From Earth and Space: BRICS Universe Exhibition Opens in St. Petersburg

On 7 March the BRICS Universe exhibition, a unique collection of photographs of UNESCO Creative Cities Network in BRICS countries taken from Earth along with pictures taken by Heroes of the Russian Federation, cosmonauts Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and Ivan Vagner on the International Space Station, officially opened at the Museum of Cosmonautics and Rocket Technology, located in the Peter and Paul Fortress in St.Petersburg.

“It’s a great honour to be part of an exhibition in a city where literally every building and every street are of historical importance. St. Petersburg is the jewel of our nation, and we want to introduce it and other beautiful cities to people in other countries, as well as to acquaint Russians with the wonderful creative cities of BRICS. We want to show how beautiful Earth appears from space and in the eyes of those who love their city and their country more than anything. We wanted to bring these two views together to make it possible for everyone at the exhibition to take a trip to a new city, regardless of where it might be,” Kud-Sverchkov said during the opening ceremony. According to him, a picture from space requires a great deal of time and luck, with a rare chance of getting a good shot and sometimes stretching out over months.

The ceremony was also attended by Deputy Chairman of the St. Petersburg Committee for Culture Stanislav Moldovanov, Hero of the Russian Federation and cosmonaut Andrey Borisenko, BRICS diplomats and representatives, international students, and notable figures from the world of science, culture, and art. St. Petersburg photographers Dmitry Fufaev and Roman Pimenov, whose works were a part of the Earth Series on display at the exhibition, also attended the ceremony.

“I think it’s interesting to show people on Earth the difference between how they see these beautiful landscapes from here and how they look from 400 kilometres away. I am sure that these amazing photographs will make it clear that space is closer than it may seem and how beautiful our planet really is, wherever you are looking at it from,” Borisenko said.

The opening of the exhibition, which will continue until 3 April, coincided with the traditional midday firing of the signal cannon from the Naryshkin Bastion in the Peter and Paul Fortress, on this occasion fired by the project participant Sergey Kud-Sverchkov. “The firing of the cannon is a serious affair, similar to a rocket launch, and everything is calculated to the second,” Kud-Sverchkov said.

The BRICS Universe project received its grant from the Presidential Foundation for Cultural Initiatives in August 2023 and would have been impossible without the partnership of the Grechko Nizhny Novgorod Planetarium and Roscosmos, the Creative Industries Foundation of the Ulyanovsk Region, and the Russia – BRICS Project Office of International Youth Cooperation with the support of the Federal Agency for Youth Affairs. The project has enjoyed the patronage of the Commission of the Russian Federation for UNESCO and is a part of the events plan of Russia’s BRICS Chairship in 2024, managed by the Roscongress Foundation.

48 Russian photographers were joined in the project by 41 photographers from other BRICS countries. 20 photos taken on Earth have been selected for the exhibition along with 20 taken by the cosmonauts on the International Space Station. Photos were picked from a total of 600 collected from all over of the world.

The international project kicked off on 1 February 2024 at the Museum of Cosmonautics in Moscow. The next city to host the exhibition will be Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), after which the exhibition will travel to UNESCO cities Kargopol (Russia), Beijing (China), Nizhny Novgorod (Russia), Ulyanovsk (Russia), Mumbai (India), Durban (South Africa), and Kazan (Russia).