Hermitage small

Magazine

mm x.v iii. №1– 2

(15). Summer 2010

to keep forever

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C O N TE N T

6

Magazine

mm x.v iii.

Issue № 1– 2 (15). Summer 2010

12

au thors publishers first person

M i k h a i l B o r i s o v i c h P I O TR O V S K Y

8 10

the a rt of post

14

Letter of happiness

A N IGH T AT THE MUSEUM

quotes s pa c e

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But the sands of Petersburg cover us And the trail of our ancient hands

words

26

An official question

A l e x a n d e r S e k a t sky

children

28

A Night at the Museum

Ye l e n a K os t yl e va

the sou n d of time

36

The Paint Layer

V l a d i m i r Y E F IM O V,

A n n a P ETR O VA , I v a n S A B L I N

Reminiscences of Zoya Tomashevskaya

38 44

staking a claim

N a t a l i a L E B I N A , A n n a P ETR O VA

storage unit

48

Kandler’s Fridge

person n el

50

You can’t run any further than your thoughts

J ö r g G r u b e r , S v e t l a n a O s t r ova

60

pa r t i c u l a r s

A l e x a n d e r I L I C HE V S K Y

The Goatfather

A r k a d y I P P O L IT O V

66

pa r t i c u l a r s

O l g a F lo r e nsk a y a

The Picasso Case

76

kor e a n c r e at ion s

K o n s t a n t i n AGU N O V I C H

sea son document

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A special project of Hermitage Magazine and Sberbank of Russia: This issue features embossed reliefs for the blind and visually impaired.

dictiona ry

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children They can do anything. Touch statues, hug vases, study mosaics.

The children discover all this with their hands.

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M M X . V I I I

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CONTRIBUTORS At the History Faculty of Moscow State University, the art critic and art historian Konstantin Agunovich studied the paintings of Vrubel. He has covered all the ins and outs of the exhibition scene in Moscow for Afisha magazine, and since 2004 in St Petersburg as well. In this edition he shares his impressions of the exhibition "5,000 Years of Korean Art." P. 7 6

The editor of regional digest Kvartalny Nadziratel (“District Overseer”), a musician and historian Anna Petrova knows all the glass plates, daguerreotypes, slides and transparencies in the Archive of Cinema and Film. In this edition she writes about the reminiscences of Zoya Tomashevskaya and talks about the historical transformations of the Alexander Column.

Yekater ina Khozatskaya graduated from the architectural faculty of the Academy of Arts, but preferred paintings and drawings to becoming an architect. Seated at one of the tables, she avidly draws the life of bars and restaurants.

At the request of the magazine she has depicted the editorial roundtable dedicated to the opening of the exhibition of works by Picasso.

The poet and writer Alexander Ilichevsky — a theoretical physicist by training who won the 2007 Russian Booker prize and the Yury Kazakov prize for short prose works — is the author of a collection of stories, “Song of the Limestone”, as well as the novels “Matisse” and “The Persian.”

Here he talks about his first visit to the Hermitage.

Konstantin AGUNOVICH

Yekaterina KHOZATSK AYA

Pp. 38, 46

A n n a P E T R O VA

J ö r g G ru b er

P. 6 8

P. 6 0

The German photographer and video artist Jörg Gruber has made films in Argentina, China, Iceland, Pakistan, Tibet and Ukraine.

As a photographer, he combines reportage and a cinematographic approach, for which he won the Kodak New Talent Award in 2004.

For the Hermitage magazine he has created a series of portraits of employees who have been working at the museum for 60 years and more.

The critic, essayist and curator Arkady Ippolitov, an admirer of mannerism and custodian of the Hermitage’s collection of Italian engravings, knows everything there is to know about Western European art. For this issue of the magazine, he examines the semantics of the image of the goat from the Ancient Era to the present day.

Alexander Ilichevsky

Arkady IPPOLITOV

P. 6 2

P. 5 0 H

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MM X . V III

10

Issue № 1– 2 (15). Summer 2010 Chairman of the Editorial Board

ON T H E C OV ER

MIKHAIL PIOTROVSKY

Wa r r i o r s a n d N i k a , detail from a ceiling.

A r c h i t e c t A . P. B r y u l l o v.

1 8 4 1 . W i n t e r Pa l a c e . F i r s t f l o o r, W h i t e H a l l ( R o o m 2 8 9 )

E d i t o r i a l B o a r d GEORGI VILINBAKHOV, YULIA KANTOR, MICHAEL MALTSOV, VLADIMIR MATVEYEV, ZORINA MYSKOVA, GERALDINE NORMAN E d i t o r - i n - C h i e f YURY MOLODKOVETS

DMITRI BARBANEL T y p e f a c e s YURI GORDON A r t D i r e c t o r ZHDAN FILIPPOV E x e c u t i v e E d i t o r Maria Pirogovskaya M a n a g i n g E d i t o r Katerina Marsova, YELIZAVETA KALININA D e s i g n IGOR MOZHEIKO H i s t o r i c a l C o l u m n s E d i t o r Anna Petrova L i s t i n g s E d i t o r Marfa Khromova-Borisova P r o d u c e r o f “ P e r s o n n e l ” S e c t i o n SVETLANA OSTROVA E d i t o r o f E n g l i s h v e r s i o n JENNIFER BERRY T r a n s l a t i o n s PETER MORLEY, SIMON PATTERSON, PHILIP PARKER P r o o f r e a d i n g , f a c t c h e c k i n g ALEXANDRA BAGULNIK, ANDREI BAUMAN P r e p r e s s Mikhail Shishlyannikov P h o t o D i r e c t o r Alexey Ivanovsky P r i n t M a n a g e r Artur Sabiryanov Layout

co n tr i b u tors Ko n s t a n t i n A g u n ov i c h Yu l i a A l e x e e v a Alexander Babin Nadezhda Danilova Vladimir Efimov Olga Florenskaya D a r y a Fo m i c h e v a Mikhail German Nadezhda Gorodetskaya Jö r g G r u b e r Alexander Ilichevsky Arkady Ippolitov Ye k a t e r i n a K h o z a t s k a y a A l b e r t Ko s t e n ev i c h Ye l e n a K o s t y l e v a Alexey Lepork Maria Mezentseva Marina Novikova Svetlana Ostrova Nikita Panin F yo d o r Po go r e l ov Dmitr y Rastvortsev Ivan Sablin Alexander Sekatsky Kirill Shamanov Z o y a To m a s h e v s k a y a

C O MMER C IA L A N D A D MI N I S TRATI V E D IRE C T O RATE

Zorina Myskova Polina Zavyalova

C h a i r m a n o f t h e B o a r d o f T h e H e r m i t a g e 2 1 s t C e n t u r y Fo u n d a t i o n D i r e c t o r o f T h e H e r m i t a g e 2 1 s t C e n t u r y Fo u n d a t i o n

OLGA ABALYASHINA OLGA VORONOVSKAYA M a r k e t i n g , D i s t r i b u t i o n Yekaterina Atoyan-Milyukova F i n a n c e D i r e c t o r Victoria Dokuchaeva Project Director

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T h e H e r m i t a g e 2 1 s t C e n t u r y Fo u n d a t i o n t h a n k s OA O S b e r b a n k R u s s i a f o r i t s s u p p o r t f o r t h e “ C h i l d r e n ” s e c t i o n ( t h e f o r m s f o r t h e r e l i e f s w e r e c r e a t e d u s i n g d o n a t i o n s g i v e n t h e H e r m i t a g e ’ s M e t h o d o l o g i c a l C e n t e r ” ; Z A O S o n y E l e c t r o n i c s a n d Yu l i a P a k h o m o v a f o r d o n a t i o n s in the form of the photographic equipment used in the creation of the issue’s projects; the BDO Russia group of companies for c o n s u l t a t i o n s o n t h e p u b l i s h i n g p r o j e c t a n d f i n a n c i a l d o n a t i o n s . S p e c i a l t h a n k s t o : S v e t l a n a A d a k s i n a , V l a d i s l a v B a c h u r o v, Ye v g e n i i G a s k e l b e r g , P a v e l Z a b r i l i n , A l e x a n d e r K o n o n o v, L a r i s a K o r a b e l n i k o v a , B o r i s K r a v c h u n a s , M i k h a i l K r o k i n , M i k h a i l N o v i k o v, N a t a l i a S h a t i k h i n a , M a r i n a T s y g u l e v a a n d S e r g e i M o n a k h o v.

ISSN 2218-0338 Fo u n d e r F G U K S t a t e H e r m i t a g e . P u b l i s h e r H e r m i t a g e 2 1 s t C e n t u r y Fo u n d a t i o n . S t a t e H e r m i t a g e M a g a z i n e : c e r t i f i c a t e o f r e g i s t r a t i o n S MI P I F S 7 7 - 3 8 1 2 6 , i s s u e d o n N o v e m b e r 2 4 , 2 0 0 9 b y t h e Fe d e r a l S e r v i c e f o r t h e O v e r s i g h t o f C o m m u n i c a t i o n s , I n f o r m a t i o n Te c h n o l o g y and Mass Communications (Roskomnadzor). Signed for print 1.07.2010. Print run 10,000. Published 4 times a year. Address of publisher a n d e d i t o r i a l o f f i c e s : 5 A U l i t s a C h a p a y e v a , S t . P e t e r s b u r g , 1 9 7 0 4 6 . Te l e p h o n e ( 8 1 2 ) 3 3 2 2 0 9 0 , ( 8 1 2 ) 3 3 2 2 0 9 0 . E m a i l : i n f o @ h e r m i t a g e m a g a z i n e . r u . P r i n t e d a t O O O P a n d a - P r i n t . 7 K Pe r . D e k a b r i s t o v, S t . Pe t e r s b u r g , 1 9 9 1 5 5 . N o f i x e d p r i c e . R e p r i n t i n g o f a n y o f t h e m a g a z i n e ’ s materials without the written agreement of the editorial department is forbidden. Where quotations are used the magazine must be acknowledged as the source. The editorial staff does not bear responsibility for the content and accuracy of advertising materials. The opinions of the authors may not reflect those of the editorial staff.

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p ers o n

мik h a il pio trovsk y Di rector of the State Her m itage Museu m

P R O V O C AT I O N The Hermitage magazine is being refreshed once again. Like the Museum, it changes without changing. Today, as has always been the case, the world perceives images more readily than letters. And we have decided to make visual content the foundation for the magazine’s style. Everyone is doing it. This is what lies at the heart of “glamour.”

We want to juxtapose this with the visual imagery that is more traditional in the museum context. This is somewhat provocative.

We are taking up the challenge of contemporary society, where a carnivorous attitude towards a museum, seen as being a place where there are easy pickings to be made, is popular. Alongside that goes a certain plebeian haughtiness. But between the “thieves” and the “plebs” are millions of people for whom a museum is a welcoming, sacred space. It is with these people that we wish to enter into a dialogue.

Sometimes provocatively. Our discussion of the colour of the Winter Palace is provocative. Everyone has forgotten that the current colour far from matches the original. We have woken them up. Our Picasso exhibition is provocative. A standard “touring” exhibition has been placed in the palace’s ceremonial, imperial war rooms. The artist has never had an exhibition like it. Incidentally, for the Hermitage this exhibition is not a commercial undertaking. At this time of year we always have queues.

And that is also provocative. It is aimed at different levels of perception. We treasure readers for whom this brings the joy of participation.

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LeТteRS of hapPiness For five years running, to celebrate the International Museum Studio, the Hermitage has sent postcards to the museums of the world. Hermitage Magazine is publishing a selection of these missives from 2010.

W h e re

Zoologica l Museum of the Zoologica l Institute of t h e Rus si a n Aca dem y of Sci ence s 1 Un i v e r s i t e t s k ay a N a b . , S t . Pe t e r s b u r g , 19 9 0 3 4

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S tat e M u se u m of the Hist ory of Religion 10 P o c h t a m t s k a y a U l i t s a , S t . P e t e r s b u r g , 1 9 0 0 0 0

P o s ta l M u se u m PO B o x 16 7, FI - 0 0 10 1 , H e l s i n k i , F i n l a n d

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Yulia Rostovsk aya,

10 y e a r s o l d

W h e re

Fr o m

Polina Borilkevich,

8 years old

(Po s t c a rd L i z a Z h u kova i n e x p a n d e d fo r m)

W h e re

V r u b e l Om s k R e g i o n a l M u s e u m o f t h e V i s u a l Ar t s 2 3 U l i t s a L e n i n a , O m s k , 6 4 4 0 10

Fr o m

Liza Zhukova,

7 years old

W h e re

S pa c e Tr av e l M e m o r i a l M u s e u m 1 1 1 P r o s p e c t M i r a , 1 2 9 16 4

Fr o m

Sergei Borzunov,

Central Museum o f t h e Gr e a t Pa t r i o t i c Wa r 10 B r a t y e v F o n c h e n k o , M o s c o w , 1 2 1 17 0

9 years old

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P o s ta l M u se u m PO B o x 2 0 0 2 , S E -10 3 1 1 , S t o l k h o l m , S w e d e n

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Liza Lyapushkina,

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W h e re

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Vera Drobilko,

W h e re

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Z v e r e v s k y M o d e r n Ar t C e n t r e B u i l d i n g 4 , N o v o r y a z a n s k a y a U l i t s a , 10 7 0 6 6

Oleg Turobinsky,

Fr o m

Liza Oparina,

8 years old

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S u vor ov S tat e M e mor i a l M u se u m 4 3 K i r o c h n a y a U l i t s a , S t . P e t e r s b u r g , 1 9 10 1 5

Museum of Books of t h e Ru s si a n S tat e L i br a ry 3 / 5 Vo z d v i z h e n k a , M o s c o w , 1 1 9 0 1 9

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C e n t r a l R a i l wa y Tr a n s p o r t M u s e u m , R u s s i a n R a i l wa y s M i n i s t r y 5 0 S a d o v ay a U l i t s a , S t . Pe t e r s b u r g , 19 6 0 6 8

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Yegor Mitrofanov,

8 years old

W h e re

M o s c o w M o d e r n Ar t M u s e u m 2 5 P e t r o v k a , M o s c o w , 10 7 0 3 1

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Masha Kuzmina,

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QUoTes a l e x a n d e r av d e y e v Russian Culture Minister Source: Inter v iew w ith Ek ho Moskv y radio Date

—6

J a n u a r y 2 0 10

Museums need good premises and new technologies; museums need care from society and the state; and museum workers must have their salaries raised.

