the best works of painting, graphics, sculpture, and decorative and applied art from the museum’s holdings, created by major masters of Russian art — Antropov, Alekseev, Tropinin, Bryullov, Savrasov, Aivazovsky, Shishkin, Makovsky, Serov, Roerich, Petrov-Vodkin, Konchalovsky, Deineka and other artists.
E.O.: “We managed to organise exhibitions that were very diverse and very different in character. And this is the result of team work. I cannot fail to mention Deputy Director for Research Varvara Sergeevna Ozerina, an extraordinary person with a very rare capacity for work; Chief Curator Irina Vladimirovna Kostrykina, a true professional; Senior Researcher Olga Petrovna Malkova, who continues the traditions of her mother, Inna Nikolayevna Nepokupnaya, the former director of our museum, who laid the foundation for the collection of Mashkov’s works; department heads and highly qualified specialists Valentina Rostislavovna Glinkina, Irina Vasilyevna Preobrazhenskaya, Tatyana Timofeyevna Sementseva, Irina Yuryevna Agafonova... Unfortunately I cannot name everyone here, because the team is quite large — 77 people now work at the museum, and all deserve the kindest words. It is a great happiness to work with such a team. I am certain that every person should feel like a creator; they should grow wings. Our staff are exactly such people. When there is trust in one another, when all positive forces unite to solve common tasks, when one can rely on everyone — with such a team, I am sure, one can move any mountains and do the impossible.”
Next year will mark 130 years since the birth of Ilya Ivanovich Mashkov. Already now, the museum that bears his name is preparing very seriously for the artist’s anniversary. This means that Volgograd residents can look forward to many unforgettable impressions from encounters with beauty.
Polina Sergeeva,
Gubernskie Vesti, January 2011
P.S. Ilya Ivanovich Mashkov, a well-known Russian artist, became one of the boldest reformers of the artistic language of Russian art. Mashkov became known as one of the brightest and most original heroes of the avant-garde and as the organiser of the “Jack of Diamonds” society. From the 1910s his works began to be acquired by the Tretyakov Gallery and received international recognition. Today Ilya Mashkov’s works are held in the largest museums of our country and are exhibited abroad. The museum’s collection of paintings and graphics reflects all stages of the artist’s creative evolution, both before and after the Revolution. The museum also preserves I. I. Mashkov’s archive from the 1930s. In 2005 the collection of I. I. Mashkov’s works from the museum’s holdings was presented at the State Tretyakov Gallery as part of the “Golden Map of Russia” project. In 2005 I. I. Mashkov’s paintings from our collection were included in the exhibition “Idealistic Socialist Realism,” shown in Liège, Belgium, as part of the Europalia-Russia Festival of Russian Culture.
