01.05.2024

Festival “Roerichs’ Realm” in the Roerich Estate

On May 1, 2024, the International Roerich Memorial Trust in Naggar held a children's paintings competition to commemorate the Roerich family anniversaries: the 150th birth anniversary of Nicholas Roerich, the 145th of his wife Helena Roerich, and the 120th of their younger son Svetoslav Roerich. The competition was attended by 87 children from 10 schools in the Kullu Valley and the Helena Roerich Academy of Art for Children of the IRMT.

The competition is a part of the International Children and Youth Art Festival “Roerichs’ Realm” organized by the International Centre of the Roerichs (ICR, Moscow), the International Roerich Memorial Trust (IRMT, Naggar, Kullu, HP), volunteers of the ICR with the support of the general public. The Festival will host exhibitions of drawings by Russian and Indian children dedicated to the life and work of the great Russian family in both India and Russia. These exhibitions will include works by young artists of the Kullu Valley, who gathered at the Roerich Estate on May 1 to demonstrate their artistic skills, originality of idea, and depth of elaboration of the theme.

Suresh Kumar, Indian Curator of the IRMT, and Larisa Surgina, Russia Curator of the IRMT, welcomed the participants and guests of the competition. Galina Stepanova, a renowned Russian artist and proprietor of Museum and Exhibition Center "St. Petersburg Artist" (Russia), was the Guest of Honor and a member of the jury. An exhibition of her paintings will open at the IRMT on May 4. 

Even today in the room-verandah there is a chair of the Master, at which intimate conversations were held. There is also a triptych painting by Nicholas Roerich “Fiat Rex”, in the central part of which the artist depicted the shining Image of the Teacher.  

“Dear friends,” wrote Nicholas Roerich on March 24, 1939, “on the memorable day of March 24, we will come together in different parts of the world and send our best thoughts to Him who in eternal labor and in eternal beauty composes a happy future. <...> Let us summon all our strength to serve humanity. Let us not stumble over human fallacies, but let us hope that it will be possible to sow throughout the earth those good seeds called goodness. This seed of goodness needs a beautiful frame and therefore, while calling for goodness, let us also serve beauty. Beauty and goodness are the key to joy. Rejoice on the day of March 24!”