Because the average monthly salary for museum workers in the country is 8,500 rubles — a little under 300 U.S. dollars. I was recently in the Tver Oblast, and went to a local history museum. A curator was guarding church relics — now museum relics — that are probably worth about a million dollars. I asked him: “How much do you earn?” “4,300 rubles” — that’s 140 dollars a month. And this poor curator is in charge of unique national treasures. This is not right. For that reason we need good premises, we need money, prestige for the museum-worker’s profession and, as I said earlier, attention from parties and the government, and, at present, from the ruling party and the state.

mik h a il pio trovsk y Di rector of the State Her m itage Museu m

va d i m z a k h a r o v Artist, Kandinsky Prize winner 2009 Source: Inter view with RIA Novosti Date

— 15

M a r c h 2 0 10

It seems to me that there ought to be prizes that serve as incentives at a local level — that means prizes at a municipal or regional level. But noone has an interest in this, because no-one has an interest in contemporary art — today it only creates problems. Censorship still exists to this day, and it is increasingly linked with religious issues, for example.

Contemporary art is linked to scandals, and exhibition organisers have to think about whether or not to invite contemporary artists, because who knows what they’ll get up to. Contemporary art has become something of a bogeyman for the cultural system in Russia as a whole. Russian culture needs works that are loyal to the orthodox state system that has been constructed today. Contemporary art is ungovernable, it can do whatever it wants, and in this sense it is inconvenient.

To understand this, we need to learn tolerance, and to envisage culture as free territory.

Source: Inter view with Kommersant newspaper Date

—5

M a r c h 2 0 10

No museum can compete with billionaire private collectors, of whom there are now many. And moreover, when we turn up at an auction, the prices immediately shoot up. Once, Rostropovich and I were competing for a snuffbox with a portrait of Count Orlov. We were unable to buy it, as he offered more.

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Di rector of the State Histor y Museu m

A r t i s t , w r i t e r, a r t t h e o r e t i c i a n

Source: Inter view with Gazeta.ru web portal

S ou r c e: I nt er v ie w w it h A r t-K h r on i k a ne w s p ap er

Date

— 19

A p r i l 2 0 10

We need to establish in legislation a list of things that cannot be considered for transfer to the church. This relates to objects that have long since moved beyond their original intended ecclesiastical purpose. In my opinion, first and foremost, this list should include the Uspensky, Archangel and Blagoveshchensky cathedrals of the Moscow Kremlin. Also, the Pokrovsky Cathedral on Red Square, which was never really used for daily worship. Perhaps certain sites included on the UNESCO World Heritage List, for the protection of which the government has taken on certain responsibilities, should also be included.

Date

— 26

M a y 2 0 10

A museum is not a projection of eternity in which, as the Gospel says, there is no decay or disintegration, but a complete illusion. Museums calmly throw out items that just the day before could be found on lists of masterpieces.

v l a dimir du k el sk y Historian, museologist, museum designer

hen ri loy ret te D i r e c t o r, L o u v r e

Source: “W hy is the museum boom passing Russia by?” roundtable discussion Date

— 15

December 2009

Source: Inter view with Izvestiya newspaper Date

—1

M a r c h 2 0 10

A museum that doesn’t give a push to contemporary creative art and is only occupied with its own past glories will sooner or later die.

Illustrator Nadezhda Danilova

Another problem is that the attitude towards museums of those who decide their fate (to build or not to build, to tear down or not to tear down, to support or not to support) is reflected in the polarisation of attitudes to museums. There are two considerations here that, strange as it may seem, exist side by side: “What’s all this rubbish you’re hanging on to?” and “Where have you put our treasures?” These two conceptions exist on the same level, on the same plane, and are expressed at one time or another depending on specific needs. This is because the authorities merely see in the museum an official warehouse — the quieter, the more closed off, the less noticeable it is, the better.

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The Lomography Embassy

but the sanDs of petersbUrg cover us and the PriNT of our ancient haNds A project of

At the invitation of the Hermitage Magazine, the Petersburg Lomography Embassy occupied the museum, armed with twenty-three LCA, Holga and Diana cameras. The results are in this issue

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Lef t: Photographer

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Fi lm — Fiji Superia 400

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Fi lm — Fiji Superia 400 Development — cross

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Marina NOVIKOVA

l omo l ca

Fi lm — Fiji Superia 400 Development — cross

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Development — cross+push

Marina NOVIKOVA

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Development — cross+push

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Project participants

Artyom MOSKOVSKY

Olga YAKOVLEVA

Yulia SVETLOVA

Vladimir IVSHIN

Vladislav GRAD

Olga ANTONOVA Anastasia KOPTEVA Gleb VERESHAKO

Yekaterina LEONTIEVA

Konstantin SHOLOKH h

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S p e c i a l t h a n k s t o Yu l i a Svetlova for providing a vast archive of shots of the Hermitage S u m m e r 1–2 (15 ) 2 0 10

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A n official q u estion Тex т

А lexander SEK ATSKY

To outside obser vers, “museum work ” ha s an a ssociation w ith the routi ne, something akin to teaching geometry in a school. Many believe that if cu lture does have any hot spots or zones of conf lict, then there is no way that they cou ld be located i n museu ms. A n acquaintance of mine, taking great pride in his wit, defined a museum as “a hospice for works of art.”

the particu lar item kept at the museum, thus reinforcing the status of the protected artifact. If there are visitors (parishioners, rather than passersby), or if the rite’s significance requires it, in the case of an anniversar y, say, or a particular day of remembrance, the off iciating attendant could recount a detailed history — after all, as well as the reg u la r ser v ices there a re occasional religious rites. A decisive shift on the part of museums in the direction of sacralization is capable of breathing new life into these structures which real ly are in the midst of a deep str uctural crisis.

I n t he c ont ex t of t h i s u n f l at t er i n g evaluation and, even more shockingly, equally poor self-esteem, the museum community does ever y thing it can to f i nd a justi f ication for its ex istence, and fal ls into a trap in doing so, taking on a role that is alien to it and neglecting its actual cultural work, which is extremely important.

We must, first and foremost, establish which polar ity a museu m is d r ifting towards — that of a church of that of a warehouse.

If we leave aside local histor y and profes siona l mu seu m s (they a re a separate topic), then we must ad m it that today, a museu m — a museu m of the v isua l ar ts i n the w idest sense of the wor d — ex i s t s i n a s p a c e t h at i s d irectly opposed to its or ig i na l conception, its so-ca l led eidos. Today, a museu m is bu i lt i nto the process of the democratization of ar ts; what ’s more, it head s the l i st of i n stitution s that d ispense cu ltu re, w ith home del iver y ser v ices into the bargain. Increasingly, we a re com i n g i nt o cont a c t w ith museu ms on electron ic car r iers, w ith mu seu m s presented on the Inter net, so the remai n i ng “here” element has become mea n i ngles s. Mu seu m s, havi n g ap e d show bu si ne s s a r en a s , u nq u e s t io n i n g l y i nvo ke t h e “ i m p e r ative of moder n ity,” fear i ng the onset of tota l futi l ity and i r relevance. The mo der n i z i n g t r end , i nde e d , c a n not b e t a ken a ny f u r t her — a refor m of t he s p el l i n g s y st em a lon g t he l i ne s of “w r ite it the way it sou nds” wou ld m a ke the whole i n stit ution of spel li ng redu ndant.

Never theless, i f the publ ic does continue to bless museums with visits, it merely does so in order to desig nate its par ticipation in the list of sights, to tick the box, as it were, and this is on ly remains tr ue of international ly renow ned museu ms such as the Louvre or the Hermitage, rather than city museums as such. W hat is to be done? h

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А le x an d er S E K A T S K Y P h i l o s o p h e r, c u l t u r e e x p e r t , s i n o l o g i s t , author of the books “The Mighty a n d T h ei r M i g ht ,” “ I nve s t i g a t i o n s ” and “T wo Caskets, T u rquoise and Jade”

The answer, which to this day doesn’t appear to be immediately obvious, is as follows: fire the sharp entertainers and games ma sters, a nd ta ke a lead from the church. A service in a church is held irrespective of the number of parishioners in attendance on the day in question. Even if there are none, the ser v ice is held never theless, and not just to go through the motions, but to mark a form of the eternal — it is in this, after all, that the power and the might of the church lies. The time has c ome t o em b o dy t he or i g i n a l met aphor of a temple of the a r t s, a nd to abandon the humiliating hunt for ever y passerby w ith the ai m of foisti ng the a r t it sel f upon h i m. Suppor t for the doomed “culture delivered to your home” project must be abandoned. Yes, all these forms should and must exist, but more as a handing out of alms that doesn’t interfere with the daily liturgy of the museum service.

It could look something like this: At the appointed time, the museum wardens cou ld tour their ex hibition, stopping at each ex h ibit a nd i nt on i ng appropriate words, perhaps merely naming

Everything is in place for this new life for museums to begin, a life that in fact once existed but has long since been forgotten. Firstly, the avant garde of contemporar y art has set a course in a d i rection of ser v ice that wa s h ither to character istic of cu lt practices alone. Second ly, ar tists representing extremely varied versions of art, which to a large extent negate one another, are all united in their wish to get into museu ms. It is f i na l ly ti me to ma ke proper u se of that a spi ration, ma i ntaining the dignity and worthiness fitting to the institution. There are other factors, in particular those arising thanks to the collapse of faith and the resulting vacuum.

Cer tai n museu ms, and the most succ e s sf u l at t h at , h ave lon g si nc e b e come analogous to neo-pagan temples.

Mikhailovskoe, Yasnaya Polyana, Bayreuth in Germany — they can all stake a claim to the role of cathedrals of a special kind. The Supreme Warden of the Pushkin Museum in Mikhailovskoe, S. S. Geichenko was, in his own way, a veritable Patriarch, a recognized “elder” of Russia’s museum world.

It would seem, then, that it is not the popularization of arts as an end itself but the retention of its transcendental status that is the future of museums.

Not the corral ling of chance passersby — on the contrar y, it is the limitation of access, the creation of a stable hierarchy of the initiated. That is the on ly way t o su r v ive a nd f u r ther develop. Only in this way can the museum warden restore his right to primogeniture with regard to curators and all other manner of “art-makers.” And the Hermitage (naturally!) could very easily lay claim to the role of Russia’s premier cathedral.

Phot o g r aph Yu r y Molo d kovet s

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Tex t

Elena KOSTYLEVA

Photo

Yury MOLODKOVETS

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How do you explain the myth of Hercules and the Nemean lion to someone who ha s never seen a lion? How do explain the paintings of the sur reali sts to people for whom reality i s ju st a s fanta stical?

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By the time that Borges became the director of the National library in Buenos Aires, he was almost completely blind: “I always imagined heaven as something like a library, just as some imagined it as a garden or palace. And now I was in one. There were 900,000 volumes in different languages gathered here. I found that I could barely make out the writing on the spines.” This is probably how blind children feel at the Hermitage — all the treasures of the world lie before them, but they cannot see them.

Children from the Grot boarding school for the visually impaired come to the museum regularly. They don’t look like they have anything wrong with them, though many of them wear glasses.

“Yes,” says Larisa Shostak, senior research assistant at the Hermitage, “when I started working with this group, I also had my doubts. This is because they are well-looked after at the Grot school. And then they began drawing here, and I realized that one of them saw nothing apart from the narrow strip of floor in front of him, another could not focus on the sheet of paper, and the rest had serious problems with their vision. How could the Hermitage be introduced to these children?”

For the first year they visit the museum once a month, just to get them started. Unlike the standard excursions, the lessons are not organized in topics, such as Medieval France or Greek Gods, but by halls. One lesson, one hall. For example, the Knights’ Hall. It is crucial that the children feel what we have long become used to and often overlook — echoes, the footsteps of other visitors, the volume of the space. From the second year, they begin to learn about genres of art, such as painting and sculpture.

The guide doesn’t read off a text for the excursion off by heart. Instead, the tour is always conducted in a conversation format.

“I memorized the text, but I quickly lost my place, and that was the end of that. I realized immediately that it was hopeless,” says Shostak.

Initially, Shostak guided these groups herself: “We started doing this in 1990. The children’s homes used to be closed institutions, and the children were isolated. But perestroika began, and everyone remembered that these children should be in society. And children came along, completely blind, and I didn’t have any teaching aids for them.

I put the first excursion together and thought: This excursion is far too short. By the third time we already had to separate it into three parts. That’s because the main thing is to give each child time to understand and feel what they’re seeing. Take an ornament for example. For us it is simply a rosette.

But a blind person needs to study this rosette for a very long time. h

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Twelve excursion guides currently work at the Hermitage with these special children. The lessons for visually impaired children are fundamentally different from the ordinary approach employed, being based on the principle of “less is more.” For example, in the Bosporus Halls there is a life-sized lion. The children study its paw.

At first, they think it’s a dog. Then they think it’s a large dog. Only slowly do they being to realize that it’s a lion.

Two boys — one blond, one red-haired — are behaving like clowns on the excursion. Artyom, sitting on the floor, pretends to be Jupiter, but the rest (those who can see to a sufficient degree) aren’t distracted by this pantomime — the guide Avgustina doesn’t lose their attention for a second. She chooses the largest vase and tries to help the children see what is depicted on it, and if they can’t see, they guess: “She has a bow and a quiver with arrows. Who is she? That’s right, Nastenka, Artemis! She has a helmet. Who is she? Correct, Athena! And do you know that she was born in a very strange way. Do you remember that Zeus had a headache, and he swallowed Athena’s mother, because he didn’t want to have children? But Athena was born anyway — out of Zeus’ head!”

Poor Ilya, in an attempt to concentrate, pulls at his own cheeks.

“Do you want to go to a wedding?” asks Avgustina.

“Yes!” the children cry in unison.

They gather by a bas-relief and spend a long time touching each figure.

“What’s in the center? A tripod! What’s under it? Fire! Light! What was the name of the hero who stole fire from the gods and brought it to the people? Prometheus, that’s right. Prometheus was the son of a mortal woman, and a god, in other words he was — that’s right! A hero! And what other superheroes do you know?

“Jesus Christ!”

“Batman!”

“Spider Man!” “Jackie Chan!”

“And who is standing there with the three apples?”

“Hercules!”

They absolutely love Hercules, even more than Spider Man. They discuss his condition, and come to the conclusion that Hercules is tired.

“Correct! He just held up the sky in place of Atlas — remember how he tricked him?”

“Poor Atlas…” Artyom feels sorry for Atlas who has been left standing with the sky on his shoulders.

“Couldn’t they put up some columns? Under the sky?”

The science of therapy for the blind tells us that the h

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main problem for visually impaired children is so-called “secondary deviations”: psycho-neurological diseases, speech impediments, reduced activity and negativism (where you don’t expect anything good from reality in general). One of the main tasks of learning is to minimize or eliminate secondary deviations. Judging by the curiosity and attentiveness of the children, the task is being carried out successfully.

