Mintimer Shaimiev visits island town of Sviyazhsk

On August 13,Tatarstan State Counsellor, Chairman of Guardian board of Republican Revival fund of history and culture monuments Mintimer Shaimiev with Executive Director of Regional Foundation “Revival”, Deputy Chairman of Tatarstan State Council  Tatiana Larionova, Tatarstan Minister of Culture Airat Sibgatullin, Chairman of Tatarstan State Committee on tourism Sergey Ivanov and other officials visited the island town of Sviyazhsk. 

Guests saw the exhibition “The Saint Warrior Christopher” to be opened  on August 8 in the State Historical, Architectural, and Art Museum “Island Town of Sviyazhsk”.  It should be mentioned that the exhibition is a large interregional museum project with participation of 17 museums and open-air museums from 11 regions of Russia. 

The purpose of exhibition project is to show the significance of the image of the Saint Warrior Christopher in the world spiritual culture and to establish the role of the Assumption Cathedral fresco of the Saint Christopher in the history of Russian Orthodox Christian culture.

Mintimer Shaimiev highly appreciated the exhibition arrangement and outlined that the exposition is valuable because they are preparing for nomination of Sviyazhsk’s Assumption Cathedral to be inscribed into the UNESCO World Heritage List. In addition, Mintimer Shaimiev expressed his gratitude to museum representatives  who brought valuable exhibits and those who allowed to show these icons and frescos  in Sviyazhsk museum.

Later on the same day, opening of Children's Museum Centre to be designed for tourists with pre-school and primary school aged children was held.  While sightseeing, parents can leave their children under the care of a teacher. 

The centre is a place for children’s cultural and creativity development. Owing to specialized installations, the interactive game area and  training programmes, the centre allows its young visitors to learn the local cultural heritage - fairy tales of Russian poet Alexander Pushkin and famous Tatar  educator Qayum Nasiri. 

Then, guests went to the river-boat station where work on setting up wood archaeology museum is underway.  The museum is also supposed to be an educational centre of Kazan Federal University. 

Unique remains of  Tatar settlement’s wooden constructions dated to 16-17 centuries  were discovered at the site of excavations. 

“All construction work is expected to be finished in November this year. Then, we will begin the museumification”, Mintimer  Shaimiev said. He  added that all plans have been realized and main task is to organize  all services for tourists and to improve logistics. 

In conclusion, Tatarstan State Counsellor held a meeting with archeologists of Khalikov Institute of Archaeology and congratulated them on Archeologist’s Day to be celebrated on August 15.