On October 30, 2017, the opening of the national memorial “Wall of Sorrow” dedicated to the victims took place in Moscow. political repression Soviet era, reports IA Regnum.
The opening ceremony was attended by the President Russian Federation Vladimir Putin, Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus' Kirill, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin. They said solemn words and laid flowers at the monument.
The opening of the “Wall of Sorrow” occurred after a meeting of the Council for the Development of Civil Society, at which issues related to ensuring the environmental and electoral rights of citizens were discussed. Vladimir Putin, speaking at this meeting, emphasized that the year of the centenary of the revolution should draw a line under the split in society.
“The very memory, clarity and unambiguous position regarding these dark events serves as a powerful warning against their repetition. The terrible past of repression cannot be erased from the memory of the people and cannot be justified by anything,” Vladimir Putin noted.
According to the president, the consequences of political repression “are still being felt,” but this is not a reason to settle scores. The monument, located on Sakharov Avenue and representing a thirty-meter bronze bas-relief, was described by Vladimir Putin as “grand and piercing.”
After the president's speech, a funeral composition was performed by the choir. Then the cordon around the monument was lifted, and everyone was able to enter the territory. People laid flowers, prayed and lit candles. Opponents of the “Wall of Sorrow” also gathered at the ceremony; some organized single pickets.
Memorial "Wall of Sorrow"
The “Wall of Sorrow” memorial was erected in accordance with Decree of the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin dated September 30, 2015 No. 487 “On the construction of a memorial to victims of political repression.”
In 2015 State Museum history of the Gulag held a competition for memorial projects. The jury included 25 public figures and human rights activists: L.M. Alekseeva, N.D. Solzhenitsyn, V.P. Lukin, D.A. Granin and others. A total of 336 projects were presented. The winner of the competition was the project of sculptor G.V. Frangulyan "Wall of Sorrow".
To raise funds for the creation and installation of the memorial, the Foundation “Perpetuating the Memory of Victims of Political Repression” was established. The foundation has collected more than 43 million rubles in donations. The Moscow Government also took part in financing the project.
The composition of the square on which the memorial is installed includes “weeping stones” brought from 82 regions of Russia. The inscription “Know... Do not forget... Condemn... Forgive!” is placed on the stones! by N.D. Solzhenitsyna.
The “Wall of Sorrow” is a double-sided high-relief wall with several arches, composed of the outlines of numerous figures symbolizing those killed as a result of repression. The length of the wall is 30 meters, height - 6. Along the edges of the monument there are two relief tablets with the word “Remember” written in 22 languages (in 15 languages of the former republics of the USSR, in German and 6 official UN languages).
The monument was erected at the intersection of Academician Sakharov Avenue and the Garden Ring.
The Wall of Sorrow memorial is open to everyone.
Memory of the victims of political repression
The process of rehabilitation of victims of mass political repression in the USSR from the late 1920s to the early 1950s. began after the death of Joseph Stalin in 1953.
In 1961 at the XXII Congress Communist Party Soviet Union(CPSU) First Secretary of the Central Committee (Central Committee) of the CPSU Nikita Khrushchev first voiced the idea of erecting a monument to the victims of political repression.
At the same time, archives and museums began to collect memoirs and biographical information about the executed and injured citizens. In 1964, after Leonid Brezhnev came to leadership in the USSR and the end of Khrushchev’s “thaw,” the process of rehabilitation and perpetuation of the memory of victims of repression was suspended.
In September 1987, a commission of the Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee was created to further study materials related to political repression. In 1987-1990 A number of legislative acts were issued, including resolutions of the Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee “On the construction of a monument to the victims of repression” (July 4, 1988) and “On perpetuating the memory of victims of repression of the period of the 30-40s and early 50s” (June 28, 1989 of the year).