“Look — what’s she wearing? It’s not a dress, not a pinafore and not a skirt.”

“It’s a tunic!”

“That’s right!”

Avgustina praises each child, whatever their reply.

“It’s transparent or… that’s right! Wet. Because where did she come from? From the sea. Doesn’t she have beautiful legs?”

“Aphrodite!” says Artyom. “Everyone fell in love with her, even doggies ran after her wagging their tails.”

“When the mass of the sculpture talks with the palm and the palm listens to the sculpture, the resulting density of communication is such that the connection between the palm and the sculpture can remain in the palm forever,” wrote curator Michael Brandon in 1995. Watching the children swarm around Aphrodite’s legs, you feel genuinely envious.

They’re allowed to do everything — touch the statue, embrace a vase, and study a mosaic or the luxurious marqueterie parquet in the Georgievsky hall. There are numerous details there — bouquets, berries, curls — like a beautiful rug. The children discover it all for themselves with their hands.

The Metropolitan Museum in New York also has Touch Tours, for the main exhibition and the garden of sculptures, where you can study art by touch — albeit in gloves. The list of artifacts that can be touched, however, includes works by Rodin, Picasso and Matisse. Similar programs exist at the Guggenheim Museum and the Parisian Museum of Science and Industry. The history museum in Guangzhou recently created a zone for the blind where you can touch replicas of cultural relics, and opened a hall of books in Braille. The Louvre has a tactile gallery.

But none of this is considered as effective as working with the visually impaired in the main halls: these visitors don’t develop a sense of the museum as a whole if they are restricted to specialized zones and facilities.

The New York Metropolitan Museum has worked with special visitors — from invalids and the blind to patients suffering from Alzheimer’s diseases — since 1972.

There is a Braille plan of the museum in the foyer, one can enter the building with a guide dog, and the entire building is equipped with lifts and elevation platforms (the Hermitage also has them, though the Moscow Pushkin S u m m e r 1–2 (15 ) 2 0 10

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c h i l d r e n Arts Museum does not). Accompanying brochures are in large print, and specially trained lecturers work as guides.

Audio excursions for all the permanent and temporary exhibitions can be listened to on portable players, and amplified earphones are attached to the video art installations. Finally, part of the collection is displayed in tactile diagrams in special classes. The museum doesn’t take a cent from visitors for any of this.

Many organizations around the world are working on the difficulties involved in teaching blind children.

Every museum organizes the process in its own way. Larisa Shostak notes the difference in approach between teaching blind children in Russia and in the West, although her experience, unfortunately, is limited to a trip abroad that she made 10 years ago.

“I was in Helsinki at the international conference ’A museum for everyone.’ Our task was formulated as follows: To do as much as possible for each individual visitor. Develop a route. Think up various accessories or devices. Deaf people should be given texts, and blind people should be given earphones.

Art-therapy is highly developed in the West, psychologists with expertise in psychoanalysis work with children, and art specialists also help them.

This approach is used in the Russian Museum.

There is the ’A step towards you’ program, which is run by Olga Platonova, who is both a psychologist and an artist. We also work at the Hermitage as art historians. But we selected several methods for showing the art for ’different’ children.

Autistic children form the most difficult category, in Shostak’s experience.

“Autism is the general name, and we don’t have the right to ask about the specific diagnoses. We had a group from the Fathers and Children foundation, aged 5-25 — some of them don’t say anything at all, while others talk constantly. I got very tired.

We decided to start at the age of 14, because when the children get a little older they get used to some kind of social role and come out of their sealedoff worlds.”

But no, they probably don’t really leave those worlds — otherwise they would simply be cured. But what remains, what were they able to see? How can you find this out?

One of Shostak’s scientific articles focuses on the importance of drawing at the museum: “In trying to depict a sculpture, the authors themselves are often unhappy with the results, they see clumsy lines on paper, distorted proportions, and a kind of caricature of a work of art. But the aim of our lessons is not so much to teach them to draw, as to teach them to see and understand a work of art.

When the children look at a sculpture, and try to detect the main forms and lines of the human figure and convey

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them on a piece of paper, they carry out very complicated analytical work.”

Perhaps these results are much more important that what a tourist with full powers of sight really takes in when rushing through the Hermitage in headphones or in a group.

“And in the end, the children get something to talk about!” Shostak says.

At the Hermitage’s restoration and preservation centre, Old village, they are taught by archeologists and historians. The program is called “The past at your fingertips.” Using brushes, children dig out useful items in sandpits, and archeologist Anna Terentieva comments on their finds — she tells them how ancient people lived and what moved them.

Kirill finds a weapon — a club - and is very happy: “This is a real find. You could really knock someone out with this club!”

Tanya moves away just in case and changes the subject.

“I’ve got a whole cauldron!”

Timid Liza asks her neighbor: “Show me your piece of pottery!”

Carefully feeling the design on the clay side, she comes to a conclusion: “It looks like we’ve got the same pot”.

It looks like…

Art Education for the Blind, Inc. has worked for many years on creating methods that allow the blind to understand art. In first place is sound, while the Braille alphabet is slowly receding into the background.

Innovations include tactile diagrams — this is an expensive method of converting a picture into a three-dimensional depiction, into the language of touch, as it were. a large stamp is used to produce them, with each print corresponding to one view of the picture. However, both teachers and pupils have to learn to read these diagrams.

There are entire specialized museums for the blind around the world, for example the Museum of Tactile Antique and Modern Painting in Bologna and the Tactile Museum for the Blind in Athens. There are museums dedicated to the history of blindness, for example the Marie and Eugene Callahan Museum at the American Printing House of the Blind, where books, maps and typewriters in Braille are collected, along with the most recent achievements by specialists. But when you read all of this, you begin to realize that resources on education, art education and elementary care for the blind are concentrated in just a few places on the planet. Of course, it’s great that the Hermitage is one of these places, but an incredibly large amount remains to be done.

“A museum of the 21st century can only be created if there it’s a building in which the designer has h

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c h i l d r e n created an interior the way it should be from the very outset,” says Larisa Shostak. “We have a class where we can draw and talk with children. I have eight slides — I show them the Acropolis, Mount Olympus, and then they go to the classical halls.

The children do some drawings, and then discuss them — the Neuroses Centre works with us, and we get very good therapeutic results. What about deaf children? We need a person who knows sign language and has an excellent knowledge of the Hermitage. If this wonderful person is found, I’ll be very happy! But at the moment teachers interpret for our guides. There is school №33, where the teacher Yana Genrikhovna works. The way that she tells the children about the exhibits is wonderful.

They then draw and put on plays. Anima Centre brings ten groups of invalids and their parents.

Some of these invalids are already adults. It won’t be the first time they’ve come here, so they need a new program each time.”

The museum does everything with its own resources and, of course, with the help of sponsors.

The program entitled “The past at your fingertips” is paid for by Heineken and Cafemax, whose employees have been volunteering to dance for the children in Neanderthal costumes at their graduation parties for two years running.

Almost in passing, Shostak mentions the enormous amount of organizational work involved, the fact that working with the handicapped can be difficult, that they need to be met and guided, and that you never know what problems are going to arise on any particular occasion.

“But we seem to have learned how to manage it all, and we’ve built up a lot of experience. You have to understand that a museum isn’t just a place where you are given information. People come here to receive pleasure.”

All the pre-conditions for tactile art seem to be in place, but in reality it’s only done as something of a curiosity.

“You can’t categorize it as a sphere outside arttherapy,” says Yekaterina Andreyeva, a leading researcher at the Innovations Department at the Russian Museum. “I haven’t heard of any major exhibitions of tactile art, at the Pompidou Center or the Guggenheim Museum, say. There are individual examples, and of course you can analyze each one…

But in a purely functional sense, it is of no use in the adult world. It is only interesting to rare fans of surfaces, or people who are trying to speculate on blindness.”

The word “speculate” sounds harsh, but what else can you call attempts to raise the topic of blindness in

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modern art? In 2001, at the Tactile Exhibition in Petersburg, there was an exhibit entitled “Our favorite books” — a long box with two holes through which you could stick your hands and feel the book bindings without seeing the books themselves. This Borgesian nightmare was made real by Mikhail Ephstein and Irina Danilova. Artist Yury Albert arranged mocking guided tours — visitors were blindfolded, and the guide gave an ordinary tour: “Look to the left, look to the right.” In commenting on this project, Albert said that art arises in a person’s mind, and not on the retina: “I have always believed that imagined or remembered art is better and more interesting than what we can see in reality. I hope that all the participants will see with their inner gaze art that I cannot even imagine.”

Yekaterina Andreyeva believes that there is no imagined art, only people who have been able to break through blindness into reality: “In the context of the example of Timur Novikov, who was blind for the last five years of his life but continued to work as an artist and organize the artistic process, this kind of talk is extremely annoying. There are few works of ’tactile art,’ they are for the most part connected with the surrealist tradition. There are works that border on it, such as artists who were visually impaired: Alexei von Yavlensky or Vladimir Yakovlev, an outstanding conceptual artist of the 1970s. Yakovlev had poor vision from childhood, and over the years his vision got even worse. He chose two motifs that he remembered — the human face and flowers. And he created numerous amazingly expressive works.”

The Tate Modern gallery, besides ordinary materials for the blind — a brochure in Braille, sculptures, 3-dimensional pictures — has an additional program aimed at viewers’ imagination, their metaphorical thinking. Essentially, hanging a plaque in Braille next to each picture or converting pictures into 3-dimensional forms is not enough. This formal concern for the artistic education of the blind actually gives little in the way of results. Thus, for example, lecturers at the Tate Modern accompany a talk about Picasso’s works during the civil war in Spain by handing out shards of Plexiglas — as cold, sharp and harsh as Guernica. In talking about Dali’s work, they provide silicon implants for the blind to touch: the flexible, soft and unpredictably firm material makes it possible to imagine distortions of space and objects in surrealist art.

The way to overcome the gulf between the blind and the sighted is probably not through adaptation, but through the development of new concepts that will make art accessible to the blind. Through working with images.

In translating the artistic image into a new language — an image which cannot be explained using diagrams or words. h

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Anna PETROVA, Ivan SABLIN

Consultations and illustration

17 7 0 – 17 9 0

r a s t r e l l i ’s design a n d pa l a c e tr a ditions

V ladimir EFIMOV

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Sand façade with

Resonant ochre façade

Pale yellow façade with

yellow tinge

Details, white lime

ochre coloring

Details, white lime

Detai ls marked out w ith toning

Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli

In the first century of its history, the Winter alace, designed and built by Rastrelli, was of two colors. This remained unchanged for many years, even after the famous three-day fire in December 1837. Such was the force of tradition: The ochre background that was varied only slightly, and the unchanging white details, were inherited by Rastrelli’s building from its predecessors. One of these — the palace of Peter the Great’s era by Tresini and Mattarnovi — has been partially preserved: On the bank of the small Winter Channel, one can see a fragment of the original building that was discovered in the 1980s.

The initial ochre color of the ensemble is also reproduced, roughly, by the Church and Kitchen courtyards. They can be seen from the corridor of the Palace church and from the Jordan staircase. h

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For the most part, color changes weren’t down to changes in taste, largely being dependent on the tones available in any particular period. The move from two colors to monochrome, however, was a development in tastes and fashions in architecture, as the standard white for the columns was available, but, for some reason, was abandoned under A lexander II. The details were highlighted, by being somewhat brighter than the walls. By this time, gloomy beige and brown dominated in the city, and the white columns were painted the same tone as the façade. In the 1890s, Nicholas II went a step further, ordering that his entire residence be painted a terracotta tone, along with the Main and Guard ’s Staff Headquarters building. This was the color of the square — “the color of f lame and meat” — during Bloody Sunday, all the Russian revolutions and the “red days” of the first years of the Soviet regime.

High-ranking officials asked Nicholas on several occasions to change the “ugly” color — but to no avail.

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The number of colors used in any architectural composition is paramount. Architects usually strived towards a monochrome approach — excessive diversity of colors detracts from the overall impression created by the building itself. Few buildings of three colors are known. The Winter Palace as we know it, painted in three colors, was the invention of Soviet architects — by distant analog y with the palace in Tsarskoe Selo. At the wish of Tsarina Elizabeth Petrovna, the capitals and cartouches were gilded, creating an effect of unimaginable, exalted luxury. Catherine the Great ordered that the gilt, not suited to the northern climate, be replaced with ochre, creating the threecolor design followed by restorers after the Second World War. W hile Tsarskoe Selo lay in ruins, the Winter Palace was supposed, in some way, to become a monument to the destroyed suburban residences. The cobalt tone, however, was deemed too radical, and green, which was not part of Rastrelli ’s original design, was used on the Winter Palace's walls.

In the 18th-19th centuries, the binding foundation for the paint was slaked lime, into which pigments were mixed - “red earth ” and Olonets earth were used to pigment the Winter Palace, giving it a red shade and an ivor y coloring respectively. In 1934, the Winter Palace was painted with an oil-based f inish, but its destructive impact on the stone and plaster made a return to lime necessar y.

The post-War green paint is made of chromium oxide with emerald pigment, along with umber ochre for the details. In the 1960s1970s, expensive synthetic paints were introduced, making year-round work on façades possible. Few people were worried about the fact that beneath the perchlorovinyl paints, the moldings, plaster and stone “suffocated ” and crumbled. Recently the coatings of synthetic paint were scraped off the Winter Palace, and replaced with synthetic paints that breathe; they are not as watercolor-like and light as the lime paints, but they have a pleasant velvet texture.

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The color of a city changes over time. Especially if the coloring of the façades is not determined by the building materials — local stone, brick or concrete — but by the plastering.

The green of St. Petersburg’s Winter Palace is an innovation of the post-War era, and as an imperial residence it in fact changed colors several times,

together with rulers and fashions.

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Dense ochre façade

Dense ochre façade with

Ter r a cot t a-br ick façade

Fer r ic c h r ome f a ç a d e

Details marked out

red pigmentation

Detailing in the tone

Details, white, ochre

with toning

Detai ls marked out w ith toning

of the facade

The Winter Palace is also indebted to Russia’s last emperor for the dark f igures on its roof. Rastrelli ’s original statues were white, made of stone rather than copper. By the end of the 19th centur y they had either become dilapidated, or were no longer in keeping with contemporar y concepts of beauty. They were replaced with bronze statues. The roof also changed color several times. In the 18th centur y it was white; in the 19th centur y — and this seems incredible today — it was painted red. And only as a result of the post-War restoration was the roof painted green, the color it is today.

