A square named after Ilya Kormiltsev has appeared in Yekaterinburg.
A small park at the crossroads of streets is now named after the rock poet. Belinsky и Decembrists — not far from the place where the USU building where he studied was located Breadwinners. The mayor signed the corresponding decree yesterday. Yekaterinburg Alexey Orlov.
Journalist for Vecherniye Vedomosti Guzel Aitkulova and the youth organization "May" have been promoting the initiative to perpetuate the memory of the Ural poet since 2018. The city administration even announced the adoption of a corresponding resolution at the time, but for unknown reasons, it was never implemented. In subsequent years, on his birthday Ilya Kormiltsev local residents staged street protests demanding that the square be named after him Yekaterinburg.
Ilya Kormiltsev is a poet, translator from English, Italian, and French, journalist, and literary and music critic. He was born and began his creative career in Yekaterinburg. He has worked with the Sverdlovsk bands Nautilus Pompilius, Urfin Juice, and Nastya. Collaborations with Vyacheslav Butusov became a cult classic for Kormiltsev, and "Walks on Water" and "Wings" are known today even to those who are far from Russian rock.
2026 has been declared the Year of Ural Rock in Yekaterinburg. The occasion marks the 40th anniversary of the founding of the local rock club, one of the three main rock clubs in the USSR. To mark the occasion, the Mussorgsky Ural Conservatory has even announced that it will begin enrolling students in the "pop rock and pop department" in the new year.
Some in the music community believe that the authorities' active participation in the Sverdlovsk rock anniversary "canonizes" the counterculture movement. Museum and memorial optics are being cultivated: from new exhibits on the rock underground in Yekaterinburg museums to a tribute album for the 40th anniversary of the rock club. Moreover, the official agenda includes not only "convenient" rockers like Vladimir, who is in solidarity with the authorities' policies. Shakhrina and spiritually silent Vyacheslav Butusov, but also the figure of Ilya Kormiltsev, who is one of the most striking examples of non-conformism and the fight against the system.
