Fyodor Dostoevsky. Florence, Italy, 2021

This monument to the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky was unveiled in Florence in 2021. A gift from Russia, given to Italy for the 200th anniversary of Dostoevsky’s birth, the statue was installed in the Parco delle Cascine, on the avenue named after the famed author. Dostoevsky was known for his love of Florence, a city he visited twice. During his second and quite a lengthy stay in the Tuscan capital, he completed his novel The Idiot, a fact commemorated by a plaque mounted on the wall of the building where he lived, on Piazza de' Pitti. Zeinalov’s statue of Dostoevsky is holding a copy of the book, a pair of broken shackles lying at his feet. Sentenced to execution on political charges and pardoned just before the execution, the writer described this harrowing experience in The Idiot, through one of Prince Myshkin’s monologs.