At the Amber Trip exhibition

The Leading Research Associate of the Kaliningrad Regional Amber Museum Zoya Kostyashova delivered public lectures at the 13th International Jewellery Show "Amber Trip", that took place in Vilnius from 9 to 12 March. She chose two themes for her reports – "Resins of the world in the Kaliningrad Regional Amber Museum's collection" and "Amber in the religious art", which aroused interest both participants, and guests of the major event.

Visitors of the Amber Trip Show could also listen to the speeches of the specialists from Lithuania, Poland, Ukraine – Arunas Kleismantas, Giedymin Jablonski and Elena Belichenko.

Press-conference took place within the exhibition. The chief organizer of the exhibition Giedrius Guntorius and director general of the Kaliningrad Amber Combine Mikhail Zatsepin.

"There is jewellery made of sun stone, which is a priority of course, but also made of other minerals presented here, – told Giedrius Guntorius, –  as well as precious and semi-precious stones, souvenirs, interior objects and special equipment. All the magnificence has come from the territory traditional in working with amber such as Estonia, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia (Kaliningrad oblast), also from the rather far from the Baltic Sea Czechoslovakia, Greece, Hungary, Italy. And the guests have come from the whole world. We are especially glad to see the guest from Kuwait. China's interest to amber is well known, now we would like to "transfuse" this love into Arabic countries. Every year we monitor the amount of participants. At the present exhibition there are 35% more buyers than there were in 2015. It is a resounding success".

Mikhail Zatsepin mentioned in his speech that there are plans to conduct a massive forum exhibition in the Kaliningrad oblast in this September. Only amber will be featured there – showing all many sides of its beauty.

"We rely on support of the "Amber Trip" administration", – said Mikhail Zatsepin. – The event will take place in the new space "Amber Hall" in Svetlogorsk. And here are specialists of the JSC "Yantarniy Yuvelirprom" working at the exhibition – the subsidiary enterprise of the Kaliningrad Amber Combine. Their goal is entering into contracts with major buyers and suppliers".

Except for this enterprise, artists of the Kaliningrad Guild of Amber Craftsmen represented our region in Vilnius. Yuriy Velikotskiy, Konstantin Bushmelyov and Lana Egorova not only showed their works (jewellery and stone-caring works), but also prepared a prize for one of the participants of the contest that traditionally takes place within the exhibition. Organizers of the event supported the initiative.

"The prize – the figurine of Jurate, character of the famous Lithuanian legend – was given to the jeweller from Latvia Juris Gagainis for his brooch "House on the Fly", – says chair of the board, head master of the Kaliningrad Guild of Amber Craftsmen Yuriy Velikotskiy. – The award has own history. The similar work that I created for the contest "AquaTerra" of the Fifth International Biennial of Amber Artworks "Alatyr 2013", got a special diploma from the jury member, French jewellery artist Pierre-Marie Bernard, and now is part of the Kaliningrad Amber Museum's collection. Back then he explained his decision in a following way: the work is artistically interesting, corresponds the contest theme, includes amber and demonstrates flawless quality of materials working. We also used these principles choosing our prize-winner. We would like to establish a similar award from the Guild at the Seventh Regional Biennial of Amber Artworks, which is conducted by the Kaliningrad Amber Museum. It takes place this autumn".

Yuriy Velikotskiy traditionally comes to "Amber Trip" since 2008. In the end of the past year he initiated creation of the guild that unites professional stone-carving masters, "established" artists, similar to the one that existed in Konigsberg. He hopes for the revival of shop community. The first common event – participation in the exhibition in Vilnius – was a success.

"We would like logo of the guild on a piece of work to be a sort of quality label, – shares his opinion Yuriy Velikotskiy. – The buyer should be sure, that he holds no counterfeit, but real Baltic amber".