For the first time, film documents of an amateur film studio were received by BGAKFFD
The exciting art of cinema has always attracted the general public. Amateur cinema was very popular in Soviet times. Amateur film studios were created in many cities of Belarus. One of these film studios operated in the 1970s and 1980s under the leadership of Anton Gavrilovich Shapchits at the Railway Workers’ Culture House in the city of Orsha.
The participants of this studio kept a film chronicle of their hometown, filmed significant events and activities, city residents, and veterans of the Great Patriotic War.
For about 10 years, Orsha local historian, photographer, film and video operator Eduard Eduardovich Novogonsky was searching for the archive of the amateur film studio «Kirovets». Some of the films were found in the basement of the Railway Workers’ Culture Center, some in the Museum of the Locomotive Depot at Orsha Station, and some in the storerooms of the former Museum of the Hero of the Soviet Union K.S.Zaslonov. Through the efforts of Eduard Eduardovich, as well as his associates Oleg Avtushenko, Anna Sosnovskaya, and Alexander Ermolaev, the archive was collected together. Subsequently, a colossal amount of work was done to organize it. All the films were digitized using a film projector and a video camera, and a detailed description was made for each film – practically an editing list.
The need to transfer the films to a specialized archive was not in doubt, since it was important to create the necessary storage conditions for the film documents. With the help of our colleagues, 45 storage units were delivered to the archive.
We express our deep gratitude to our colleagues who helped us obtain information about the film documents of the Kirovets film studio and deliver them to BGAKFFD. This is the deputy director of the institution «State Archive of the Vitebsk Region» Tatyana Vladimirovna Buevich, the director of the institution «Zonal State Archive in Orsha» Olesya Mikhailovna Bergovina, deputy head of the department of state registration of commercial (non-profit) organizations, legal expertise and organization of work of archival institutions of the main department of justice of the Vitebsk regional executive committee Oksana Vasilyevna Pashkevich.
We hope that local historians, historians and simply caring people of our country will follow the example of Orsha residents and replenish the archive with new acquisitions of films and other amateur studios. After all, this is our history!
In the photo: Film documents of the amateur film studio «Kirovets», 03.10.2024 Dzerzhinsk. Photo by L.V. Dubatovka
