Resulting from my participation in a contest, I was proposed the creation of a bust monument of Fyodor Dostoyevsky for the city of Tallinn – as a gift to the Estonian capital from the Moscow city administration. The idea to erect this monument belonged to the Union of Slavic Enlightenment and Charitable Societies of Estonia.
I began my work on research without wasting any time. Little by little there came to be discerned two main versions: a bust in the classical manner, resembling the upper part of the figure in a design that was meant for Moscow city; and a more strongly dramatized version of the image, that was closer in spirit to the Russian symbolism of the early 20-th century – in which the spatial proportions, the plastic of the bust and of the pedestal were aesthetically closer to the value space of the sculptor – a fragment of the spiral-crater.
While I was working on this bust of Fyodor Mikhailovich, I did my best to render the state of the writer who was intently looking with his inner sight at the future condition of Russia – into the future state of all humanity.
The monument was unveiled by the representatives of the Moscow Government that gave it as a gift to Tallinn, and was consecrated by metropolitan bishop of Tallinn and All Estonia Cornelius, on 31 May 2002. The unveiling ceremony was carried out by Edgar Savisaar, Mayor of Tallinn; Alexander Muzykantskiy, head of the Moscow Government delegation; and Nikolay Solovey, chairman of the Union of Slavic Charity and Enlightening Organisations in Estonia. Valery Yevdokimov
September 4, 2003 |