Musings from Moscow
See but don’t touch, listen but don’t ask, walk but don’t stop as you will be amused by whatever is waiting to welcome you – for you are in Moscow. That’s how I define the city. For the ones who grew up knowing Russia as USSR symbolized by the hammer and sickle, it’s hard not to get nostalgic. For us Moscow meant the seat of socialism, bitter winter and where the god was the KGB. USSR in general meant: Mig-21 fighter jets, Kalashnikovs, massive postage stamps bearing the mark CCCP, Yuri Gagarin, Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky, and the most difficult map whicht most of us failed to draw in our geography class.
Russia of 2014 is of course different, smaller in size and has a different flag too; relentlessly struggling to transform itself to get attuned with the fast changing world. Today it’s re-defined through the branding of the Russian oligarch, Maria Sharapova and a president who is hell-bent to restore his country’s lost glory by defying the ‘all-American-supremacy’.
So what’s Russia doing to maintain a tuneful relation with the commonwealth of former Soviet states? More importantly, what is it doing for Bangladesh? In reality, under the brand Rossotrudnichestvo, the country is broadening its diplomatic horizons - in terms of, fostering friendly ties for the advancement of Russia's political, diplomatic and economic interests. It’s carrying out an off-beat exchange programme.
Why off-beat?
Because apart from the former Soviet and Communist states like Armenia, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Ukraine, Bulgaria and Czech republic and many others now they have added a different country that is poles apart from the Russian fraternity : Bangladesh. Rossotrudnichestvo is an autonomous Russian federal government agency; it intensely campaigns to re-define modern Russia rather than only inviting young political leaders and journalists for a round trip to Russia. This re-defining process is versatile to help a participant understand, why today’s Russia and Russians are different from how they are being perceived worldwide. Consisting of roundtables, conferences, excursion trips, and Q&A sessions what Russia is doing through Rossotrudnichestvo is: building friends to create a different perception of Russia for the newer generation.
Having spent a stint of five days in Moscow taught me one important lesson: travel to differentiate between facts and fiction. What I knew before was learnt by reading and watching fiction and what I now know is what I had experienced – facts. So the Russian story is based on facts that have been interpreted from this writer’s personal musings and romanticism.
My penning of the Russian story begins with Moscow and its landmarks. Know for sure, Moscow’s museums, St.Basil cathedral, red square and Kremlin are not all that matters. Rather it's off the beaten track. It’s about the most convenient transport mode that brings you to these landmarks and that is: the Moscow metro.
One of the busiest by daily ridership and longest metro system in the world it’s, in general, a beaming achievement that echos of the hard labour put in under the tutelage of Joseph Stalin. For a keen traveller like I, the metro itself is a museum. Today, it even ties the Moscowvites with the Wi-Fi so that they stay connected.
For the folks, like my companions, Tatiana and Galina the metro may be a regular affair but their pride for being a citizen owner of the metro is surely hidden somewhere. There are few metros in the world, on which when you travel history of former times begins to unfold. It feels like, you are travelling through a chain of stopover museums. It’s the range in design, tastes, ideas hopes, and colours that captures the commuter’s attention. From palatial baroque marble and granite structures to the trendy iron and glass; socialist symbols to the glory of the Red Army; from poets to novelists. For instance, The Ploshchad Revolutsii station is decorated with over 70 bronze sculptures of workers, soldiers, farmers, students and other Soviet walks of life. I call it the proletarian station. The Stretensky Bulvar is there to signify the architectural designs of the 30's and 40's that’s further complimented with silhouettes of Pushkin and Gogol. I named it station Art Deco. The station Dostoevskaya is decorated with black-and-white panels featuring the main characters from Dostoyevsky’s novels The Idiot, Demons, Crime and Punishment and a few literary works that I failed to identify. The features appear with added pastoral mosaic landscapes. I named it as the literature station. Apart from the stations one of the trains itself seemed like a moving carriage of poetry. For it has been dedicated to not Russian, but Italian poets. Unfortunately, all of the poems are featured in two languages, Russian and Italian. It is history, literature and architecture which are the frequent elements that move fast as the train.