The gates, which the entire world knows from the scene of the storming of the place from Eisenstein’s film “October,” seem so baroque and so close to Rastrelli in spirit that the actual period in which they were created — the end of the 19th century — seems to be a mistake.

The designer of the gates, Robert-Friedrich Melzer, also designed the gates to the Personal Garden, which is now the square containing a fountain opposite the Admiralty (after the revolution the gate was removed, now standing on Prospekt Stachek, by the gardens commemorating the victims of Bloody Sunday, 1905. Initially the gates were modest and fashioned in wood.

Under Catherine, they were painted white; under Paul they were striped, like posts on roads marking distances or checkpoint barriers, and they stayed like this until the reign of A lexander III.

Ever y thing changed in the su m mer of 1941. A i r-fair y scholarly investigations, attempts at par tia l repainting, d isputes about what the pa lace was actua l ly before it had been tu r ned into a Sov iet museu m — a l l this became im mater ia l in the face of mor ta l danger. Li ke a l l the impor tant bu i ldings in the city, the pa lace needed to be camou f laged.

In order to ma ke the Winter Pa lace inv isible to the Nazi ar ti l ler y, it was painted g rey — approximately the same color that the Librar y of the Academy of Sciences is now. It seems li kely that a w ish to contrast the Warera color ing w ith new tones for an era of peace explains the post-War move to three colors and br ight paint.

W hat will the palace look like in the near future?

V ladimir Yefimov, the Hermitage’s deputy chief architect, believes that the postWar three-color design was an apt and gifted choice in coloring. But if there is an attempt to achieve historical accuracy, and return to the color of the late 18thearly 19th centuries, then all of Palace Square will have to be repainted. In the 19th century ensemble, the light yellow Winter Palace of Rastrelli was matched by the pearly grey General Staff building with gilded balusters — this was the way that Rossi originally planned it.

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Zoya Borisovna Tomashevskaya (born 1923) worked at the Hermitage as a volunteer in 1941 — she helped to package the collections to be sent away from the frontline. At the request of Hermitage Magazine, she recalls the events and feelings of those days.

Zoya Tomashevskaya ( b o r n 1 9 2 2 ) A r c h it e c t , w r it er, m em oi r i s t

“It was the 22nd of June 1941. We were happy first-year students of the architectural faculty of the Arts Academy.

We loved Petersburg, the Academy and our teachers, and even the sphinxes. And of course the Hermitage. We had just had entertaining lectures on art history there by our H

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the 1 Pavel Ni kol a ev ich Shu lt s (190 0– 1983) — a rcheolog i st a nd a r t h i st or ia n, profes sor of the A r t s Academy.

“He made u s fa l l i n love w ith the Her m ita ge, a lthough he wa s on ly i n cha rge of the a ncient section. In the wa r he wa s su rrou nded, then joi ned a Pa r tisa n d iv i sion, got frostbit e a nd had h i s a r m s a nd nose a mputat ed. But th i s d id not d i sf igu re h i m, he rema i ned ver y elega nt. We ca l led h i m ’a ntique Shu lt s’, says Toma shevsk aya.

2 Vladimir F r a nt sev ich L ev i n sonL es si n g (1893–1972, at the Her m ita ge from 1921 t o 1972). In 1941, he wa s the head of the depa r tment of the h i st or y of west er n Eu ropea n a r t.

He wa s appoi nted d i rect or of the br a nch i n Sverd lovsk, a nd wa s the head of the f i r st g roup.

“He wa s the second per son a f t er Orbel i, he wa s i n cha rge of ever y th i ng, they were both i n the ha l l s a l l day a nd a l l n ight.”

3 Ja net t a A nd reev n a Mat su lev ich (1890–1973, at the Her m ita ge from 1920 t o 1950), head of the scu lpt u re section at the depa r tment of west er n Eu ropea n a r t.

4 “None of ou r boys — my fellow school mat es a nd st udent s — su r v ived the wa r. T hey were a l l k i l led.”

5 Iosi f A bga r ov ich O r bel i (1887– 1961, at the Her m ita ge from 1920 t o 1951).

F rom 1934, d i rect or of the mu seu m.

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teacher Pavel Nikolaevich Shults1. We spent all the time there when we weren’t at other lessons.

The academic year was drawing to a close. There were viewings and exhibitions of our works. We were very diligent. There were 13 of us. Although it was Sunday, we were all at Tsirkul (architectural faculty workshops). The next day there was to be a faculty inspection…

At 12 o’clock, the radio came on. War was declared. Everyone rushed to ’save the Hermitage’.

At the Jordan entrance we were met by Levinson-Lessing2 and Janetta Andreevna Matsulevich3.

Evidently, despite the fact that it was Sunday, all the employees were also in a hurry to ’save the Hermitage’. No one was surprised by our arrival. They wrote down our names and arranged a date for us to come there. We needed documents — photographs, student passes — it was the Hermitage, after all!

We came on the appointed day. There were no longer 13 of us. Enlistment was underway. The home guard was being formed4.

They didn’t take my documents. I was petrified with fear. I didn’t know how to defend myself yet…

Janetta Andreevna said: ’Iosif Abgarovich Orbeli5 wanted to know whether you were related to Boris Viktorovich Tomashevsky’6. I was petrified from fear again, that they wouldn’t take me, or would ask my

F r o m t h e a r c h i v e o f Z . B .To m a s h e v s k y, 1939

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father. I said timidly: ’He’s my father’… And in reply I received an enormous canvas apron with an enormous pocket, where evidently items needed for work were supposed to be held (yarn, scissors, soft padding etc.): ’You don’t need a pass.

Your name will be at all the checkpoints. You are confined to barracks. You can sleep on the couches’.

How about that! I could have wept for joy. The Hermitage would become my home. What could be more wonderful than that? I wasn’t 18 yet, and I didn’t know what war was.

I was singing and rejoicing on the inside. I lived in this home for almost two months! Of course, I sometimes when home, or to the Academy. This was allowed, only I had to tell the guards.

And another small miracle. It doesn’t seem small to me.

On the contrary, it seems grandiose. I work in Matsulevich’s group. Imagine, I can touch Michelangelo’s7 ’Boys’, I measure it… What’s more, Janetta once gives me a wooden sketch of a slave, and says that this is a sketch by Michelangelo, and asks me to go with it to the carpenter’s workshop, to order a box… The carpenter’s workshop is in the second yard, and I need to leave the Hermitage (with it in the pocket of my canvas apron!). I need to walk along the embankment to the gates… My heart stops… I want to tell all the passers-by what I have in my apron pocket…

The tragic day of sending away the items comes…

Orbeli is standing on the granite slope that leads down to the Neva. He is crying”.

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T w o m o nt h s , o n e w e e k a n d o n e day Commentary

Аnna PETROVA

6 B or i s Vi k t or ov ich Tom a shevsk y (1890–1957) — ph i lolog i st, one of the leader s of the for ma l school, P u sh k i n specia l i st. In 1941 he wa s a lect u rer at the L en i ng r ad Un iver sit y, a nd a n employee of the P u sh k i n Hou se.

“I d id n’ t k now at the ti me that my father wa s fa mou s. He wa s ver y modest. I probably rea lized the mea ni ng of the word “g reat ”, when I received a t eleg r a m from A n na A nd reevna A k h mat ova when he d ied i n 1957: “I mou r n for a g reat schola r, a nd tha n k a fr iend ”.

7 T he attr ibution of th i s sket ch wa s lat er cha nged.

Orbeli and A mosova prepare a new ex hibition. 1945.

The preparation of Hermitage collections for possible evacuation began in 1939. A detailed plan of action was drawn up, special boxes were prepared of all necessary sizes, and packaging materials were stockpiled: kilometer-long rolls of oilcloth, wax, cigarette and wrapping paper, tons of wood shavings, cotton and cork chips. The employees made a test packaging. Later, they recalled: “Every box knew its painting, ever sculpture knew its box”.

From 23 June, the Hermitage became to a barracks — the employees barely left the museum. After a week of uninterrupted work and strict military discipline, half a million exponents of the first group were packaged.

Especially large paintings were taken out of their frames, wrapped in rolls, sewed into wax paper and packaged into boxes. The only exception was made for Rembrandt’s “The Prodigal Son”. Small canvases were taken out of their frames and placed in the boxes horizontally. Pastels H

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were packaged in glass, protected from the light by paper.

Drawings and engravings were evacuated in suitcases and boxes, just as they were stored in the museum. The tapestries and fabrics, sprayed with kerosene, were also rolled up and sewn into oil cloth. The sculptures were fixed firmly in boxes with wooden beams, so that they could not move inside. Porcelain, majolica and antique vases were placed in cotton wrapped in cigarette paper, and cushions of wood shavings and wrapping paper tied with twine were placed on top. Similar bolsters were placed between the objects and walls of boxes to protect against jolts and blows.

On 1 July, the first group was sent away from the front line (to Sverdlovsk), and the second on 20 July. The third did not make it: on 30 August the Germans took Mga, cutting off the railroad. The volunteers working H

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Employees inscribe codes on boxes in the Rastrel li gal ler y.

Central State Archive of Film and Photo Documents. 1941.

Order of Orbeli №168. “The day off on the 23rd of June is cancel led. Directions on days off for scientif ic employees, workers and ser vice personnel w i l l be given later” State Hermitage archive. — F.1. — Op.18. — Item.149. — L.136.

Form of new scu lpture.

Form №36. Form of packaging box №47.

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8 T h i s ex h ibit w i l l be exa m i ned i n deta i l i n the nex t i s sue of the ma gazi ne.

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Employees move furniture and chandeliers in the Apol lo hal l.

1941. CSAFPD. Un loading of boxes on 10 October 1945 in the Jordan entrance. CSAFPD.

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at the Hermitage were allowed to go home. The remaining exponents were put into the basements and halls of the first floor.

For two months, the halls were filled with the banging of hammers, the treading of Red Army boots and sailor’s shoes, the scrape of sleds and rollers on which the heavy boxes, weighing tons and hundredweights, were dragged. There was no time to talk. Codes were inscribed on the boxes. OV — Oriental department, OK — Special storage, OIPK — Department of primitive culture art. The heads of departments compared the notes and contents of the boxes, and when they were loaded into the trucks, they gave the documents to the escorts. At the train station, another employee made a note on the arrival of the boxes and their codes. Of 1,117,000 exhibits, only one8 did not return to the Hermitage in 1945.

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STaKINg a cLAIm

A year ago, by order of the Ministry of Culture, the Alexander Column was transferred from the control of the Museum of City Sculpture, which has been responsible for it since 1939, into the operational administration of the Hermitage. The monument, which honours Alexander I, has been assigned the position of Exhibit No. 1 in the Museum of the Guards.

The Alexander Column is the centre of a vast ensemble commemorating the Russian victory over Napoleonic France.

Created by the French architect Auguste de Montferrand, the column symbolically links the Triumphal Arch and “Chariot of Victory” at the centre of the General Staff Building with the Alexander Hall on the first floor of the Winter Palace — they are all on the same axis. If Montferrand’s most important creation, St. Isaac’s Cathedral, is a clumsy copy of the Panthéon in Paris, then the Alexander Column is his answer to the Colonne Vendôme, cast from Russian cannons in 1810 and erected in the centre of the French capital. Although both columns — that commemorating Napoleon’s victory and that honouring Alexander I — hark back to the column of the Roman Emperor Trajan, Montferrand allowed a greater h

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degree of abstraction and generalisation in his execution of the government commission. He decided against a ribbon of bas reliefs, used an indestructible monolith of stone instead of cast-iron, and topped the monument with a figure not of the emperor but of the spirit of peace. This saved the monument from subsequent abuse. The Colonne Vendôme was not so lucky, being resmelted with every change of regime, with Napoleon discarded or redressed either in a greatcoat or in a classical toga. In contrast, not even the Bolsheviks could touch the Alexander Column.

Although they did try, and there are archive documents that testify to various efforts to modernise the column.

November 7, 1918.

Mayakovsky’s metaphor that “The streets are our br ushes, the squares our palettes” almost turned out to be a mirror-image ref lection of reality on the f irst anniversar y of the Revolution. The facades of the bui ldings on Palace Square, renamed Uritsky Square, were draped in coloured suprematist panels. The project’s designer, Natan A ltman, not on ly camouf laged the “imperial text” of the palace ensemble by covering over the classical al legories, but also created the i l lusion that the shape of the square had been changed. The A lexander Column was surrounded w ith a futurist platform, and it is li kely that the participants in the demonstration symbolical ly vanquished the monument as a class enemy when they mounted the podium.

Central State Archive of Cinema and Photo

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L a rge A ngel s, Life-Size Commentary

Nataliya LEBINA,

doctor of historical sciences

I first heard of the efforts made in 1924 to replace the angel on the Alexander Column with a figure of Lenin in an article by the historian Andrei Dzeniskevich (Art of Leningrad, 1989, No.2). He found materials in the archive of the Leningrad Soviet of Worker and Peasant Deputies, from which it was clear that the angel was saved by Lunacharsky, the People’s Comissar of Englightenment. In December 1924, he sent the then head of the city, Grigory Zinoviev, a letter in which he explained the absurdity of “ putting a portrait figure on top of a vast column... The individual features will be unidentifiable at that hight; the existing figure of the Spirit of Peace is artistically justified by the decorative spread of its wings and the mass of its long robes.” Zinoviev, an active supporter of Leninisation, closed the matter with the resolution: “ Well, to hell with them. We’ll leave them a column with an imperial angel.”

However, I found it hard to believe in this apparent solution to a complex issue. Confirming my suspiscions became possible in the late 1990s when, in the archives of the Central City Administration of St. Petersburg, among the papers of the Departments of Communal Property, and of the Reconstruction of Cemeteries, Bathhouses, h

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September 1, 1933. On International Youth Day, the column was capped with a hat of baloons. This effect was also used for the Anniversaries of the October Revolution. As one of the creators of this “installation” (a huge stand covering the facade of the Winter Palace) recalls: “Baroque f lourishes weren’t in tune with the era of the First Five-Year Plan.

