Presentation of Chagall’s painting in Minsk hailed as historic event for Belarus

The exhibition of a single masterpiece – Marc Chagall’s painting The Promenade from the collection of the St. Petersburg-based State Russian Museum – at the National Art Museum is a historic event for Belarus and for everyone who loves art. Belarusian Culture Minister Ruslan Chernetsky shared this opinion with journalists before the official opening of the exhibition, BelTA has learned.

Belarusians will be able to see Marc Chagall’s painting The Promenade from 8 April through 6 July. “One of the most iconic and famous works by Marc Chagall, which everyone should know about, is being exhibited in his homeland for the first time. This is a historic event for our country and for everyone who loves art,” said Ruslan Chernetsky.

“Chagall is our compatriot who made paintings about Vitebsk Oblast. Huge gratitude to the Russian Museum for allowing Belarusian viewers to see such a masterpiece of world classical art. I know how complicated it is to organize the exhibition of even a single painting of such a high level of artistic execution and significance for world culture as a whole. I thank everyone who participated in this work. It is truly worth a great deal,” he added, urging everyone to visit the museum and be sure to admire this masterpiece of world pictorial art.

Director General of the State Russian Museum Alla Manilova emphasized that the Days of the Russian Museum will be held at the National Art Museum from 8 through 10 April. Together with the exhibition of the single masterpiece by Marc Chagall, this is one of the key events for the museum in 2026.

“We remember that Chagall left a huge legacy, and it is scattered primarily across France and the world. When it comes to what is in Russia, of course, The Promenade is Chagall’s central work, the second part of a famous triptych. The first part of the triptych is The Double Portrait. It was gifted to France and is located at the Pompidou Center while the third part – Over the Town – is in the permanent collection of the Tretyakov Gallery,” she explained.

According to Alla Manilova, it was the Chagall collection, which the Russian Museum acquired once, that allowed the institution to form the largest, most complete, and most valuable collection of Russian avant-garde art in the world.

“Let us not forget that Chagall was born near Vitebsk, was raised here in your blessed land, and took his first lessons in Vitebsk before coming to the imperial capital and then moving elsewhere. In all his recollections and aspirations his incredible, magical, romantic love for Vitebsk is always emphasized. It is a love that the artist carried throughout his long life. Perhaps it was Vitebsk that gave Chagall that incredible strength that fueled his natural genius. He painted Vitebsk everywhere. In The Promenade we see Vitebsk. We also see Vitebsk in Over the Town,” added the director general of the Russian Museum.

“When Chagall came to Petersburg for the first time in so many decades in the 1970s, he came to the Russian Museum, and the museum organized a single masterpiece exhibition for him as for the first time the museum practiced the genre that is now known well in Europe. And this century we are repeating this kind of an exhibition not in Petersburg, but here in Minsk,” she noted.

Director General of the National Art Museum of Belarus Irina Matyas thanked the ministries of culture of Belarus and Russia for their support as well as the staff of the National Art Museum. “You are a wonderful team. Without you it would have been impossible. And special thanks to those who met the valuable cargo at night. We truly will have a holiday for these three months,” Irina Matyas concluded.