A prominent theatre and film director, art director of the Moscow theatre P. Fomenko Studio, Pyotr Fomenko has died on the 81st year of his life.

      According to the Fomenko's Studio representatives, he died on Wednesday's night in the hospital, the more detailed information is not available yet.

      Pyotr Naumovich Fomenko was born on 13 July 1932 in Moscow. His debut as a theatre director was on the stage of the Moscow Dramatical Theatre in 1958 - "Uneasy Legacy" performance based on the play of Konstantin Finn.

      In the 1960s he worked in different theatres - the Central Children's Theatre, Theatre of Malaya Bronnaya street, Mayakovsky's Moscow Dramatical Theatre and others. His perfomances were often banned by censors because of discrepancy with Soviet ideology. At that time Pyotr Fomenko lived without regular work, kept going with odd jobs on TV, in provincial theatres, theatrical circles, and even private lessons as a philologist.

      Starting from 1970 Fomenko worked in both Moscow and St. Petersburg theatres. In 1977 he was appointed as the head director of the St. Petersburg (Leningrad) Theatre of Comedy. Simultaneously with his stage work he continued making projects for the Soviet television - TV-performances and documentary films, mainly.

      In 1981 he was invited by his teacher Andrei Aleksandrovich Goncharov to lecture in GITIS, initially as a teacher in the workshop of Oskar Yakovlevich Remez.  In 1992 he received a chair in the Russia's Academy of Theatrical Art. In 1993 the course of Fomenko’s students (intake of 1988) acquired the status of a theatre (P. Fomenko Studio) with Pyotr Naumovich Fomenko as its art director. In 2001 he graduated his last course, and in 2003 Fomenko resigned as a teacher.

      Pyotr Naumovich was honoured the title of the People’s Artist of Russia in 1993, and many other titles in different years.