LPR restored 74 historical and art objects during the past year and a half

11.10.2016, DPR.

Since the beginning of 2015, Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR) restored 74 historical and art objects, LPR Minister of Culture, Sport and Youth Oksana Kokotkina informed Lugansk Information Center.

She reminded that 3649 objects were included in the Official register of the cultural heritage objects of LPR. Many of these objects were in need for restoration even before the beginning of the civil war in Ukraine.

86 cultural and historical objects and memorials were severely damaged by Ukrainian army’s shellings. These were mainly the monuments dedicated to the events of the Great Patriotic War. Two mass graves of the soldiers-liberators were completely destroyed.

The objects of the architectural heritage of Lugansk city were also heavily damaged. For example, Museum of History and Culture of Lugansk located in the building of the former City Duma (Council), built in 1880, as well as the house of the landlord Golub, built in 1772.

A total of 140 historical objects and objects of monumental art, including those which were already in bad condition before the war, were in need of repair and restoration by 2015.

The restoration was launched immediately after the active battles subsided. During the past year and a half, 74 monuments were restored, including the mass grave “We Shall Never Forget, We Shall Never Forgive”¹ of victims of fascism and a mass grave of the Soviet soldiers-liberators in the 9th May name’s public garden in Lugansk.

Another 66 objects are about to be restored. For example, “Ostraya Mogila” (“Sharp Grave”)², “For the Fighters of Revolution” memorials, monuments to the Soviet soldiers-liberators, to miners of “Menzhinsky” mine killed during the Great Patriotic War; to the inventor of the world’s first coal  mining machine Aleksey Bakhmutsky; to the famous Soviet writer Boris Gorbatov, born in Pervomaysk town of LPR; commemorative sign in honor of the soldier-miners killed during 1941-1945, as well as the mass graves of the Soviet soldiers in Pervomaysk town, Stakhanov town and Veselaya Gora village of Slavyanoserbsky district. The monument to Prince Igor³, located at the contact line between Lugansk and Stanitsa Luganskaya village, also needs large restoration work.

The repair and the restoration works require significant resources, both financial and human. On behalf of the LPR Head Igor Plotnitsky, the Ministry of Culture, Sport, and Youth is already negotiating with the representatives of the Russian Federation on the help in this field, though, of course, the people of Lugansk are also working on this problem.

In 2015, over 400 memorials and commemorative places were restored with the help of the administrations of towns and districts of the Republic during the month of the renovation of the cultural heritage objects held on the occasion of the 70th Anniversary of the Victory in the Great Patriotic War. The public movement “Peace to Lugansk Land” also organized additional works on the renovation of 300 historical and monumental art objects of the Republic in the frameworks of the project “We Shall Never Forget, We Shall Never Forgive!”. Schoolchildren and students of the Republic were actively involved in these works.

“We are glad that the children and youth readily respond, take part in the renovation and restoration of our monuments and consciously work on the preservation of the history of our land. This means that the traditions of respect for their own spiritual and historical background, which have always been peculiar to the people of Lugansk land, will be continued. By restoring the monuments, we are preserving the link between the generations, our culture, and historical memory,” the Minister said.

On September 23rd, the LPR Head Igor Plotnitsky authorized the Ministry of Culture, Sport, and Youth to intensify the work on the restoration of the historical and art objects damaged in the shellings of the LPR territory by the Ukrainian military.

According to the information of the Ministry, the cultural heritage of LPR includes 3649 objects, including 2933 archeological, 413 historical, 77 monumental art, 219 architectural and town building objects as well as 5 objects of garden design and 2 landscape objects.

Source: LuganskInformCenter

¹ The slogan, which appeared, for the first time, in the newspaper “Krasnaya Zvezda” (“Red Star”) on October 14th, 1941. It was the title of the war letter from the North-Western direction of the front written by Pyotr Pavlenko, a Soviet writer, screenwriter and war correspondent. Citing the recon information and evidences of the witnesses, he described the barbarities and brutality of the fascists and Nazis towards the Soviet people, which started at the very beginning of the Great Patriotic War. His correspondence concludes with the phrase that expresses disgust towards the hateful enemy and hope for the victory of the Soviet people – “The end of these beasts, which look like people by mistake, will be terrible!”

² Memorial dedicated to the heaviest battles of the Civil War (1917-1923) between the Red Army and White Guards and also to the victory in the Great Patriotic War. In 1919, during the hard battles against Denikin’s troops of the White Guards, the people of Lugansk had made a human chain from an ammunition plant to the place, where the memorial was later erected, passing the ammunition from hand to hand.

³ Prince Igor was a Rus’ prince immortalized in an anonymous epic poem “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign” written in the Old East Slavic language. It is an epic poem telling about a failed battle of Prince Igor against the Polovtsians of the Don River region. Alexander Borodin adapted this poem as an opera, which became one of the greatest classics of Russian theater.