Monument "Solovetsky Stone"
In the late 1980s - early 1990s. activists of the Memorial society proposed to erect a monument to the victims of political repression in Moscow. By agreement with the Moscow City Council, the location for it was chosen in the park of the Polytechnic Museum on Dzerzhinsky Square (now Lubyanka Square) opposite the building of the former NKVD (KGB).
The monument was a granite boulder brought from the territory of the former Solovetsky special purpose camp ( Arhangelsk region). The stone was chosen by journalist Mikhail Butorin (at that time chairman of the board of the Arkhangelsk regional organization “Conscience”) and Arkhangelsk architect Gennady Lyashenko.
The grand opening of the monument, called the “Solovetsky Stone,” took place on October 30, 1990. The artist-architect S. Smirnov and designer V. Corsi took part in the creation of the sculptural composition.
In February 2008, it became known about plans to move the Solovetsky stone for construction work. In May 2008, after protests by human rights activists, they decided to leave the stone in place and assign it the status of a landmark.
Other famous monuments to victims of political terror
Today in Russia, hundreds of monuments, obelisks, steles, foundation stones, memorial signs, crosses and memorial plaques related to the history of repressions and the memory of their victims have been installed at the sites of mass executions, on the territory of former camp centers and in the settlements of special settlers.
Large monumental forms were also installed - chapels, belfries, walls of memory, sculptural compositions, memorials, memorial complexes.
Here are some of the most famous monuments and memorial complexes to victims of political terror:
Monument to the “Victims of Political Repression” in St. Petersburg. Located opposite the Crosses prison on the Robespierre Embankment). Opened on April 28, 1995. The author of the project is sculptor Mikhail Shemyakin. The sculptures in the form of two bronze sphinxes were cast in the USA and presented by the author to the city.
Sculpture "Moloch of totalitarianism". Opened on May 15, 1996 at the entrance to the Levashovskoye Memorial Cemetery in St. Petersburg. Authors: Nina Galitskaya and Vitaly Gambarov.
Memorial "Mask of Sorrow" in Magadan. Opened June 12, 1996. Authors: Ernst Neizvestny and Kamil Kazaev.
Memorial and museum complex in memory of deported peoples in the village of Nasyr-Kort (Ingushetia). Opened on February 23, 1997. Author of the project: Murad Polonkoev.
Bas-relief “Execution with Guardian Angel” in the Sandarmokh tract in Karelia. Opened on August 22, 1998 (under reconstruction since 2006) on the territory of the memorial cemetery. Authors: Grigory Saltup and Nikolai Ovchinnikov.
Memorial complex "Katyn" in the Smolensk region. Opened on July 28, 2000. Unites Polish military cemetery and burials of Soviet citizens - victims of political repression. The authors of the project for the Polish part are sculptors Zdislaw Pidak, Andrzej Solyga, Wieslaw and Jacek Synakiewicz. The Russian part was designed in creative workshop number 4 of the Union of Architects of Russia under the leadership of Mikhail Khazanov.
Memorial complex "Mednoye" in the Tver region. Opened on September 2, 2000. Polish prisoners of war, executed in 1940, and Soviet citizens (victims of the repressions of 1937-1938) are buried here. The design of the Russian part of the Memorial was carried out by Workshop No. 4 of the Union of Architects of the Russian Federation under the leadership of Mikhail Khazanov, the chief architect is Nikita Shangin. The authors of the concept of the Polish cemetery: a creative group led by sculptors Zdzislaw Pidek and Andrzej Solyga.
"Monument to the Victims of Political Repression" in Ufa (Bashkortostan). Installed on December 23, 2000. Authors: Yuri Soldatov and Leonid Dubinsky.
Worship cross on the territory of the former Butovo training ground(one of the sites of mass executions; near the village of Drozhzhino, Leninsky district, Moscow region). Placed on August 7, 2007 on a foundation made of stones from the Solovetsky Islands and elements of previously destroyed Orthodox churches.
