Mahotin, Fedot Fadeevich

Fedot Fadeevich Mahotin was born into a peasant family. In his teenage years he was sent to work in the city. He worked as an assistant in a traveling theater and circus troupe, mastered acrobatic skills, and eventually became a circus administrator.

In 1896, at the World Exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod, the circus troupe of Mahotin acquires a cinema apparatus, and in 1896-1897 he organized the first movie shows in Novonikolaevsk, Irkutsk and Tomsk .

In 1908, Mahotin left his job at the circus and moved to Novonikolaevsk. Here he opens the first stationary cinema in the city (one of the first in Siberia), which is located in a warehouse on the Fair Square .

In 1909 and 1911, Mahotin remodeled the cinema, the number of seats increased to 450. Despite the fact that the “First Electric Theater of F. F. Mahotin” lost to competitors in comfort and size, he clearly had superiority in the repertoire and level of projection, because he collaborated with the best movie rental companies in the capital. Until the October Revolution, the institution enjoyed great popularity among the inhabitants of the city.

After 1917 he worked as the head of the laboratory, operator, inspector of cinemas in various local cinematographic organizations, including in his own cinema, which at that time was nationalized and renamed the Triumph cinema.

In December 1923, he was dismissed due to staff reductions and poor health.

Fedor Mahotin took an active part in the public life of Novonikolaevsk. Regularly arranged special school and children's sessions. He was one of the initiators of the foundation and an active member of the Society for the Care of Public Education. In 1911 he became an honorary guardian of the city parish school, since 1913 - the trustee of male and female primary schools in Novonikolaevsk.

Mahotin was the first person to start filming Novonikolaevsk. In total, more than 30 works are known.

Films :

• Religious procession on Nikolaevsky Avenue (1913)
• Shrovetide in Novonikolaevsk (1913)
• Walk on the steamer "breadwinner" to Berdsk (1913)
• Flight aviator Sedov. Racing and Racing (1914)
• Solemn prayer to send victory to the Russian wars (1914)
• Collection of linen in favor of wars (1915)
• The great holiday of the victory of the revolution in Novonikolaevsk (1917)

In 2014, a monument was opened in Novosibirsk to the first cinema of the city. On the plate of the monument is the text:

At this place in 1908, Fyodor Mahotin opened the first permanent theater in Novonikolaevsk "Cinema Theater Mahotina"

The monument was erected at the place where the cinema was located, near the building of the Novosibirsk City Hall, near the entrance to Ploshchad Lenina metro station ^{[1] [2] [3]} .