St.Petersburg Cultural Festival in Brno

The Russian president's aide Sergey Yastrzhembsky has supported the idea of staging a St.Petersburg cultural festival in Brno, Southern Moravia, timed to the city's 300th anniversary. He said it would add up to the image of the Northern capital and Russia abroad.

In his letter to the festival's sponsors, Yastrzhembsky who worked as a Russian ambassador in Slovakia and is an expert on Central European region, notes that this cultural project will expose wide Czech public to the St.Petersburg jubilee.

Czechia's Culture Minister Pavel Dostal has taken under his patronage the coming event in Brno. He expressed conviction that the project was a brilliant opportunity to admire the cultural tradition of Russia's Northern capital and would make a major contribution to the development of Czech-Russian links.

According to Denis Grishchenko, Russian consular in Brno, "this festival is likely to be as long as a year." The event is to be inaugurated on March 9 with a gala-concert of St.Pete ballet stars. On the programme are all manner of performances as well as a week of movies by St.Petersburg film directors. The city theatre will show "Oedipus Rex", a production of St.Petersburg's Theatre on Liteiny. To perform during the Moravia Autumn international musical days this October will be the Big Orchestra of the St.Petersburg state philharmonic society.

The festival will wind up in November-December 2003 with an exhibition in the Moravian gallery from the State Hermitage.

St.Petersburg's cultural workers will give performances also in Prague. It is the RIA Novosti agency that will be an information sponsor of the festival.