Court to Mull Mitki Studio Privatization

Staff Writer

Published: April 12, 2005 (Issue # 1060)

ALEXANDER BELNEKY / The St. Petersburg Times Dmitry Shagin, leader of the artistic group Mitki, in the studio that the group may have to leave after it was sold under them.

The courts must decide if the privatization of part of an attic that the Mitki artists use was legal, says the St. Petersburg property committee, or KUGI.

"If the privatization was illegal, nobody can force Mitki out of their studio," Alexei Chichkanov, first deputy KUGI chairman, said Monday at a news conference.

Governor Valentina Matviyenko has taken personal control of the case, he added.

"Mitki's creation is the cultural property of St. Petersburg," he said.

Mitki, which has about 15 members, who wear blue-and-white striped sailors' shirts and portray figures clad in sailors' shirts their work, has been going since the early 1980s.

The spaces that were murkily privatized last year have since been sold and Mitki face eviction from the attic at 16 Ulitsa Pravdy, which they were allocated in 1996. Leading city cultural figures have appealed for them to be allowed to stay.

The attic is one of about 2,000 artistic studios in the city that are owned by City Hall, but rented to artists at discounted rates. Last year the property committee started an initiative to phase in market rate rentals or to sell the studios, which it later renounced.

The alleged new owners of the space in Mitki's studio have never shown up in person.

However, even before a Monday court hearing of the case to evict Mitki, muscle-bound men broke into the studio and tried to force Mitki out by force last Wednesday.

About 10 intruders, who said they were representatives of the new owners, broke doors and threw art works around. However, the intruders left after the police and journalists arrived at the scene.

Mitki's lawyer Andrei Tyndic said the privatization of part of the attic was done dubiously.

The privatized parts of the studio, which have a total area of 212 square meters, had been classified residential space in the past, but should not have been because it was uninhabitable with no water, heating or sewerage, he said.

In October 2004, two orphans were registered in the "apartment," which was part of a 193-square-meter area leased by the artists.

Later the orphans, who have never visited or lived at the address, privatized the space.

One sold it to a new ownerand the other gave it away to new owners, Tyndic said.

Yury Romanyukin, head of law firm Gessen, which has been advising Mitki, said Monday it looked as if "someone was trying to turn city property into private property."

Meanwhile, Chichkunov said that KUGI was planning to continue the lease agreement with Mitki for the next 10 years.

If the disputed space is confirmed to be uninhabitable, the court should order that it is classified as such, he said.

Mitki leader Dmitry Shagin said the court will hold a hearing on the legality of Mitki's lease on May 24.

Shagin said at a preliminary hearing on Monday that the court said the new owners and people who sold the accommodation to them should appear in court. They did not show up Monday.