And what were we to do with the angel who, as everybody knows, has the face of Alexander I? The solution was to order baloons from Red Triangle and hang them in bunches on the statue with a cross.” (B. Semenov, Vremya moikh druzei) S u m m e r 1–2 (15 ) 2 0 10

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and Public Toilets, amongst a lot of rubbish I found a “ Correspondence on the reconstruction of the Alexander Column.” From the notes of various meetings it became clear that throughout 1924 and 1925 the threat of the leader being raised up remained a reality. However, the authorities rashly called on the intelligentsia to solve the issue. To begin with, the architects Lev Ilin and Alexander Udalenkov, the historian Vladimir Kurbatov, the sculptor Matvei Manizer and the artist Yevgeny Lansere fooled around, suggesting “ when mounting the figure on top of the column ... that a Lenin be created in the style of the monument, for example, dressed in a Roman toga...” Then, however, they resorted to a tried and tested method — red tape. At meetings, they spent hours discussing whether or not Lenin should be replaced with the figure of a Red Army soldier, so as not to interfere with the ususal image of the leader in jacket and cap. Whether to dress the defender in “ imperial clothes”. Whether it was “ possible to replace a symbol of peace with a statue of a symbol of war.” Absurd plans were investigated, the authors of which were willing for as little as 300 rubles, with 35 boards and two poods of nails, “ to remove the angel of the spire of the Peter and Paul Fortress as well.” They compared estimates. The decision was also delayed by the mineralogist Alexander Fersman’s commission, which studied the crack in the body of the column to decide whether or not a monument “ of unstable material” could actually support Lenin. In the end, the committees established for the “ reconstruction” drowned in paperwork. And thus the Alexander Column was saved. h

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Above left and on the page 45

In 1937, in an attempt to override the custom of celebrating Christmas, New Year’s celebrations were off icial ly permitted in the Soviet Union. In Moscow, the USSR’s main New Year’s tree was placed in the House of Soviets w ith a red star on top. In Leningrad, a vast New Year’s bazaar was organized on Uritsky Square, and the A lexander Column was transformed into a New Year tree.

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Invent or y

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K a n d l e r ’s Fr idge № э -70 4 1 Winter Palace, hall №298, 2nd f loor

A font, vase, or perhaps a tureen — visitors try to guess what the gigantic silver cup that opens the exhibition of English art really is.

Provenance.The bowl ’s vast size is the result of the ambition of the card-sharp Littleton Pointz Meynell. Meynell wanted to amaze his acquaintances, and most importantly surpass the enormous wine cistern of his neighbor Nicholas Licky, Duke of Scarsdale. As fate would have it, both bowls made it to the Hermitage collection by the 18th century (Scarsdale’s is in the A lexander Hall). The English draughtsman George Vertue designed the bowl, and the banker and jeweler Henry Jerningham engraved it, being in charge of the project. John Michael Rysbrack sculpted the wax models, and Charles Kandler turned it into silver, further engraving it — hence its alternative name: Kandler’s Fridge. W hen the gigantic gift, which took four years and 220 kilograms of silver to make, was finished, the client rejected it. His neighbor had gone bankrupt, so buying it was pointless. Jerningham offered it to George II, various foreign nations and the Russian ambassador, Prince Antiokh Kantemir, and even suggested that Parliament make it a lottery prize to raise funds for a bridge over the Thames. He ended up organizing his own lottery, and the bowl was won by a Major William Battine from Sussex. Agents for Empress Elizabeth Petrovna appear to have bought it from him in 1741, and it was sent to Moscow for coronation ceremonies. By the end of the 18th century, bottles had gone out of fashion as containers, and in the 19th century, according to chamber fourrier journals, the bowl decorated the table “adorned with f lowers on the inside.”.

The English, who took a lively interest in this exhibit, made an electrotype copy for the Victoria and A lbert Museum.

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Trompe-l’oeil The grapevine on Kandler’s bowl is covered in snails, caterpillars and lizards in their natural size. These visual tricks, which were often even painted, were popular in the baroque era.

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In ventory n umber The wine cistern was received by the Hermitage in 1882 from the Silver storerooms of the Winter Palace, and the inventory number 506 was stamped under one of the handles. h

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Satyr and Bacchante The decorative program of the cup is dictated by its function: the court of Dionysus is depicted on it with baroque excess, along with dozens of kilograms of heav y bunches of grapes. A satyr and bacchante serve as handles, having been forged separately and attached to the cistern with enormous bolts.

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Panthers The circle of Dionysus usually contains oriental animals in harness, often panthers, serving as a reminder that this deity came to Greece from Asia. On the cistern, the panthers look suspiciously like dogs. The sculptor probably did not have a precise conception of what these animals looked like.

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Stamp The British guild of silver workers checked all works created by its craftsmen, and when they had certified its quality, they stamped it with four stamps (whereas only two were used in Germany). The first stamp is London, the second Britain, the third master Kandler, the fourth a letter for the year. 1735 corresponded to the letter T. The female figure of Britain meant sterling, which indicated a very high standard of metal: 960 units of silver per 1,000 units of alloy.

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Style “Truly exquisite French work ” was how the wine cistern was described in the 18th century. Until 1886 it was considered to be of French manufacture, as the design seemed to be so over-the-top, which was not characteristic for the English.

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Deep shadows The cleaned cistern should be almost white, as is fitting for silver. Its dark shadow is not the noble patina of time, but the result of oxidization, open storage and contact with the public.

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A Children’s orgy Babies with wings, babies with hooves, drunk babies embracing girls with goats’ legs — this is how Europeans have imagined a bacchanalia since the Renaissance, where putti, the offspring of goats, satyrs, bacchantes and other deities, played adult games.

Теx t А n n a Pet r ov a C on s u lt a nt М a r i n a L op at o Phot og r aph Yu r y Molo d kovet s

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Svetlana Ostrova Jörg Gruber P h o t o g r a p h e r ’s a s s i s t a n t Nadezhda Gorodetskaya

Project design and production Photographer

yoU can’t run anу furtheR Than уoUR thoughts

Photog raphic portraits of Her mitage employees who have been working at the mu seum for more than 60 years.

i r i n a k o t e l n i k o va

S e n i o r r e s e a r c h o f f i c e r , d e pa r t m e n t o f r u s s i a n c u l t u r a l h i s t o r y S t a r t e d Wo r k : 1 Au g u s t 1950

The Hermitage took me on as a scientific officer in the paintings section of the department of the history of Western European art. I was still just a girl really. It was very fortuitous, because that’s where I got to know the watercolours of the peasant artist Sadovnikov. I’ve spent my whole life dealing with portraits, studying what they are. It’s not just about curiosity; at home it’s curiosity, but at the museum it’s a science. For example, say you find some document in the archives, or a reference in an inventory — received from so-and-so, a portrait of an unknown man. If there is a signature, then you have to identify the face that’s depicted. There are many elements to this work. Things have been painted over; then there’s the attribution, and identifying the sitter. But it’s work! h

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P RINCIPAL R ESEARCH O FFICER , D EPARTMENT OF R USSIAN C ULTURAL H ISTORY s t a r t e d wo r k : 2 0 Ju ly 194 9

A person should like what they are studying, regardless of whether it’s some piece of iron, or simply a cube, or a little vase, or an embroidered gown. You and I have short life histories, but objects have long ones. As you grow up, knowledge accumulates about the feel of a material, about form and styles. Some obtain only a minimum of knowledge, and some more, but nevertheless, all museum-workers gradually become specialists who can tell just from a smell, or a small detail, or a little feather, what the object in front of them is and why the things that have been brought to the purchasing department have to be bought. I’ve breathed in so much dust from reading things in libraries and archives after the working day is over! If you can’t remember what the tail looks like on that carved dog in the collection, or what symbol is on this plate, then no computer will be able to help. And if that’s the case then there’s no point in working here.

o l g a b o g d a n o va

At right

HEAD , TECHNICAL SERVICES DEPARTMENT S t a r t e d Wo r k : 17 S e p t e m b e r 1945

I turned 20 on 6 July 1945 in Warsaw, on the second Belorussian front. After my service ended I came to Leningrad.

I heard an announcement on the radio that the Hermitage was looking for a communications specialist. A friend and I sent in applications, and on 17 September 1945 the deputy head of personnel took us to see the director, Orbeli.

Seeing a real live professor made us nervous. He said to me: You, my girl, will be in charge of housekeeping, and your friend (she was taller than me, a pretty girl) will be office manager. I had no work experience, no idea how everything worked, but he just said: Don’t worry, you’ll learn, I trust you. Orbeli even told the personnel woman not to give us back our passports, so that we wouldn’t run away. And that was when life really began! I know how many windows there are in each room, how big each room is; I know all the telephone numbers off by heart. I even sleep with the Hermitage; I see how the whole day went, what I didn’t do, and what I still have to get done. I think everyone in the Hermitage works like that. It’s how Orbeli taught us to work. h

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boris sаpunov PRINCIPAL RESEARCH OFFICER , DEPARTMENT OF RUSSIAN CULTURAL HISTORY s t a r t e d wo r k : 3 0 Ma r c h 1950

When I used to give lectures — at the Hermitage, at the university, in Luga — I would try to get the students to understand an object. For example, here is a table, which has four legs. It’s important to understand not the object per se, but how life has established it as a contact between man and memory. So, for me, an object would be “ brought back to life by life,” if you see what I mean. How our psychology can be interpreted as an artefact and how that influences us is an important interaction. Objects in a museum are classified by time, and by type. But in our houses they all lived together, from different eras — the end of the 18th century, the 19th, the 20th — they have become accustomed to one another. They were the continuation of the evolution of human thought.

At left

y e l e n a o y a t e va

SENIOR RESEARCH OFFICER , EASTERN EUROPE AND SI B ERIA ARCHAEOLO G Y DEPARTMENT

s t a r t e d wo r k : 4 No v e m b e r 194 6

God preserve me, I’ve always been amazed that they don’t charge us money to work here! There’s such beauty, so many fascinating people! And how many of them there have been! If you’re feeling down, all you need to do is go into one of the halls, walk around... It’s like you’re breathing pure oxygen, or pure air. Sixty years have passed. Research work makes putting up with difficulties easier. And everything else — service, day-to-day worries — you realise that to avoid drowning in the mire of work, you have to have a creative approach to life, and this creative work gives you strength and distracts you from any ills, from everything. h

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y evgen i yа shch u k ina PRINCIPAL RESEARCH OFFICER , NUMISMATICS DEPARTMENT

s t a r t e d wo r k : 1 O c t o b e r 1950

Oddly enough, numismatics suited the way my mind works. I think that the female mind, except for great women like Marie Curie, is broader than it is deep. That’s why women are interested in so many different aspects of life. Coins and medals I find attractive as historical and cultural artefacts. Once, Professor Yanin, a great expert on the culture of ancient Rus, came along with his wife, and I took them to the store rooms to show them something. All at once his wife, who was the head of the numismatics department at the Historical Museum, asks me: “ Zhenya, do you have a hobby of any sort?” And Yanin says to her: “ What are you talking about? What sort of hobby could you have amid all this abundance!”

ly u dm i l a vor on i k h i n a

At right

PRINCIPAL TEACHIN G METHODS OFFICER , EDUCATION DEPARTMENT

s t a r t e d wo r k : 1 Ma r c h 194 8

My generation felt like we were working in a palace. A palace! You’re never sitting at a desk; you have all of the space of these halls. Of course, everything that we see in these halls has an effect on us. It’s good when you get into the Hermitage in the evening, when there aren’t many people around, or early in the morning. I came to children’s classes in 1938, and then again in 1946 to a tour-guides’ seminar. I’ve been here ever since. Being in the Hermitage is amazing, surrounded by the halls and the pictures. You can always engage with them, learn from their wit and wisdom. Especially from Rembrandt. He’s an artist with such a great heart, who knows life so well, that his paintings are always a lesson for people — if you think about what you’re looking at. h

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k a r i n a o r l o va SENIOR RESEARCH OFFICER , DEPARTMENT OF RUSSIAN CULTURAL HISTORY

s t a r t e d wo r k : Au g u s t 194 6 -Au g u s t 194 9; 1 O c t o b e r 1950

For my first three years I was the department’s laboratory assistant. I got my own collection after university, in 1959.

Tatyana Sokolova began to give her collection to me. She was a furniture specialist. I cried for two days! I don’t know what I wanted to do, but I knew it wasn’t furniture. Then I got to understand furniture. I realised that you have to know about architecture, that you have to know about painting, that you have to know about applied art. You have to know everything. A few years later a new colleague joined, and the head of the department said that I could give her my collection. And I cried again, because I didn’t want to hand anything over. I’d already realised how interesting it was. But for most people, what does furniture really mean? h

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60

Тex t

A lexander Ilichevsky

At fourteen years of age, twentyfive years ago, I descended from the platform of the Moscow Railway Station, and followed Nevsky Prospect to the river. That walk was the strongest impression of my life to be brought to me by my legs. For someone born in the wasteland of Apsheron, for someone who grew up in the industrial hinterlands surrounding Moscow, Petersburg appeared to be something unknown, perhaps from the pages of a fairytale — it really was the first calling of civilization.

First there was a trip to Peterhof, where I walked from the station through the forest and saw how the trees gradually formed themselves up into a park, the palace buildings and the cascading fountains revealed themselves; then suddenly Mon Plaisir, and just one more step brought the endlessness of the Finnish Gulf, melding into the sky, a view that stopped my heart with rapture. A palace on the shores of the sea — are we not in the realms of a fairytale kingdom?

When I walked through the twilight, past a mound of leaves that had survived the winter, along a swept path, past statues that had

Illustration

Nadezhda DANILOVA

been partially bared of their plank armor, I suddenly saw a tall, transparent giant in a three-cornered hat, pacing towards me: The spirit of Peter the Great, having been through the winter, was touring his dominions.

In the Winter Palace I sought out the Gonzaga cameo (I had a stamp depicting it in my album).

I eventually established that the cameo had been sent for restoration and, satisfied that I had at least established that it existed, I happily wandered on, getting gloriously lost.

Exhausted, I eventually reached Matisse’s “The Dance.” I needed a few moments in order to realize that this explosion of light was a treasure; that Matisse’s sunny patches were more real than the surrounding world.

In the second half of the day, I endlessly glided through the internal suites of the Hermitage. Every picture, every statue, every staircase led into an alternative space.

The following day I returned to look at Matisse alone, but nevertheless got lost on the way to his paintings, like an ant in a casket of treasures.

As a result, I found myself by the statue of a sleeping hermaphrodite1, walking round and round

it for a long time, unable to believe my eyes.

And I carried on walking around Petersburg in the same way — unable to trust my sense of sight, and to this day not entirely convinced that this city exists. It is so far removed from the country’s mentality, despite at one time having been created in order to form that mentality, that sense of style.

It is a strange conjunction of habitat and uninhabited, not intended for life, and yet populated; all too incredible, but also accessible, just as one of Babel’s characters, in the Anichkov Palace, found himself able to place his hand on the shirt of Alexander III, the sleeve stretching down to the floor: a strange confusion of inappropriateness and beauty, an understanding of the fact that beauty destroys desire and any chance of a simple life — all this has come together and evened itself out in the form of a great city.

