Remembering the Tarkovskys

The creative project “Father and Son,” dedicated to Arseny and Andrei Tarkovsky has recently been launched in France, reports the press service of the cultural-educational center Master Class. Kyiv’s chamber orchestra New Era Orchestra gave two concerts, conducted by Tetiana Kalinichenko, in Paris and Fontainebleau. The musicians presented the program “Every Sound is Echoed on the Earth.” In the evening the audience heard Eduard Artemyev’s futuristic arrangements, as well as the works of classical and contemporary composers, which were not simply used by Andrei Tarkovsky in his films, but also gave a special meaning to them. Yevhen Utkin, the head of the KM Core and co-author of the pro­ject called the concerts of the New Era Orchestra in France “a cultural expansion into old Europe. The soirees met an amazing success in France.” Sharing her impressions about the tour, Kalinichenko admitted that their team had taken a risk, a venture, not knowing what would come of it, but the result exceeded their expectations.

According to KM Core head, the project “Father and Son” is a cultural phenomenon of global significance, going beyond national borders. In terms of its content, it is a supra-national cultural product, like the modern art festival Hohol-Fest and other initiatives of KM Core and Master Class. It was created in Ukraine, based on Slavic heritage and designed for export. “The mission of Master Class is to create an intellectual milieu, a groundwork where the grains of international culture will be grown, with its heart located in Kyiv,” Utkin underlined. “In the concert hall Cortot in Paris I, as every musician present, felt as if we stayed in the room of desires from Andrei Tarkovsky’s film Stalker,” Kali­nichenko said. “The acoustics of the hall are different, and it is an immense pleasure to perform there, and the final ovation and recognition of the French audience (which is exacting and coddled by good performers) is worth a lot.”

It will be reminded that the creative project took place with the participation of the family and friends of the Tarkovskys, specifically Arseny Tarkovsky, Andrei Tarkovsky’s son, Aleksandr Gordon, Marina Tarkovsky’s husband and Andrei Tarkovsky’s fellow student, and Layla Alexander Garret, who was the director’s assistant during the filming of his last movie Sacrifice et al.

Moving forward, the Master Class project plans to go to the poet’s native city, Kirovohrad, in spring 2011, in order to erect a monument to the Ukrainian-born man of great talent, Arseny Tarkovsky.