Aren’t these all the aspects that we try to find inside any museum?
Whatever, the point is what could amuse more while you are commuting?
Now let’s move from metro to museum. The Tretyakov art gallery and museum was not far from Sholokhov Moscow state university’s campus. It not only houses a vast wealth of Russian fine art but also rare traditional toys. An entire floor displays a considerable chunk of the George Costakis collection. Within a span of 3 hours it wasn’t possible to browse through a collection of some 160, 000 pieces of work so I had drawn my lines between the special display of nude art and the Costakis collection. Both of them were within the shortest walking range too.
To be honest, fine arts was never my cup of tea but the trouble to concentrate was because of something else. It seemed like a conflict between visitors and what was being visited.
On my entering the passageway I found a plethora of nude oil works hanging on both sides. The visitors, mostly young women were even finer than the fine arts. It was seen not only in the gallery but in all of Moscow. If it comes to spotting beautiful women - Moscow is astonishingly a step ahead of London and Paris. Dark to blond; Slavic, Caucasian to mongoloid features; dark hair to blondes; in jeans, stilettos and skirts they come with almost flawless toned physiques and looks. You name your type and the city has it. To lower one’s gaze is not easy here. However, during the time of my visit it was the first time in the Tretyakov Gallery that an exhibition project was entirely devoted to the subject of nudity in domestic visual art and - of which I had no knowledge. Instead, I found the Costakis collection to be more revealing.
The late George Kostakis was a Greek collector of Russian art whose collection later became the most delegated form of Modern Russian avant-garde art. Born in Moscow to affluent Greek parents, completely blank of any artistic education he had developed a sharp interest in art during his adolescence. Believe it or not, he is reported to start his career as a driver for the Greek Embassy in Moscow. He literally hunted for 'lost' pictures, found the ones which were rolled up and covered with dust. Met Vladimir Tatlin and befriended Varvara Stepanova. Tracked down friends of Kasimir Malevich and bought works of Liubov Popova and Ivan Kliun. Such intense will showed him the way to make friends with the famous Russian expressionist Anatoly Zverev. By 1960 his apartment in Moscow had turned into the unofficial museum of Russian modern art. Before moving to Greece, he left 50 per cent of his collection in the State Tretyakov Gallery of Moscow. It was a condition of the agreement with the Soviets for leaving the then Soviet Union. It was all known from the video recording of his life, being repeatedly played around a corner of the floor. For connoisseurs of fine arts the Tretyakov is a sure visit.
From metro and fine arts now it’s something divine. It’s the Dormition cathedral in Kremlin. Step inside and you are close to god. By the façade of a typical orthodox church, it’s tricky to imagine that it’s actually a treasure house of icons and fresco paintings – Michael Angelo Russian style. The interior has four round frescoed pillars leaving enough space to move about. The whole cathedral is covered by groined vaults. I later learnt, it’s most important cult image of the Russian Orthodox Church, the Theotokos of Vladimir was kept here for nearly 500 years before it found its new home at the Tretyakov Gallery. Two items captivated my mind's eye. First, the fresco called, Christ the Judge with Prostrate Adam and Eve portraying both Adam and Eve prostrating near the throne with a serpent symbolizing human sins stretching till Adam’s feet. Second, Tsarina’s praying place with a hipped canopy above.
Legend has it that in the winter of 1941, when the Nazis were about to enter Moscow, Stalin had secretly ordered a service to be held in the Dormition Cathedral to pray for the country's rescue from the invading Germans.
Guess what happened?
God had answered to that pray by literally freezing the German war machine. In Russia, winter too is a blessing in disguise. If you haven’t experienced it then you won’t realize, how the Russians endure it. While walking out of the museum, the minus 10 degree Fahrenheit ran a shiver through my spine, as if warning : Napoleon, Hitler or no matter what you are, come to conquer and I will freeze.
Let’s wait a bit for more of Moscow to appear soon.
(To be continued)
The writer is Current Affairs Analyst, The Daily Star.
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