Home – Home – Jornals – Humanitarian sciences in Siberia 2014 number

A unique prison camp subculture that can be characterized as compensational-creative mechanism of individual adaptation and self-realization under extreme conditions of imprisonment emerged along with formation and development of the Soviet criminal-executive system, with expansion of the USSR NKVDMVD prison camp and settlement network. Many on-stage performance groups functioned as an element of cultural and educational work in GULAG prison camps. One of the brightest phenomena related to the post-war period of the GULAG’s history in the sphere of ideological and cultural work among the masses was the emergence of theatre and music organizations under the guidance of the Northern Administration of Railroad Construction Prison Camps that built the Trans-Polar Railway Chum (Vorkuta) - Salekhard - Igarka. The Musical-Dramatic Theater of the Northern Administration of Railroad Construction Prison Camps that emerged in 1947 (upon an initiative of the senior managers of the grandiose construction project) at the premises of cultural and educational establishments of Pechora Correctional Labor Camps reached its prime by 1950. The theater was high in demand among prison camp administrators, most notably as a means of entertainment for the constriction managers and civilians. Only a few performances were intended for the prisoner population. Plays and shows were staged at prison camps as a reward for best workers, in order to create a compensational mechanism even if limited in its scale for people working under extreme climatic conditions, as an element of relaxation and cultural activities. The theater was included into the system working under the guidance of Cultural and Educational Department. When the adjusted mechanism of construction became ineffective and the great infrastructure project was localized in areas with minimal industrial production activities, the theater was quickly closed. It was viewed as a rudiment of the past that for some reason had survived after the period of rapid construction development. The theater was closed in 1950, and two years later the construction of Transpolar Railway was completely abandoned.