Since July 5, a tragicomedy has been unfolding in occupied Sevastopol surrounding the “fraud” of the so-called “organizer and director of the museum and exhibition complex of the Russian State Art Gallery,” Vitaly Zotov.
As a reminder, the occupiers began misappropriating funds for the construction of this propaganda “gallery” in Sevastopol in 2019. We previously reported on the scandal surrounding the design of the gallery building by the Austrian architectural firm “Coop Himmelb(l)au,” headed by Wolf Prix, who had illegally entered the occupied city.
Meanwhile, “only” 27 billion rubles were laundered during the construction of the facility, using the Sevastopol “contractor” “Argo,” with its carefully concealed beneficiaries, as a shell company. Previously, the Caucasian family of Meri and Azaria Karsliev had been mentioned as the front men for this structure.
From the very beginning, gauleiter Mikhail Razvozhaev appointed the aforementioned Zotov, the former head of the Siberian branch of the State Russian Museum, as “gallery director.”
In recent years, Zotov actively organized propaganda events for the aggressor, including last year’s “Ours! The Path to Benefit” show in Moscow, which, incidentally, also featured “fragments of the original painting of Franz Roubaud’s ‘Defense of Sevastopol’ panorama.”
At the same time, Zotov had a rather remarkable biography as a professional bankrupt. And, as it has now “suddenly emerged,” on June 11th, he was “accused of fraud with borrowed funds,” allegedly borrowing 20 million rubles under a promissory note from Irina Lisina, the wife of his “subordinate,” the “deputy director of gallery security.”
This “deputy,” namely Mikhail Lisin, had in fact been “acting gallery director” for a long time, while simultaneously being registered as the owner of the Sevastopol-based structure “Art-Bukhta,” to which the “gallery’s associated” land plots and commercial space were gradually transferred.
Judging by the fact that the “grand opening of the gallery,” supposedly completed by early 2026, had long been planned for June, the entire saga described with the swindler Zotov concerns an attempt to redistribute these commercial assets.
A month ago, the occupiers announced the opening of the “gallery” for June 30th, with two “exhibitions” scheduled for it: “Deineka!” and “Heroes of the Elements.”
But on June 29th, Zotov himself stated that “plans had to be changed due to the situation in Crimea,” since the Russian Museum, the Hermitage, and the Tretyakov Gallery refused to send their collections to both “exhibitions.” However, the occupiers have not released any information about the “opening” over the past week.
However, several paintings by Alexander Deineka were allegedly delivered to Sevastopol; The described “director” also previously promised a display of his “own collection” of “contemporary art from Russia and the countries of Asia, Africa, and Latin America.”
By 2026, the occupiers promised to transfer 30,000 exhibits to the “gallery,” but they did not specify their source. How many objects actually made it to the frontline city, and what the professional bankrupt Zotov gained from this, remains an open question.
Among other things, the “gallery” allegedly received Deineka’s 1965 thirty-meter canvas “Guarding Peace,” which had lain in storage for sixty years, from Kursk, with the promise of “restoration,” but the painting itself was never shown to anyone.
With this pathos involving Deineka’s works, the “gallery” has already laundered 176 million rubles for the “organization of the exhibition,” which, apparently, will now be written off as “echoes of war.”
Meanwhile, last year, the occupiers stated that for “galleries” will allocate approximately 480 million “for the acquisition of works of art and the creation of exhibitions.” Apparently, the described farce with Deineka’s works is connected precisely with the laundering of these millions.