It can’t be said that on glancing at a sleeping hermaphrodite all this immediately became clear to me, but a sense of the authenticity of an image, the essence of which lay in a blend of attraction and inaccessibility, arose as a precise rhythm at that very moment.

1 Sleeping Herm a phrodite Roma n copy of a Greek or ig i na l.

3rd-2nd cent u r ies BC. New Hermitage, Ground Floor, Roman Courtyard (room No. 108).

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The GoatfAthеr Тext

Arkady Ippolitov

Konstantin Vaginov’s marvellous “The

However, even a reader who is

Goat’s Song” is the finest novel about St.

only on nodding terms with

Petersburg culture living out its final days

mythology will understand

in Leningrad. The repressions unleashed after the murder of Kirov erased the final traces of St. Petersburg from the new Soviet city; Vaginov himself was only spared because he died on 26 April, 1934, thereby escaping an arrest warrant that

Claude Gel lée, born Claude Lorrain (France, 1600–1682) Landscape with Apollo and the Sibyl 1645–1649. Oil, canvas.

99.5 × 127 cm

Fragment

1 Greek τράγος — “goat”, ωί δή — “son g”.

what is meant: A tragedy — the religious song that accompanied the ritual of sacrificing a goat, the god’s favourite animal, to Dionysus. Translated literally from the Ancient Greek, the

had already been signed for him. But

word “tragedy,” means “goat’s

“ The Goat’s Song ” is also dominated by an

song,”1 and the goat was the

idyllic mood among the ruins of imperial

principal protagonist of the

grandeur. There are, however, no actual goats in the novel. Only once does an apple tree gnawed bare by goats appear, while in another place the sight of a goat butting

A lbrecht Dürer (Germany, 1471–1528).

A witch riding a goat with four putti, two of which are carrying a utensil for alchemy and potion in a pot. About 1500. Engraving.

Fragment

its head against the wall calls to mind for one of the heroes a “vague image of another goat.” Exactly which “other” goat the author does not say. h

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2 In Athen s, D ionysu s wa s wor sh ipped u nder the na me “wea rer pf the h ide of a black goat,” a nd i n Potn iae u nder the na me Aegobolu s, mea n i ng “goat k i l ler.”

tragedy.

That a goat would be offered for sacrifice was no coincidence. The goat was one of the forms in which Dionysus was represented, in much the same way as Jesus Christ was depicted as a lamb. During the Titans’ rebellion against the gods of Olympus, Dionysus turned himself into a goat and escaped to Eg ypt.

Dionysus himself was

part-goat, and was favourably disposed to the animal2. The goat S u m m e r 1–2 (15 ) 2 0 10

d i c t i o n a r y was his constant companion at times of misfortune and times of joy, at the theatre and during revels; it was perhaps the principal figure at the Bacchic orgies, endowed with incredible streng th, the i ncar nation of man l iness and virility.

The goat-legged

satyrs and fauns (as well as faunesses and satyresses) present

63

frequently depicts the goddess riding on a goat or in a carriage harnessed to goats. This is no

Pau l Gauguin (France, 1848–1903).

Man collecting fruit from a tree. 1897.

Oil, canvas copied).

92.5 × 73.3 cm.

Fragment

coincidence: Aphrodite and Dionysus were frequently at one, and wine facilitates love. Aphro-

aissance era also enthralled

dite also found young white kids pleasing, as well as magnificent adult hegoats with long hair and gilded horns, sy mbol isi ng lu x u r y and sensua l ity.

And, of course, everything connected to he- and she-goats was an aphrodisiac (not only their meat and milk, but

European culture — recall, for

also goat faeces).

example, Rubens’s “Bacchanal”

it is true, were less intellectual

in the Bacchanalian scenes of antiquity have since the Ren-

at the Pushkin Fine Arts Museum in Moscow. All of these creations were considered the descendents of d r un ken ny mphs and the sacred Dionysian goats with which they endlessly copulated during the Bacchanaliae. The goat, moreover, is an animal not without pretensions to refinement, responsible for the Dionysian tetralog y of ancient theatre — three tragedies and one satire. Thus, Sophocles and Euripedes, and after them Shakespeare and Chekhov, and Becket and Stoppard, are heirs to the goats.

The goat’s endowment with

Sèvres porcelain, scu lptor Jacques Saly (France, 1717–1776). Faun with goat kid. After 1772.

Hard porcelain, biscuit firing. Height 18.4 cm.

Fragment

but also Aphrodite’s sacred animal. The art of Ancient Greece

peared closer to the sphere of glamour. It is her goats — the Angora of Asia Minor — that

expensive and finest hair, so 3 G oat H i l l, Αιγαι ον ορος, a nd the i sla nd of Capr i — ju st t wo of a mu ltit ude of a ncient “goat ” place na mes.

to indulge in coitus with anyone

ly the companion of Dionysus

than those of Dionysus, and ap-

have always produced the most

masculine traits and readiness

and at any time made it not on-

Aphrodite’s goats,

Nicolaes Pietersz Berchem (Holland, 1620– 1683). The Abduction of Europa. 1649. Oil, canvas.

219.5 × 270.5 cm.

Fragment

prized in the Cashmere and Silk chain of stores.

Some of the authors of antiquity considered the horn of plenty — the cornucopia, the most important decorative element in architecture and sacred vessels — to be the horn of yet another ancient goat, Amalthea, which fed the young Zeus in the cave in Mount Aigaion (“Goat Mountain”)3 on Crete. This brought goats into the retinue of the king of the gods; Zeus turned his nurse into a constellation, thereby adding goats to the map of the heavens thanks to Amalthea. Capella, the principal star in the constellation Auriga the Charioteer is her, Amalthea, with her kids. h

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A herd of goats is the subject of

but lives on and on... the story is

innumerable bucolic landscapes

entirely in the spirit of Vaginov.

from Lorrain to Gaugin. The

connected with feelings of

In the Old Testament tradition, as in antiquity, the goat was a sacrif icial animal. 4 In the Torah, we read: “And he shall take of the congregation of the children of Israel two kids of the goats for a sin offering, and one ram for a burnt offering. And Aaron shall offer his bullock of the sin offering, which is for himself, and make an atonement

being dissolved in nature and

for himself, and for his house.

swallowed up by the universe.

he shall take the two goats, and

The characters in the novel are themselves l i ke a herd of goats, and the whole of the novel ’s panorama of Petersburg life, with its intellectualism and poverty, sketched penetratingly yet lightly and with warmth, is similar to one of Claude Lorrain’s landscapes, one of which, “The Bay’s Port”, could easily be called “The Kingdom of the

present them before the Lord at

thought about “another goat” comes to Vaginov’s hero at a time of heightened anxiety,

Goats.”

The numerous goats in

the painting leap around and

Nicolas Poussin (France, 1594–1665).

Venus, Faun and Putti.

Begun in the 1630s.

Oil, canvas. 72 × 56 cm.

Fragment

And

the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. And Aaron shall

Jacob Jordaens (Flanders, 1593–1678).

The infant Jupiter drinks the milk of the goat Amaltheus.

About 1640. Black chalk, quill and paintbrush in a brown tone, blue and pink gouache, paper. 37 × 46 cm.

Fragment

butt heads, and roll around in

4 T he forbea r of the domesticat ed goat (lat. Capra aegag ru s hircu s) i s bel ieved t o be the bezoa r goat (lat. Capra aegag ru s), wh ich wa s domesticat ed i n the M idd le Ea st about 9,0 0 0 yea r s a go.

the grass, while amid the ruins a sad story unfolds: Apollo, wearying the Cumaean sibyl

cast lots upon the two goats; one lot for the Lord, and the other lot for the scapegoat. And Aaron shall bring the goat upon which the Lord’s lot fell, and offer him for a sin offering. But the goat, on which the lot fell to be the scapegoat, shall be presented

with his love, promises her as

alive before the Lord, to make

many years of life as there are

an atonement with him, and to

grains of sand in his cupped hands in return, but takes her youth away in a deceitful manner. The poor sibyl, no longer of any use to Apollo, grows old, h

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let him go for a scapegoat in

A ntonio Rossetti (Italy, 1819–1856).

Esmeralda. 1856.

Marble, height 100 cm.

Fragment

5 L ev iticu s 16:7–10.

to the wilderness.”5 This is the origin of the tragic scapegoat, taking on itself all the sins of the world.

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Goats were the draught ani-

goats on their way to assemble

mals for Thor’s chariot; an-

for the witches’ sabbaths. The

cient Germanic myth recounts that Thor each evening would cut up his goats and eat their meat, and in the morning they

goat became an animal of the

Il Garofalo Benvenuto Tisi)Italy, 1476?–1559). The Allegory of the Old and the New Testaments. 1430s.

Oil, canvas. 318 × 257 cm.

Fragment

would be reborn. It was forbidden

on ly to touch thei r bones — hor n s a s wel l a s legs — but on one occasion a v isiti ng god broke the proh ibition, after which one of the goats became lame. This is presumably the origin of the curse “lame goat.”

To

ancient Germanic tradition (or more precisely ancient Sanskrit, to which ancient German mythology is closely connected) can be adjoined the sacred goat of Hinduism, the splendid animal of the fire-god Agni, a symbol of cleansing and — once again — sacrificial fire.

This animal has very many protectors among the ancient pagan gods. For the Jews, too, the goat is a sinful animal I n the M idd le A ges, therefore, the goat was made into an accomplice of Satan and a par ticipant i n Satan ic

Pau lus Potter (Holland, 1625–1654).

Punishment of the Hunter.

About 1647. Oil, wood.

84.5 × 120 cm

Fragment

night, with eyes burning in the darkness — depraved, impudent, cunning and dangerous.

T he trained goat that belongs to Esmerelda i n “The Hu nchback of Notre-Dame” is the main argument in the case of witchcraft advanced by the church court that leads the poor gypsy girl to the gallows.

The goat was universal ly associated with Satan, so that even Satan himself was depicted as a goat, for example

by Goethe in “Walpurgisnacht” or in Goya’s 1789 painting “The Witches’ Sabbath“. Paulus Potter’s “Punishment of a Hu nt er ” a ccor d s the goat the Satanic place of honour by the f ire over which the hunter will be roasted.

But even in the most profane contemporary imaginings the goat is not simply just a brazen rascal, but also a tragic unfortunate with latent associations with both Dionysus and Jehovah. And the beautiful children’s story so popular in Russia about the little grey goat that granny so adored — and of

Dionysus and the satyrs

which only the horns and legs

were turned into demons and

remained — adds the mark of

devils, and Aphrodite and her

tragedy between the horns of

entourage into witches, riding

any representation of the goat.

doings.

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Тex t a nd i l lu str ation

Ten years ago, Sasha Florensky and I came up with a project with the name of “Pushkin-Monumentum”. At that time in Russia, the 200th anniversary celebrations of Alexander Pushkin’s birth were in full swing. We decided that we too would mark the occasion with our own celebrations. For example, by erecting a statue to this poet who suffered at the hands of the Tsarist state during his lifetime. And to set it up in the Tsar’s very own lair — in the Hermitage itself.

In the entrance hall of the State Hermitage, there is a small rotunda church with eight malachite columns and a gilded two-headed eagle on top. Despite the fact that the rotunda lies right in their path, visitors to the museum who rush past rarely pay attention to this pompous structure that resembles an inkstand.

The malachite rotunda, at a cost of 2 million gold rubles, was made in the 1830s in Paris, having been commissioned by the factory owner Demidov, who wanted to present a valuable gift to Nicholas I, and thus win the Tsar’s graces.

A bronze bust of the emperor came with the rotunda, and was supposed to be placed inside it. However, the Tsar was skeptical about this, and was against keeping the expensive

Оlga FLORENSK AYA

gift at home. The rotunda traveled extensively around Petersburg before occupying the place originally intended for it in 19541.

Having carefully examined this rotunda, Sasha and I decided that a statue of Pushkin should be set up within it. It would be, so to speak, a triumph of historical justice, for the original idea had been to place inside the rotunda a bust of the Tsar, who we know to have persecuted Pushkin. And Pushkin himself, in his poem “The Monument,” expressed his wish to raise his “disobedient head” higher than the Alexander Column, which stands next to the Hermitage on Palace Square.2 Thus, we proposed the installation of a mechanical device within the rotunda, which we named the “Pushkin-Monumentum”: a lifesize figure of the poet Pushkin, in a top hat and tails. When a special button was pressed, this figure was

supposed to make a welcoming gesture towards the public (he was to doff his top hat and then put it on again). All this was intended to amuse and enlighten viewers.

Logically, our statue of Pushkin was supposed to appear at the Hermitage in the anniversary year of 1999. But the official all-Russian Pushkin celebrations were distinguished by such idiotic levels of pathos and shameless officiousness that we were simply ashamed to take part in this bacchanalia. We decided to delay the implementation of the project until 2000, when the public would have forgetten about Pushkin and individual observations on this subject would become possible.

And so we thought everything out, drew up plans and even went to see the Very Important Hermitage Management. The management had no particular objections to Pushkin.

Ten years have gone by. Alas, because of our own laziness and disorganization, the “PushkinMonumentum” has not appeared at the Hermitage, and remains at the drawing-board stage. But perhaps this is for the best. As we know, “for a work to remain eternal, it should never be finished.”

1 I n 1952 the rot u nda wa s g iven over by the T r i n it y Cathed r a l of the A lexa nder Nevsk y Mona st er y t o the Her m ita ge, a nd i n 1958 it wa s set up i n the Entr a nce Ha l l of the Wi nt er Pa lace.

2 For P u sh k i n, the A lexa nder Colu m n wa s a colu m n i n A lexa nd r ia. See a r ticle on the colu m n on Pa lace Square page 44.

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On its jour ney around the world, the exhibition from Pica sso Mu seum in Paris is due to open in St. Petersburg. In ord er to ra sp the con sequences of this event, the Her mitage Magazine staged a roundtable di scu ssion.

