Bizerte is a quiet picturesque town on the Mediterranean coast of Tunisia. It was the final destination of Russian fleet, departed from Sevastopol, Feodosia and Kerch in autumn of 1920. 

Exhibition in Erarta is dedicated to the tragic events of Russian history and the 95th anniversary of the outcome of the Black Sea Fleet from the Crimea at the end of the Civil War. For the sailors and their families Bizerte became the second home. This Russian colony in Tunisia housed thousands of people who had lost contact with their relatives and couldn’t even hope to see their homeland again. Each of them faced a difficult adaptation to another world, climate, and social status, but even in such conditions, people were able to preserve their cultural values and traditions. They lived, worked, brought up children, wrote poetry, died and left...

Anastasia Manstein-Shirinskaya spent in Bizerte most of her life and was one of those who kept memories of Russian culture and Russian sailors. The Fund of Anastasia Manstein-Shirinskaya invited contemporary Russian artists to Bizerta to work in the open air and to depict the traces of Russian colony in Tunisia.

The exhibition aims to present Bizerte as a place of historical memory. Visual imagery of the exhibition features houses, streets, bays, ships, portraits, and interiors. The landscapes are painted from nature, another works are based on archival, photographic and artistic experience.

Among the participants of the exhibition there are Konstantin Sutyagin, Tatiana Yang, Tatiana Struchkova (Moscow); Alexandr Kosenkov, Julia Sopina, Dmitry Shagin (St. Petersburg) and many others.

Erarta Museum of Contemporary Art appreciates partners in the exhibition organisation — The Fund of Anastasia Manstein-Shirinskaya and "Art-Volkhonka" publishing house.