Vitebsk is a pretty town that sits on a bend of the Dvina River in eastern Belarus. Best known as Marc Chagall’s birthplace and an inspiration for his art long after he left in 1922 to never return, it was also the home of the late 19th/early 20th century renaissance in Russian and Jewish painting. The Tsarist-era painter Ilya Repin lived here for a while and a major art school was started after the 1917 revolution. It has great landscape and light, and the compact old town sits on the east bank of the river surrounded by a large city park network.
It’s a good base for a few days and regularly hosts cultural events, with the Slavianski Bazaar in July/August being a major one.
The city area to the south of the old town has a postwar Soviet feel, with the obligatory massive square, Ploscha Pieramohi, and slogan-topped monolithic building blocks.
Vitebsk was an important medieval commercial center, located about 100 kilometers southeast and upriver from Polotsk (more of which here https://wp.me/p7Jh3P-Jg) and so obtained the obligatory religious center. The Ouspensky Cathedral of the Assumption is relatively recent, constructed in the late 17th century and replacing it’s 14th-century predecessor that had been destroyed. Much of the cathedral was demolished in 1936 by the Communists and only fully restored in 2000. You can easily fill a couple of days here, and some ideas are below.
City Art Museum. Vitebsk’s art museum (Ulitsa Lenina 32) is worth visiting for it’s comprehensive local collection, which has a mix of pre-revolutionary and socialist art.
The museum has a leading collection of paintings donated to the city by Yehuda (Yuri) Pen, Chagall’s art teacher and one of the founders of the Vitebsk Art School. Pen (1864-1939) was mainly a portrait painter and also painted Chagall in 1915.
The museum is an experience in careful docent supervision, as you will be asked for your ticket in each gallery! It also has an unusual and elaborate wrought iron staircase.
Marc Chagall Museum and the Jewish Quarter. In 1900, almost half of Vitebsk’s population of about 65,000 was Jewish, with the community located on the west side of the river, traces of which remain to this day.
The museum is in Chagall’s boyhood home between 1897 and 1910 at Ulitsa Pakrouskaya 11, and consists of a recreation of the home’s interior with art and photographs on the walls.
The house is tiny (his family numbered 11 people) so it’s a fairly short but interesting visit. Chagall became the Commissar for Arts in Vitebsk after the revolution, in 1918. He opened the city’s People’s Art School which now houses the Contemporary Art Museum at Ulitsa Krylova.
You should also take time to walk around the neighborhood to the east and south of the house, which was Vitebsk’s Jewish quarter. You can also visit the Dvina Brewery Shop (Ulitsa Ilinskaha 25а) to buy a beer and some traditional Belarusian drinking snacks.
See the plaque outside the brewery commemorating Lieutenant-General of Artillery Beskin Israel Solomonov, Hero of the Soviet Union (1945) who grew up locally and worked at the brewery in 1910-11. General Solomonov, who returned in 1944 to liberate the city, is also commemorated in the city museum.
Also stop by the abandoned Zhadzvinni Synagogue at (Ulitsa Revaliucyjnaya 10) (https://34travel.me/gotobelarus/en/post/synagogues). The synagogue closed in the mid-1920s after the revolution but the structure still stands along with an information board.
There is a statue of Chagall with the figure of his first wife hovering above him in the square that sits where Ulitsas Pakrouskaya and Sovetskoy Armii join. It’s a good place to take a break and admire the redbrick prewar houses.
Marc Chagall Art Center (Putna 2). The art center contains a collection of prints bequethed by the artist’s granddaughter and other donors, that’s worth a visit. As with many birthplace galleries, the originals are mostly elsewhere but it’s still a good place to get an idea of his work and some context.
Vitebsk Regional History Museum. The museum (Lenina 36), run by the local city, is a great grab bag of different exhibit rooms, from medieval artifacts, natural dioramas, through to an extensive WW2 exhibit. Vitebsk stood in the main invasion and recapture routes in 1941 and 1944, and so was heavily pummeled.
The museum has small but interesting art collection, including a self-portrait by Yuri Pen and Ilya Repin’s Madonna with Child (1896).
Frunze Park. Frunze Park, just east of the old town and flanking the Visba River, is worth a detour for its attractive landscaping of the hilly riverbanks of this tributary of the West Dvina River.
It is also a good place to head further west for a dose of brutalist yet functional Soviet architecture, including the city concert hall. Check out their schedule here http://www.gck.by/afisha to see what’s on.
Logistics
Vitebsk’s very grand rail station is just south of the more functional bus station, both about 1.5km west of the old town over the river at Ulitsa Kasmanautau. In general, buses are more frequent and often faster than the train, however you should compare schedules. The Belarusian Railway Company has a good English-accessible website (https://poezd.rw.by/wps/portal/home/rp/schedule) that allows you to buy e-tickets, which is especially useful if you plan to book an overnight sleeper. Connections to the western cities of Brest and Grodno are likely to be via Minsk. The train and bus station schedules are in Cyrillic only, but the staff at the information booth are quite helpful and can write out timings for you.
I stayed at the Smart Boutique Hotel (Suvurova 11) which was a modern and comfortable small hotel right in the old town and a less than 20 minute walk from the bus station; highly recommended on all fronts.
There are plenty of good food options in town, mostly Belarusian but well-delivered. The Lyamus Restaurant-Brewery (Pobedy Avenue 1) is a slight way out but a good traditional brewpub option – they don’t always have the full selection of draft beer but the food is very good. In the old town, both the Pushkin Times (Tastoga 4) and Vitebskiy Traktir (Suvurova 2) are a bit higher-end and popular. Both offer the cellar experience or outdoor seating. Pelmennya (Janki Kupaly 12/5) is a good lunchtime cafeteria, specializing in soup broth pelmeni. Torvald (Tastoga 1) is a decent and lively bar with a food menu. The Dvinskiy Brovar Bar (Lenina 57) is the main craft beer place, although get a taste of the drafts before you buy or stick to the bottles from the nearby Dvina Brewery.
If you need a good supermarket, try the Euroopt located in the Marko Citi shopping center at Lenina 26A, just south of the old town. You can also check out the more Soviet-style Univermag nearby at Zamkovaya 19.
