Three Stops on a Trip to Russia

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Marina Vancatova in an interview
Autor:   České centrum - Český dům Moskva  

Last week was marked by a series of lectures on gorillas (and not only them) in Russia. 

First stop: May 19,. 2009 - Czech Culture Centre in Moscow.
That day, the Revealed exhibition officially opened on the premises of the Czech Culture Centre in Moscow, with the kind help of the centre's director Vlasta Smolakova and her team. The exhibition features 20 large-format panels authored by Miroslav Bobek, Khalil Baalbaki and Marek Vaclavik. This is the second venue in Russia that the exhibition has visited and I firmly hope it is not the last one. I told the guests about the objectives of the project and its colourful history. I mentioned Kamba's miscarriage and Kijivu's illness as well as joyful events, such as the birth of Tatu. I spoke about the Revealed project's far-reaching educational activities in Africa as well as its contribution to the protection of wild gorillas. The opening of the exhibition was attended by regular visitors to the Czech Culture Centre who are interested in Czech culture and all things Czech as well as Czech compatriots who live in Moscow. I was happy to see many colleagues of mine from the Lomonosov University and the Moscow Zoo. All the visitors showed active interest in the project and the life of gorillas in Prague's zoo. I can tell that the enormous success of the exhibition has led the the Darwin Museum in Moscow - which is, in my opinion, the best museum in the Russian capital - to host it in autumn after it closes at the Czech Culture Centre.

Second stop: May 20, 2009 - Official opening of an exhibition of ape drawings at the Darwin Museum in Moscow with a public lecture.
This exhibition, too, was hugely successful. It featured 16 paintings by apes from Czech zoos. I should mention creations by Nigra, a female gorilla that lived in the Prague Zoo before the closure of the old monkey pavilion, and those by Tadao, a male gorilla at Zoo Dvur Kralove nad Labem, whom the audience of the Revealed project knows very well. After the opening of the exhibition I held another public lecture. The visitors there, too, were curious about the Revealed project and the life of gorillas. We are planning a similar exhibition for the Czech public to take place at the Anthropology Department of the Masaryk University in Brno in autumn.

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Lecture at the Darwin Museum
Autor:   České centrum - Český dům Moskva  

Third stop: May 22, 2009 - Science Days in St. Petersburg.
In St. Petersburg I lectured at the House of Science on various aspects of primate behaviour including gorillas. I could not omit mentioning tool use by members of the gorilla troop at the Prague zoo that we can observe almost on a daily basis thanks to the Revealed project. Every time I talked about it - here and elsewhere in Russia - the project met with great interest among the general public as well as experts.

My great thanks to the Dynastie Fund that financed my journey, as well as to the Czech Culture Centre team led by Vlasta Smolakova, and to Julia Subinova, science secretary of the Darwin Museum in Moscow. This technically demanding presentation would not be possible without their assistance. First and foremost, however, I'd like to thank the Revealed project team led by Miroslav Bobek who has masterminded and carried out the whole project.