Memory of the World: The 2nd Centenary of Taras Shevchenko’s Birth Historical and Documentary Exhibition in St. Petersburg

The historical and documentary exhibition dedicated to the 200th anniversary of Taras Shevchenko opened on April 17, 2014, in St. Petersburg, in the Tauride Palace, the headquarters of the Inter-Parliamentary Assembly of the States - the Members of the Commonwealth of Independent States.

The exhibition presents the copies and the originals of the documents on the life and works of the famous “Kobzar” (kobza-player, poet, bard), from the Russian State Archive of Literature and Art (known as RGALI), the Central State Historical Archive of St. Petersburg, the National Library, the Research Museum of the Russian Academy of Arts and the Institute of Russian Literature.

The exhibition consists of the drawings and etchings of Taras Shevchenko, the poems and letters of the great Ukrainian poet, the editions of the famous “Kobzar” in Russian, Ukrainian, Armenian, Azerbaijani, Kazakh and other languages, copies of the manuscripts of the great poet, documents of mid XIX - early XX centuries, including the official papers of III Branch of own of Her Imperial Majesty Chancery, St. Petersburg Committee for the Press, and the Russian Academy of Arts. The researchers are familiar with some of the documents presented at the exhibition, but some are being shown for the first time.

Russian State Archive of Literature and Art has offered the exhibition a high-quality digital copies of the documents from its collections: Shevchenko’s poems, "If Over Muddy Swamps..." and "Spring Evening", the etchings completed by Taras Shevchenko, the portraits of Shevchenko and his ambience and other materials.