Dramatis personae: M a r i a P IR O G O V S K A Y A e x e c u t i v e e d i t o r, He r mita ge Ma gazin e

A lexander BABIN art historian, curator of We s t e r n E u r o p e a n p a i n t i n g s o f th e 19 th c e n t u r y, He r m i t a g e

I v a n SA B LI N critic, architectural hi stor ian, Ru ssian In stitute of th e Hi stor y of Art

M i k h a i l GERMA N Ph D in ar t hi s to r y, c r i t i c, Ru ss i an Mu seum

D a r y a F O MI C HE VA a r t c r i t i c , m a s t e r ’s g r a d u a t e of the Smolny In stitute of Arts and Sciences

A l b e r t K O STE N E V I C H P i c a s s o c u r a t o r, He r m i t a g e A l e x e i LE P O R K critic, art historian, curator of Ge r m an an d Au str i an e n g ra v i n g s o f th e 19 th & 2 0th ce ntur i es, He r mita ge

K i r i l l SHAMA N O V artist, curator

Illustrator

Yekaterina KHOZATSK AYA

THe PicasSo cAѕe M a r i a P i r o g o v s k a y a On June 17, a Picasso exhibition will open at the Hermitage. We organized a roundtable to find out the purpose of the exhibition and who it’s being put on for — questions that should no doubt be addressed primarily to the curators. But we would also like to understand who Picasso is today; as the Soviet press wrote in connection with a Picasso exhibition held in 1956, “Picasso is our comrade.” But has he remained our hero and comrade?

A l b e r t K o s t e n e v i c h Almost all of these questions have been answered long ago — both in writing and verbally — but if we’re talking about specific details of this upcoming exhibition, then fine. This is the biggest exhibition that’s been held in Russia of Picasso’s art, although I confess that I did not see the earlier exhibition in 1956. Incidentally, in the Hermitage catalogue (its contents will be a little different from the Moscow exhibition) , the catalogue of the 1956 exhibition is presented for the first time. Around 250 items will be on display: over 200 are artistic works encompassing all the main genres of Picasso’s art — painting, drawings, sculpture. And rare photographs, which are also a worthy part of the exhibition.

P i r o g o v s k a y a And what is the route of the exhibition?

K o s t e n e v i c h It began its journey in Madrid. One and a half years ago, at the exhibition “Picasso and Masters” at the Parisian Grand Palais, there were many items from the Prado, and they had never given anyone this quantity of top masterpieces before. Naturally, the Picasso Museum thought it necessary to thank Madrid. At the same time, this is on the whole a commercial undertaking. It is hard to build anything in the historic Marais quarter, and the Picasso Museum required radical renovations, additional storage, new exhibition spaces, an underground garage… So, making use of the unavoidable interruption in their work, they decided to take the exhibition all over the world. After Madrid it went to the United Arab Emirates, Helsinki, Moscow, and now it’s here. Incidentally, this exhibition has not been put on twice h

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in any other country in the world, which is important. From Petersburg — and this is the last stage — it will go to the Metropolitan Museum in New York.

P i r o g o v s k a y a Do we already know where it was most successful?

K o s t e n e v i c h I think it’s been successful everywhere. The organizers slightly modify the exhibition for each venue. For example, in the United Arab Emirates they included items in the exhibition which reflect Arabic script in the graphic design — that is to say that Picasso, that Proteus, also looked into Arabic art. In our case, there was an attempt to link the exhibition with the Hermitage collection. Ann Baldassari, the director of the Picasso Museum, proposed the showing of 38 studies and sketches for “Three Women,” plus preparatory works for “Friendship” and “The Farmer Woman.” But we decided that this should be a special project next year. So the collection will be shown in the same form here as it was shown in Moscow.

P i r o g o v s k a y a In Moscow there were terrible queues to get in.

K i r i l l S h a m a n o v Yes, in Moscow it was sold out.

K o s t e n e v i c h So there’s the answer to your question about the hero.

P i r o g o v s k a y a And everyone crowded around “Girls on a balloon”, which is in the collection of the Pushkin Museum anyway.

S h a m a n o v I’m an artist, but I won’t judge the artistic component of Picasso. I’ll talk about the commercial side.

Our topic is the importance of this exhibition for the Hermitage and for Russian artistic life. It really is important in all these areas, it really does hit its target very precisely. Its main value for artists now working in Russia is that Picasso was a lucky artist who was very productive, and who is very expensive.

The capitalization of his works is now equal to the capitalization of Gazprom.

A l e x e i L e p o r k And that’s what captivates you most of all?

S h a m a n o v It would be good if that could captivate someone else as well. If our government started investing more in artistic projects… And another thing: Picasso’s work is that rare conjunction, where art is popular both among specialists and among the wider public.

A l e x a n d e r B a b i n Excuse me, but what about classical art?

S h a m a n o v It’s much cheaper.

P i r o g o v s k a y a And harder to understand.

D a r y a F o m i c h e va I have a question for Kirill. Do you see Picasso as a successful PR project?

S h a m a n o v I am interested in his strategy of self-promotion. He is a very good artist. And he was one of the first to register his authorial rights. Nowadays, Picasso would certainly be producing a million T-shirts a year. And a lot of cups, too.

F o m i c h e va Then what’s an exhibition?

S h a m a n o v It’s a manifestation of a brilliant strategy, which is irreversible and develops even after the death of the author. Even in the present sales and commercial sense, Picasso remains very interesting, because he did everything sincerely, he thought about the future of his works and encoded them somehow. And this is incredibly important for the modern Russian artist. Today, only the price is a guarantee that a work will get into a museum. h

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L e p o r k You’re an artist, but you immediately start with the subject of money. Tell us, Mikhail Yurevich, how did Picasso affect the viewer in 1956? After all, he wasn’t measured in Gazproms back then.

M i k h a i l G e r m a n He was measured by the cultural minister, Mikhailov, and the president of the Arts Academy, Gerasimov.

L e p o r k And people saw something else?

G e r m a n To start with, let’s agree on how his name is pronounced, PicassO or PicAsso. I think that we should respect the French choice of the master himself. He began to be called PicAsso in 1956. For the West, in 1956, he meant about the same as he does now, in view of the rising prices and the fact that he had become a classic text-book case, although at that time many were still alive…

P i r o g o v s k a y a And Picasso himself worked as hard as he could.

G e r m a n We don’t even have to talk about him, it’s astonishing that he didn’t outlast us. And for us, Picasso…

You know, it’s probably hard for you to imagine. We began studying under Stalin, and ended during the Khrushchev’s Thaw. When we were read courses on the art of the 19th century, the last contemporary artist covered was Courbet. There was also Edouard Manet, who immediately came under suspicion, but was saved by the fact that he once painted a person on a ship. The 20th century did not exist at all, there was a black hole, and artists began fighting for the world of socialism in the West. Sometimes someone would say: ah, Fougeron. But they didn’t even know him in the West. Just as everyone read Aldridge, but in England no one had heard of this writer. Rockwell Kent was considered a great artist. Now this is funny, but back then it really was the most tragic thing. This was absolutely stupid. But Picasso was a mysterious figure — a fighter for peace, a communist (after the war they all joined the Communist Party for a time). Teachers at the Academy struggled with him a great deal. Only Gerasimov, despite all the diplomatic about-faces of his superiors, hated him fiercely and sincerely. But he was silenced, the exhibition went ahead, and in October 1956 it opened in Moscow. They were afraid that no one would

come. But a crowd of people turned up. I remember this from personal experience. That year, we graduates

from the Academy were ordered to give lectures on modern western art. In particular, about Picasso.

L e p o r k Did you give public lectures about Picasso?

G e r m a n They sent us from the Komsomol (Communist Union of Youth) Regional committee to factories, to the Naval Academy. I didn’t know much about Picasso, because there was nowhere you could find out anything about him. But I had seen some things. At the Arts Academy, for example, the library was not censored, but few people knew about this. I read Proust in Lyubimov’s translation, Punin, and old encyclopedias. Ordinary Soviet people came to my lectures, mainly candidates of biological science. And they talked and argued: Art should be comprehensible for the people, but what’s all this?

L e p o r k Mikhail Yurevich, what was your impression of the exhibition itself in 1956?

G e r m a n Well, I didn’t go there as a complete nincompoop. I had been brought up with a healthy hatred for what was going on. I loved Picasso before I began to understand it, because for me it was a way out, a way “over there.” I didn’t experience any great artistic shock — it was a situational shock. It was an exhibition h

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where people shouted, where they showed admiration or fear. Your generation doesn’t understand what it means to go abroad for the first time — and thank God. But Picasso’s artistic quality didn’t astound me at the time, I have to admit.

L e p o r k What did astound you?♥ G e r m a n The sensation of freedom. A person does what he wants, how he wants, not wanting to please anyone, and talks about frightening things. We perceived everything in terms of its subject. There, it began to dawn on me that there could also be content without a subject.

L e p o r k In other words, art could be different.

G e r m a n There was a feeling of a revolution, a human revolution. And perhaps it was even more important to

look at the viewers than the paintings.

I v a n S a bl i n But is everyone certain that Picasso didn’t want to simply please? We’ve heard two opposing points of view, the traditional one — that this is an example of absolute freedom — and the deeply commercial view (which is even useful as a kind of shake-up), that Picasso is primarily a wonderful commercial project.

G e r m a n When I said that Picasso didn’t want to please anyone, that didn’t mean that he never took anyone into consideration. But if ever there was an artist who didn’t really want to please, then it was Picasso.

Because, firstly, he was an artist who was free from something that none of us are free from — from sublimation. He was the only person who could combine life and art without sacrificing one or the other.

And this already shows an enormous degree of freedom. His incredible productivity, his ability to reject successful tendencies that had already been found… All people want to please — he loved women, and loved to be loved. That’s natural, he wasn’t a hermit.

L e p o r k And today this exhibition can be an artistic event? Not a museum event, but an artistic one?

G e r m a n I don’t think that this will be a revelation for you, but in any art there is catharsis in the process of perception. In traditional art — for example, Rembrandt — it is in the emotional-artistic sphere. But in the art of the 20th century, this catharsis takes place in the process of decoding new artistic structures.

When a person looks at Magritte and Duchamp, there is an intellectual game which is easy to imitate.

But Picasso preserves the contents, and rejects the subject; he establishes the decoding and creates codes of high artistic quality.

L e p o r k The question of quality, you must agree, has been removed in the case of Duchamp — it is irrelevant to modern art. An artistic gesture questioned artistic quality.

G e r m a n When Duchamp’s wheel was first shown among pictures, this was an artistic gesture, the opportunity to look at a mass-produced object among paintings created by hand. When this was repeated, it went beyond the boundaries of assessments of artistic quality. And this was the beginning of the postmodern.

L e p o r k Fine, but is there a difference between an exhibition of Titian and an exhibition of Picasso today? In terms of its effect on the spectator?

G e r m a n I think that if you take an average person with any sense of aesthetics, with a heart and mind, a person who isn’t idle…

P i r o g o v s k a y a Where are you going to find this person? h

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G e r m a n The rest needn’t bother going! This person can look at Titian and Picasso. I think that Titian will bring pleasure, and Picasso will make him change his ideas, and perhaps make him a harsher critic of pseudo-modern art. This may create some points of reference, and serve as a reminder that there is high quality, and there is rubbish that is often portrayed as being of high quality: the naked emperor reaches an agreement with the child about how and with what he will reply when the child shouts that he is naked. And this is called being a curator.

S a bl i n But can we imagine that someone will shout the same thing about the naked emperor Picasso? We’re all prepared to pay him homage, based on the fact that there is nothing to debate, Picasso is a genius, and so on. I think that it’s not as simple as all that. For example, I can express critical judgments about this artist, not being the victim of an awful time when people were kept in a cave with their backs to the entrance, and they only saw shadows on the wall. Is it possible not to like Picasso nowadays? To criticize, and cast doubt on his right to a place on the pedestal, down from which only representatives of pseudo-art may attempt to throw him?

B a b i n I know about the negative attitude to Picasso of art historians who are experts on the Russian avant-garde.

When you talk about the influence of Picasso on Tatlin or Malevich, you hear: Why do you need Picasso?

It depreciates the Russian avant-garde! One of my teachers, Professor Sarabyanov, actually said: You have to understand that Picasso is the market. Perhaps there is an element of hatred in this, or a kind of envy. We recalled 1956, and I can remember 1981. The magazine Iskusstvo, which was controlled by the Arts Academy at the time, was planning to print my article “Picasso and the old masters” for Picasso’s 100th anniversary. The article was already in galley proofs when I received a letter from the editor: Your opinion on Picasso completely contradicts the opinion of the Arts Academy.

L e p o r k If we regard the Picasso exhibition as a purely museum event, then everything about the perception of researchers is clear. They have experience of contact with this artist, they have been studying him all

their lives. But what about the rest of us? “Let’s go and look at a famous artist?”

B a b i n You asked what the difference was between an exhibition of Picasso and an exhibition of Titian. I would reply that even if you do not like him and consider him to be an artist of the market, Picasso gives us

an idea of what modern thinking is, which is something that is lacking in this country… I don’t see any fundamental difference between exhibitions of Picasso and Titian. Both are quite conventional and quite complex. Perhaps, I would agree that it is harder to understand Titian…

L e p o r k For young viewers!

G e r m a n Picasso will be more comprehensible than Titian, because, externally, he resembles what is being done at the moment. But this by no means diminishes his importance. As for criticism — is there any need to criticize a phenomenon that has long since passed? You can analyze him, and find weak spots.

Undoubtedly, Picasso had some failures, and some great successes. But this is no longer criticism. Can you criticize Dostoyevsky? He’s a genius who wrote badly.

S a bl i n I think that Picasso needs to be criticized.

G e r m a n Yes, taking an analytical attitude to recognized idols is a useful and effective activity. You can say that Raphael has a poor sense of color, Tchaikovsky sometimes wrote salon music, and Bach has many trivial h

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pieces of music. But in this an echo of burning relevance can be heard. Picasso is so poorly known. You must first understand him in order to criticize him. This is the 20th century, the system of artistic values which created Picasso, and which Picasso created. It is a unified system of blood circulation. I think that the pathos of criticism of a great phenomenon could be successfully replaced by a pathos of perception, and ultimately by enlightenment.

L e p o r k My teacher, B.A. Zernov, always said one very simple thing: The main thing is to ask a question of art.

If a question is not asked, then why do all of this?

G e r m a n Gentlemen, can we criticize Titian, what do you think?

L e p o r k From the professional standpoint, we may only have questions for him. Criticism may exist among viewers who do not express a professional opinion, but their own personal perceptions. And there is artistic criticism which may ask the simple question: What will Picasso change in Petersburg in 2010?

B a b i n When you say that Picasso needs to be criticized, you unconsciously think of him as being alive, it seems to me. Criticize him, and he’ll become better.

S a bl i n And if he’s turned to bronze?

B a b i n There was already John Berger, for example, the author of the book “Picasso’s Success and Failure,” which was criticized by all serious scholars.

S a bl i n I was brought up to respect Picasso. But then I saw “Guernica” and felt enormous repulsion for this person.

