Creative heritage of a prominent sculptor A. S. Charkin — at the Presidential Library exhibition

Today, December 14, 2017, the Presidential Library led a ceremony of official opening of a multimedia exhibition entitled “Knight of art. To the 80th anniversary of the birth of Albert Charkin,” as well as a screening and discussion of the movie “Albert Charkin… Faces of history.”

As it was pointed out at the exhibition, the Presidential Library regularly holds events dedicated to the outstanding St. Petersburg based masters, who left a mark in the world culture. This fall alone in the building on the Senate Square were opened a few exhibitions, telling about a work of the researcher and photographer P. I. Sevastyanov, a sculptor M. K. Anikushin, and a historian L. N. Gumilev.

Guests of the Presidential Library were offered to get familiar with the works of the sculptor A. S. Charkin exposed on the screens of the multimedia gallery, many of which adorn the Northern Capital as material objects of art. Among these are the b portrait sculptures of Peter I at the Moscow Railway Station, Valery Chkalov at the “Chkalovskaya” Metro Station and Alexander Gorchakov in the Alexander Garden, the sculpture “The city policeman” at the intersection of Malaya Konyushennaya Street and the Shwedsky Alleyway and others. Slides are accompanied by detailed annotations, revealing the history of the creation of each of object.

The daughter of the sculptor Maria Charkina highlighted: “Our objective was to show how the creator’s path goes, how the sculptor works, starting from an outline and ending with the opening of complete work. This is a very interesting process, because sometimes the conceived on paper image and the embodied in clay result so much differ from each other.”

The chairman of the board of St. Petersburg Union of Artists Alexander Saykov drew attention to the very exact name of the exhibition: “It most fully reveals the character of A. S. Charkin: as a real knight of art, he devoted his life to creation. The impossibility to work was for him the most awful punishment. In addition, he was a highly moral person and managed to pass on this quality to his students, who are now successfully working all over the world.”

From the electronic collection presented on the Presidential Library website could be learned more about the sculptor, an educator, a public figure A. S. Charkin. Collection included materials courtesy of sculptor’s daughter Maria Charkina. Visitors of the website will be able to see the digital copies of the documents, photographs, newspaper publications, certificates, diplomas and much more, which will help to form a holistic view of the life and work of the sculptor with a bold touch.

After the opening of the virtual exposition, the documentary movie “Albert Charkin… Faces of history” was screened and discussed.

Multimedia exhibition “Knight of art. On the 80th anniversary of the birth of Albert Charkin” will last until January 14, 2018. The exposition can be visited independently on regular business days of the electronic reading room of the Presidential Library (Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, 11 am — 6:30 pm) or as part of a sightseeing tour over the Presidential Library building (please, make an appointment over the phone (812) 334 2514 or email: excursion@prlib.ru).