On December 10, 2014, the “Last Address” campaign started in Moscow. The goal of this project is to install personal signs of a single type on the facades of houses, the addresses of which became the last lifetime addresses of the victims of these repressions. St. Petersburg, Arkhangelsk, Barnaul, Irkutsk and other cities of the Russian Federation already participate in the program.
“Millions of people were declared enemies of the people, were shot or maimed, went through the torment of prisons or camps and exile,” Vladimir said at the ceremony, “the terrible past cannot be erased from the national memory” - and at the same time it cannot be justified by “any higher the so-called benefits of the people."
Together with Patriarch Kirill and the mayor of Moscow, the president laid flowers at the “Wall of Sorrow.”
Throughout Monday evening, live instrumental music will be played on the square near the memorial, informational broadcasts will be broadcast, and thematic stories will also be shown. After the opening ceremony, the “Wall of Sorrow” was open to everyone.
The “Wall of Sorrow” was not closed with barriers even before the opening. It would be difficult to do this: it is a sculptural group of impressive size: a double-sided high relief 30 meters long and 6 meters high, located in a semicircle.
It took more than 80 tons of bronze.
The basis of the composition is made up of faceless figures soaring upward - as sculptor Georgy explained to Gazeta.Ru, they should symbolize fragility human life in the face of a totalitarian system. According to the artist, the shape of the monument should convey to people the feeling of the “roar of terror” and the “gnashing of evil.” In the monument, which actually consists of figures molded together, there are gaps made in the form of human silhouettes through which viewers can pass - this will allow them to feel that anyone can become a victim, explains Frangulyan. Along the edges of the monument there will be stone pillars - “tablets” with the word “remember” in different languages.
The area in front of the “Wall of Sorrow” is lined with stones brought from the places where victims of political repression were imprisoned.
“The image of the monument arose in me in five minutes,” Frangulyan told Gazeta.Ru, “everything on the “Wall of Sorrow” is not at all accidental: it is a complex compositional series. Every stroke is made by my hands. To date, this is my most important work.”
The total cost of the project was 460 million rubles. The Fund “Perpetuating the Memory of Victims of Political Repression” was involved in collecting funds for it. At the same time, it allocated 300 million rubles. A significant portion came from private donations. Frangulyan's project won the competition, to which a total of 340 concepts were submitted. The jury included the chairman of the board of the company, the chairman, the coordinator of the Moscow Helsinki Group and the director. All of them are announced as participants in the ceremony.
The opening date was chosen long ago and in advance - October 30 marks the day of political repression; The HRC meeting on that day was devoted to the problem of perpetuating the memory of victims in Russia. A day earlier, the “Return of Names” event, timed to coincide with the day of remembrance of victims of political repression, took place at another monument that still served as a memorial - the Solovetsky Stone.
About two thousand people lined up to briefly say into the microphone the names, place of residence and date of execution of the victims of repression, including their relatives.
The “Solovetsky Stone” took its place on Lubyanka Square in the late 80s, when the topic of repression began to be actively discussed again for the first time after the “thaw”. A large boulder brought from the islands where former monastery SLON was located - Solovetsky Special Purpose Camp, which was de facto a former political prison. The stone was placed on Lubyanka Square as a sign that one day a full-fledged memorial would be built in Moscow. However, the issue of its construction was returned only 25 years later, when in August 2015 the concept of state policy to perpetuate the memory of victims of political repression was approved.
"Wall of Sorrow"- a monument to the victims of political repression, opened in the park at the intersection of Academician Sakharov Avenue since October 30, 2017.
The memorial has impressive size. Its central part was a semicircular bronze wall (35 meters long, 6 meters high) - a double-sided bas-relief depicting about 600 impersonal human figures, directed upward and forever frozen in motion. People's heads are lowered down, and intertwined bodies merge into a single monolith; Between their three-dimensional figures, several arches in the form of human silhouettes are left in the wall, through which you can walk. On both sides of the wall there are bronze slabs on which the word “Remember” is carved in 22 languages, and around it there are several spotlights mounted on massive granite pillars: at night their rays are directed into the sky. Behind the semicircular monument is framed by a retaining wall made of granite slabs, as if they were uplifted rocks. The monolith of the wall symbolizes the tragedy of human destinies and persons erased from life, as if they had never existed. This composition of the monument is intended to draw attention to the fragility of human life, vulnerable to the machine of repression, and invites awareness of the tragic consequences of authoritarianism, so as not to repeat the tragedy of the past in the future.
