Sacred Texts through the Eyes of Contemporary Artists at the Peter and Paul Fortress

The exhibition Sacred Texts through the Eyes of Contemporary Artists opened on the 24th of December at the recently renovated hall of the Tsar Bastion of the Peter and Paul Fortress.

The exhibition unites more than a hundred of original illustrations to biblical texts made by contemporary artists. They were created for the Sacred Texts series dedicated to the religions of the people of the world and published by the Vita Nova publishing house. There have already been issued six editions, and a number of projects are on the way. The exhibition presents already published illustrations and those which are going to be included in the new volumes.

The first book of the Old Testament called the Genesis is illustrated by the renowned artist from St. Petersburg Boris Zabirokhin. The illustrations of the well-known St. Petersburg graphic artist Alexander Lytkin depict the biblical stories included in the Exodus. The works of the Moscow graphic artist Igor Oleynikov illustrate the Book of Joshua, the Book of Judges, and the Book of Ruth. Ekaterina Posetselskaya made illustrations for the Book of Daniel. Three books of the Old Testament — the Book of Proverbs, the Ecclesiastes or the Preacher, and the Song of Solomon were illustrated by the renowned Moscow artist Yuly Perevezentsev. The illustrations to the Gospel of Mark created by the St. Petersburg artist Apollinaria Mishina remind the visitors of the exhibition about the unique, small circulation project of the artist, a book of calligraphy under the title Holy Gospel of Mark created in the etching technique with the handwritten text in the Church Slavonic and Russian languages. The exhibition also features the illustrations to the special edition of ‘The Book of Joshua. The Book of Judges. The Book of Ruth’ created by Igor Oleynikov, to the Book of Job by Petr Perevezentsev, to the Book of Psalms by Sergey Rusakov, to the Book of the Wisdom of Solomon and the Wisdom of Sirach by Andrey Mishin.

Opening the exhibition, the PR-director of the Vita Nova publishing house Natalia Delgyado said, ‘If there were no Holy Bible, the fine art would not be the same as we know it. Go to the Hermitage and see what percentage of the works of art is dedicated to biblical subjects. And now we show you an unexpected view of contemporary artists’.

Apollinaria Mishina says she worked on the illustrations for the Gospel of Mark for 5 years. The most important evangelical quote which served her as a guide during her work was ‘The kingdom of God is like a man who cast seed upon the soil; and he goes to bed at night and gets up by day, and the seed sprouts and grows — how, he himself does not know’ (Mark 4:26-27). The same about me, says the artist, I had no idea what will be, it just ‘grew on its own’ by Divine Providence.

The exhibition will be open until the 31st of January.

Sacred Texts through the Eyes of Contemporary Artists at the Peter and Paul Fortress