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Exhibition “Sholokhov’s Personages in Cinema”

In the Year of Russian Cinema, the Museum-Reserve of M.A.Sholokhov will show an interesting exhibition project “Sholokhov’s Personages in Cinema”, which will begin its run on April 28, in “Sholokhov-Centre” in Rostov-on-Don. The exhibition will display the materials telling about all the 18 feature films made after the writer’s works.

Making the project the group of authors has done a lot. We contacted the world-known film studios including the Film Concern “Mosfilm” and M.Gorky Film Studio to provide the film shooting equipment, screenplays, film fragments, video fragments of a shooting process, cinema posters in high resolution. The Rostov branch of S.Gerasimov State Cinematography Institute is ready to provide its unique museum exhibits – the field equipment of 1922, filming devices of 1920s, 1930s, film projectors of 1930s, 1940s, 1960s, and others. The Sholokhov District Administration transferred to the Museum-Reserve a stationary film projector of 1972, which was kept in the Palace of Culture in Vyoshenskaya. It is dear for us, as it was used for showing the premiere of the film “They Fought for Their Country” with M.A.Sholokhov present.

The thematic exhibition comprises four big sections: Filming of “The Quiet Don”; Filming of “Tales from the Don” and “Virgin Soil Upturned”; Filming of “The Fate of a Man” and “They Fought for Their Country”; The picture palace in Stanitsa Vyoshenskaya of 1963.

The interactive screen will show fragments of the four documentaries about shooting the screen versions of Sholokhov’s works. The monitor screens in each of the halls will demonstrate an online show of feature films, colourful posters, film fragments, episodes of the film shooting process, screenplays, and others. The centre of each hall will be occupied by installations displaying film shooting equipment.

The first, the biggest, hall will tell about the four film adaptations of the novel “And Quiet Flows the Don” by M.A.Sholokhov beginning with the silent film of 1930 and ending with the televersion of 2015. The exhibition will display the museum objects referring to shooting the films and a typology of objects from the times narrated. There are stage costumes presented to the Museum by the film crew of S.Ursulyak, and a makeshift shooting ground with an interactive banner will take the visitors back to the atmosphere of shooting the film “The Quiet Don” by S.Gerasimov.

The second hall is devoted to the writer’s early works and the novel “Virgin Soil Upturned”. The guests will learn about the history of the films “The Shame-Child”, “A Mortal Enemy”, “The Don Story”, “Unbidden Love”, will know about the memories and letters to M.A.Sholokhov by A.Y.Vitol, a playwright and screenwriter. The showcases will exhibit the items of the time: a military hat (“Budyonnovka”), a sabre, a bayonet of the Civil War time, agricultural equipment and clothes of 1930s, the time of collectivization.

The third hall shows the materials connected with filming of the “The Fate of a Man” and “They Fought for Their Country”: documents, letters, museum items of the time of the Great Patriotic War – weapon, articles of the uniform, equipment and others. A big showcase in the centre of the hall will display a film projector associated with the premiere show of the film “They Fought for Their Country”, where M. Sholokhov was present.

In the fourth hall, the visitors will see the premiere of the film “When Cossacks Cry” (film director Y.Morgunov). The film premiere took place in 1963, in Stanitsa Vyoshenskaya, with M.A.Sholokhov present among the spectators. A poster stand, benches by the house of culture, a queue to the cinema box-office to buy tickets will take you to the atmosphere of those years; and the recreated cinema hall with the film projector and the rows of spectator seats for you to take and see the film will recover the forgotten feelings of the Soviet time spectator.

The exhibition will open on April 28, 2016. You are welcome to: 125/69 Bolshaya Sadovaya Str., “Sholokhov-Centre” of the Museum-Reserve of M.A.Sholokhov, Rostov-on-Don.

Visiting hours: 10.00–17.00 (Monday is day off).

The price of tickets: 200 Rub, tour service: 150 Rub.

Irina Koveshnikova