The area around the memorial is lined with stones from the most famous Gulag camps, places of mass executions and burials, regions and settlements, whose residents were subjected to forced deportation. Among them are stones from Irkutsk, Vorkuta, Ukhta, Bashkiria, Khabarovsk Territory, Pskov, Vologda and Smolensk regions, Levashovskaya wasteland (St. Petersburg), Zolotaya Gora (Chelyabinsk region), Butovo test site (Moscow region) - from a total of 58 Russian regions.
The monument fits well into its surroundings, which also became part of the memorial: the Soviet-era administrative building located behind it, gray and bulky, became against its background a living symbol of power and clumsiness.
History of the creation of the monument
For the first time, the idea of installing a monument to victims of repression in Moscow arose back in 1961 and was put forward personally by Nikita Khrushchev as part of the program to combat Stalin’s personality cult, however, this was not realized. IN Soviet years the monument was never erected; Only in 1990, with the participation of activists of the Memorial society, did the Memorial appear on Lubyanka Square, to which the city limited itself. Meanwhile, the interested public believed that this was not enough.
In 2014, Russian President Vladimir Putin was presented with a draft program to perpetuate the memory of victims of repression, which included the installation of a monument; in the same year, a decision was made to install it and a location was chosen - a square at the intersection of Academician Sakharov Avenue with Sadovaya-Spasskaya Street.
In May 2015, a competition for monument designs began. During the competition, out of 336 projects presented to the public, a winner was chosen - the project of the monument “Wall of Sorrow” by sculptor Georgy Frangulyan, which was approved for work. The total cost of construction of the memorial was 460 million rubles, of which 300 million were allocated from the city budget, and the remaining 160 were supposed to be collected by public donations; however, in the end they were able to collect only 45 million from donations, and the city also took on the missing amount. It is curious that some donated bronze instead of money. The casting of bronze figures was carried out in a workshop in Khimki near Moscow, and the monument was delivered to the installation site in parts.
The opening of the memorial took place on October 30, 2017, the ceremony was attended by Russian President Vladimir Putin, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus' Kirill, members of the HRC and its chairman Mikhail Fedotov, sculptor Georgy Frangulyan and other persons.
In general, the townspeople accepted the installation of the monument quite neutrally - some approved that a memorial to the victims of political repression appeared in Moscow, and some did not like the idea of a huge wall of corpses on the Garden Ring, but it did not cause any resonance. Whether the memorial will receive popular recognition or remain just a bronze colossus that you can fly past along Sadovoy is a matter of time.
Monument to the victims of political repression "Wall of Sorrow" located at the intersection of Academician Sakharov Avenue with Sadovaya-Spasskaya Street (in front of the Sogaz building). You can get to it on foot from metro stations "Red Gate" And "Chistye Prudy" Sokolnicheskaya line, "Turgenevskaya" Kaluga-Rizhskaya and "Sretensky Boulevard" Lyublinsko-Dmitrovskaya.
And then he took part in the opening ceremony of the “Wall of Sorrow” memorial to victims of political repression. If the opening of the “Wall” had taken place before the council, its participants would have had time to contact Putin with much more big amount proposals, but this time they had to be limited in time. Read about what fears human rights activists managed to convey to the president.
