monastery on the island solovky | photo © bastiaan kwast
lecture about the construction of the white sea canal in northern russia. _it was constructed by forced labour in a period of twenty months, and officially opened on 2 august 1933. _bastiaan focused on the artists who paid tribute to the project by means of photograpy, literature, film and theatre. _the quintessential message of these works of art was: the harsh karelian nature had turned thieves and counter-revolutionaries - the canal workers - into proper socialist citizens. _the propaganda was artfully done, with a touch of insanity, considering the huge number of workers who lost their lives during the construction.
introduction to the lecture
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fragment from the documentary belomoro-baltiysky vodnyj put (the water way of the white sea - baltic sea) shot by aleksandr lemberg in 1933 about the construction of the white sea canal
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kremlin,
do you see that wheelbarrow down there?
that is me
in the wheelbarrow
i carry the soil of socialism
(igor terentjev)
'music speeds the men on the sluice' (photo aleksandr rodchenko)
'povenets' agit-brigade, lead for a while by the imprisoned futurist poet igor terentjev (1892–1937)'
cover of- and three pages from the december 1912 issue of the magazine 'ussr im bau', dedicated to the construction of the canal (photo's aleksandr rodchenko):
'stalin, vorosjilov and kirov at the white sea canal'
'povenets' agit-brigade'
historian yuri dmitriev combines archival- with field research on the mass graves along the banks of the white sea canal. _still from the documentary bitva za sever (the battle of the north).
photo © yuri dmitriev
photo © yuri dmitriev
bastiaan composed a list of literature and films about the solevyetsky-islands and the white sea canal. _you can download the pdf-file here.