On this day, many people gathered on Academician Sakharov Avenue. Among those standing in the wind and rain were Gulag prisoners - already very elderly, politicians, human rights activists, and clergy. The thirty-meter-tall composition of bronze and granite seemed to hang over them in the thickening twilight. Chairs were placed in front of the monument for guests, and a low stage covered with black fabric was built for the speakers. When the lights were turned on, the patriarch’s doll shone like a white spot. Vladimir Putin, who arrived at the “Wall of Sorrow” a little late, examined the monument illuminated by spotlights and was pleased: he called the “wall” grandiose and piercing.
The monument, which was assembled in Khimki near Moscow, was delivered to the site back in August, but it was hidden by a dark canvas. The author of the project, a sculptor, selected from among three hundred applicants, spoke of his work as a mission and admitted: “There was nothing more significant in my life.” The sculptor created a pressing wall with rare gaps through which everyone can walk and feel the “sword of Damocles hanging over the crown of the head.”
And although the idea of erecting such a monument in the capital appeared a long time ago, the head of the Presidential Council for Human Rights defended it only in 2014. Putin supported the idea because “repressions cannot be forgotten or justified.” “Everyone could be brought against far-fetched and absolutely absurd charges, millions of people were declared enemies of the people, were shot or maimed, went through the torment of prisons, camps and exile,” he said at the opening of the “Wall of Sorrow.”
Photo: Natalya Seliverstova / RIA Novosti
In his speech, he nevertheless urged not to push society to the line of confrontation and to settle scores. “Now it is important for all of us to rely on the values of trust and stability,” Putin said. In conclusion, the president quoted the words of Natalya Solzhenitsyna, who was present at the opening: “Know, remember, condemn and only then forgive.” “Because we need to unite,” Solzhenitsyna later added.
Putin was late for the opening of the monument for an objective reason: before that, he held a meeting of the Human Rights Council in the Kremlin. And he began it with a minute of silence in memory of the founder of the Fair Aid Foundation, Elizaveta Glinka, and the film critic - they were both members of the Human Rights Council. And then, as a positive aspect, he noted that the number of NPOs recognized as foreign agents had been halved - from 165 to 89, and the annual amount of funds allocated for support non-profit organizations, grew sevenfold. Over five years, more than 22 billion rubles have been allocated for their development only within the framework of presidential grant support, Putin specified and invited human rights activists to a discussion.
Agreeing with these figures, the head of the Council asked to allow the Fund presidential grants receive and distribute donations from foreign corporations. According to him, this is especially important for human rights organizations, since Russian charities they are afraid to support them, and “taking money from foreign funds means signing up as foreign agents.”
The head of the Moscow Helsinki Group proposed re-establishing the presidential pardons council and declared her readiness to join it. She emphasized that there may be dishonest people on the regional pardon commissions: “It’s a painful place.” And she casually mentioned that she had known for many years and could vouch for the former governor Kirov region, who is under investigation: “He didn’t take bribes - he’s not that kind of person.” Alekseeva finished her thought with a call: “Vladimir Vladimirovich, be a merciful president in the eyes of people! Our people have a high price for mercy!”
Putin agreed to think about re-establishing the pardon council, but he disputed Belykh’s assessment and drew attention to dubious episodes of his actions. “You must agree that the explanation is still strange, according to which the governor of a constituent entity of Russia takes money from an entrepreneur not in Kirov, but in Moscow, not in his office, but in a restaurant, and not in rubles, but in dollars. Well, this is somehow very strange,” Putin said, at the same time noting that Belykh’s guilt would be determined by the court.
law enforcement agencies against demonstrators.
Another speaker, journalist Stanislav Kucher, who noted that the country has “a feeling of cold civil war, obscurantism,” from which people leave abroad, Putin objected: Russia is a free country, and it is normal that a person “worked somewhere, went somewhere, then returned.” In addition, according to his feelings, the number of Russians leaving has sharply decreased, many are returning today.
In his opinion, there are no hysterics associated with protests in Russia, but there are natural outbursts of protest sentiments to which the authorities must respond. “Look at the United States - there are hysterics there,” Putin suggested. - What is happening in Europe? God knows what!