It’s ethically dubious to create a reputation from a tragedy! And in Bunuel’s memoirs, I was struck by his statement that Picasso was a scoundrel. This was a shock, because Soviet art criticism portrayed Picasso as a model of decency. But I am even more worried about the artistic component. I will explain.

The 20th century, despite all the new technologies, was an era of large pictures. Artists felt that they needed to create paintings, that they needed a large mass of canvas. The demand for sculptors is not high, and even smaller for graphic artists. Picasso should have worked as a graphic artist. He is a graphic artist — in the Wolfflin sense. An artist who did not understand the nature of painting, color harmony and the plastic of brush strokes. Why did he not limit himself to graphic work? Because pure graphic art would never have put him on the pedestal, which he was placed on by painting, which in my opinion is completely anti-pictorial. In this sense he resembles Chagall, who was initially an excellent master of the exquisite line, and then came up with daubing, monstrous color and incomprehensible blotches instead of the plastic of brushstrokes. And graphic art is either a drawing or a print, which is to say something that is incomplete or copied. It is incapable of bringing status. In the 20th century there were great painters, and I am sad that Picasso’s popularity outshines them. Of course, whatever name I mention now, you will laugh. You’ll say, lord, what Bacon, what Munch, what Kokosha, what are you talking about!?

K o s t e n e v i c h This is childish prattle!

B a b i n No other artist can draw this interest from the public. When the exhibition “Picasso and the masters” was on in Paris, on the last three days the Grand Palais was open around the clock — and people were still

lining up!

S a bl i n This is an issue of PR, you know. I saw a monstrous exhibition of Goya in Berlin, which completely distorted Goya. People stood in line for four hours in the rain to see it.

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L e p o r k It’s naïve to measure art by tickets sold — then Harry Potter would be the best…But this morning I took the catalogue of the Picasso exhibition and began looking at portraits from 1920. I looked and thought: The modern artist David Hockney wrote the book “Secrets of old paintings,” and it had an enormous print run. He claims that all the old masters used lenses, optical devices and camera obscura. And here I’m looking at Picasso’s drawings — and it’s done in such a way that you can’t compare. Some use lenses, while others have masterpieces without lenses. That’s what it means to have a skilled hand! I felt a sense of child-like delight from Picasso’s mastery.

B a b i n Picasso created everything with his own hands, and used the services of an assistant only in a handful of cases — for example, when he painted “The Parade,” or needed to draw a curtain. While Andy Warhol, for example, went so far that he never even touched his works.

L e p o r k Great! This is about Picasso’s influence on modern art. You expressed the same thought that I had, for all my light-headed views of art…

B a b i n Not light-headed, but light!

L e p o r k Oh, how heavy this light love is! I looked at the catalogue and thought: Can an artist do anything after this?

Not resort to digital, electronic, virtual, but by using your hands. This is in fact a fundamental question.

K o s t e n e v i c h I don’t understand this question. It’s like playing chess — can you play it after this or that chess player? You can, and you always will be able to.

L e p o r k Nevertheless, it’s quite a relevant question in the context of modern art.

S a bl i n Once I was in the Marble Palace at an exhibition of Picasso from the Ludwig collection. There were a lot of items there, but afterwards there was a feeling of repetition, that it wasn’t all that interesting. Any exhibition by Warhol is disappointing, because while his art is contained in boundaries, and each item is displayed as an individual masterpiece, it is weak and pathetic. But when this mirror-like endless repetition is used, then it is astounding.

B a b i n Have you been to the Warhol Museum in Pittsburg?

S a bl i n No, I haven’t. But I think that a Warhol museum is in itself an impossibility.

(Laughter.)

K o s t e n e v i c h The Americans say that it is the biggest personal museum in the world.

S a bl i n I think that the only Warhol museum possible is the entire world.

B a b i n Picasso was a person who was completely focused on his individuality and self-expression…

S a bl i n So what? Many bad artists of the 20th century are just as individual. Just take Tsereteli or Glazunov.

B a b i n There was a film where they claim that on the antiques market you get a situation where Nalbandian is better than Leonardo. The comparison is laughable.

S a bl i n You understand that the more Picasso becomes a classic artist, the greater the protest may be.

L e p o r k But at the beginning of the 18th century the followers of Rubens could argue with the Poussainists, passionately and furiously, let’s not forget! Why shouldn’t we discuss Picasso? As much time has passed.

F o m i c h e va Modern artists have an ambiguous attitude to Picasso. On the one hand, everyone gathers in groups and goes to receive communion at the Hermitage. On the other hand, many relevant artists h

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create installations, and when they find the time for painting, for working with their hands, the result is that Picasso emerges in one form or another.

B a b i n Will they come to the exhibition and curse Picasso, then?

F o m i c h e va On the contrary, they’ll see him as something sacred! You talked about the reading of Picasso in 1956. Now the coding is completely different, for the history of coding is constantly becoming further complicated, and it is no longer possible to return to the initial situation. When we compared an exhibition of Titian and Picasso, it was as if we had slapped a padlock on Titian and thrown the key away, because in principle it is impossible to decipher this. With Picasso, this possibility exists, but we distance ourselves from it, and this layer of isolation stops a young artist or art critic seeing Picasso. I think that in 1956, this layer was thinner: Picasso’s art was perceived as something living, as a part of the artistic process.

P i r o g o v s k a y a And over these 50 years Picasso has not only moved further away from us, he has also improved, because he has absorbed all the interpretations that have been made of him.

G e r m a n Did you mean the Russian viewer?

F o m i c h e va Yes. The viewer and artist.

G e r m a n But the 20th century has passed. Perhaps not in 2000, but when the planes hit the twin towers, but at any rate it has passed. Picasso is an artist of the 20th century, and he forms an inseparable whole with that century. But here… there are some unsettled accounts — with criticism of the time, and with the wish to be free from an alternative opinion.

L e p o r k But we can see a huge spectrum of reactions to Picasso! And this diversity of reactions in 1956 (and this is the fundamental difference!) could not exist, because no one could imagine the academic view of Picasso as bronze, which we have no right to dispute, and the view of the market Picasso.

G e r m a n I still think that the question of whether we can criticize Picasso couldn’t arise in any country that doesn’t have a past like ours.

B a b i n A reaction can and should be varied, but it should be adequate to the object perceived!

L e p o r k How can it be adequate to the object perceived if we have no normal aesthetics?

B a b i n You talked about the market Picasso…

S h a m a n o v He is a star of the market, certainly.

B a b i n But what’s Picasso got to do with this?

S h a m a n o v What do you mean? He created all of this! In the West contemporary artists are taught, for example, strategies for promoting art, and to curry favor in the right places. In that context, Picasso is the ideal example. He placed all the accents absolutely correctly.

B a b i n This was all thought up after the fact! Rubens didn’t think of any strategies!

L e p o r k And so he loses out in price! He never reached 120 million.

K o s t e n e v i c h One Parisian artist told me how studies take place at L’École des Beaux-Arts, where Matisse studied, for example. Only four hours a week are devoted to drawing. There is no sculpture at all. But there are many hours devoted to waffling, marketing and so on. This raises a generation of artists who do little, but think about the price a lot.

L e p o r k This is my inner dream, a very idealistic one. A modern artist would come to the Picasso exhibition and realize how many forms you yourself can create! Then this exhibition would not just be a hit, but an upheaval and a turning point.

B a b i n The artist needs to be able to draw to do this.

F o m i c h e va In Moscow they planned to create a study group to investigate the reaction of young viewers.

They’re expecting that there will be a boom, and that everything will flourish.

S h a m a n o v No, there are no units of measurement for artistic booms, apart from market units, unfortunately!

K o s t e n e v i c h You need to understand that this exhibition will never be repeated. For the next 50, 100 years, the prices on the items themselves, for the insurance and transportation, will be too high. So take this opportunity while it’s here!

B a b i n Have you been to the Picasso Museum in Paris? The Picasso Museum is the center for studying Picasso’s work and his life. There are dresses of Olga Khokholova, documents, photographs in the archives…

L e p o r k But does it really matter what biography he has, what dresses of Khokhlova are stored in the museum archive? For me, a Picasso is a picture of such artistic quality that it eternally intrigues me.

G e r m a n I agree. Picasso’s destiny is just a small episode in his art. h

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Portrait of Choi Yeonhong Chae Yongsin (1850–1941) 1914. Color on paper.

Duck-Shaped Vessel Clay. Gaya.

Теx t

Kоnstantin AGUNOVICH

KOrеan creations h

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Crown with Pendants 5th century. Gold. Silla Excavated from Seobong-chong Tomb, Gyeongju, Gyeonsangbuk-do Treasure No. 339.

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Horse-Shaped Belt Hook Bronze Age-early Iron Age. Bronze Excavated from Eoeun-dong.

Yeongcheon, Gyeonsangbuk-do And Cheongdang-dong, Cheonan, Chungcheongnam-do.

There’s something I would like to reveal to the Russian public right away: For Koreans, bears are practically their relatives. Koreans themselves believe this. They also believe that the bear is a capable animal.

People in Korea believed that if a bear removed itself from the outside world, praying for 100 days in a cave and eating only garlic and wormwood, it would become a human being. The bear Unnyo, as soon as she had taken on human form, quickly worked out what was going on — and prayed again. Hwanun himself took her as his wife (“the son of the god Hwanin”). Their son built Pyongyang. And he became the founder of the country’s first dynasty. This “silmarillion,” according to archeologists, should have taken place when the first Koreans (there are signs, at least, that they were already Koreans) indeed lived in Neolithic caves, making the historical transition to more progressive earth huts. Four corners, a fireplace in the centre; sitting there and spinning a pottery wheel was the common ancestor of “choson saram” (“those to the north of the 38th parallel,” which is to say the population of North Korea) and “hanuk saram” (“those from the country in the south” — South Koreans). The ancestor took a stick, and moved it up and down the soft spinning side of the wheel — a zigzag line was formed; the ancestor grunted with satisfaction: Hey, I’m an artist.

The line runs through “5,000 years of Korean art” — from the Neolithic pot with crested ornamentation, winding past the half-concealed smiles of thousandyear-old Buddhas, or even older, branching out and getting lost in the years of dynasties that competed and replaced one another — Pak, Sok, Kim, Li — until it skirts around the contours of the portrait of Choi Yonhon of 1914, a singer and kisen dancer. The first syllable of the word “kisen” means “prostitute.” The second means “life.” Wikipedia is on hand to assist: “The main difference between kisen and Japanese Geishas was that the former were allowed to provide paid services of a sexual nature. Geishas were h

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prohibited from doing so by law. Prostitutes in Japan were called ‘oiran,’ and kisen are their equivalents.” Got it? It seems that if Fornarina herself, the girlfriend of Raphael, had not been so haughty, the resemblance of Choi Yonhon’s portrait to the Sistina Madonna could have been most embarrassing: “Madonna putana, what’s she holding there?” But the child is not the kisen’s own, it is the offspring of an official who died “on the job.” This multitalented girl is simply looking after it. But in the framework of the composition, it doesn’t matter whether the child is hers or not… No, it’s actually simply incredible: Where did she come from, and how, Raphael’s Madonna, in the here and now, at the other end of the world, in the last year of the “belle epoque”, in the last year of the classical era in general, no longer under anyone’s dynasty. To the right of her figure, it says: “Portrait of a 27-year-old Heavenly beauty”. To the left: “Certified by district head Choson Che Yonsin.” And nothing more. The line breaks off, and the 20th century begins.

“So what,” we may want to object. “The 20th century has ended, so why not show it as well?” (In the sense that this is not enough. 5,000 years, but still not enough).

But it is pointless to object — this is the National Museum of South Korea. A Cyclopean conglomerate of the great historical museums of the country. They have 55 exhibits of the “national treasure” category. Of which, of course, a grand total of none are from the 20th century. There is also the category of simply “a treasure” — it’s simply impossible to count how many of them there are, but they are also all from the classical age. The latest are from the middle and second half of the 19th century.

Among the 250 or so exhibits at the Hermitage, 10 “treasures” and three “national treasures” are displayed — numbers 29, 91 and 143. Thus, the exhibition has almost 1 percent of the total number of South Korean artifacts that bear this “national treasure”

Ferocious Tiger Anonymous Painter Joseon, 18th century Ink on Paper.

Stone Figure of Literati Granite, Joseon.

Jar with Pine, Magpie and Tiger Design W hite Porcelain in Underglaze Cobalt Joseon, late 18th century.

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status. Almost 1 percent, because number 29 arrived in its natural size (3.5 meters high), but not in its natural form. The “Divine Bell of Sondok the Great” is not touched often. And it is only rung once every few years, as it has a crack in it. For 12 centuries it was rung constantly, but now it must be cared for. How much does it weigh? Some say 19 tons, some say 25; some even give the fantastical figure of 72; in any event, it is clear that it is the largest in Korea. And that it is indestructible. (Try getting that into the Nikolaevsky Hall!).

So, instead of the bell, there is a lighter replica, cast from one of its sides, and in the same scale as the original. At the bottom there is a ribbon of plant ornamentation, and in the empty space there is an Apsara in billowing clothes; a nymph, siren and Valkyrie all rolled into one; a sweet-voiced temptress, comforting brave fighters in heaven… The “Divine bell”, one of the largest and most sonorous in Asia, took 20 years to be cast. It is also known as the “Emille bell,” which means “child’s cry.” One smart aleck claimed that the bell would sound better if an innocent child was added to the alloy. They searched and found one. One of the rare occasions on which the bell has sounded out in recent years was when an attempt was made to discover whether it was really possible to hear any other mixtures in the components of the alloy; they looked but found nothing.

The form of the “Emille Bell” resembles the four little bronze bells that are also on display at the exhibition — melodious bells that chime in the wind, they were hung on the roofs of Buddhist temples. The little bells, which are 16 centimeters high, are 25 times smaller than the “divine” original. One percent is a minimum, four percent is enough: Against a background of 5,000 years, it’s a proportion that is entirely appropriate.

Contemplative Bodhisattva Gilt Bronze Three Kingdoms, early 7th century Excavated from Mulgeun-myeon, Yangsan Guyeongsangnam-do.

The Judgment of Kings of the Underworld Joseon, 18th century Color on Hemp.

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rus si a n ring The first exhibition of Cartier jewellery took place in 1907 in St Petersburg. In 1992, an exhibition at the Hermitage was the first step on the way to creating a Cartier Museum in Paris (the Hermitage responded by displaying tsarist-era precious stones from its collection at the Petit Palais in Paris). In May, after a 96-year hiatus, the Cartier jewellery house returned to St. Petersburg. Pierre Rainero, Director of Strategy and Heritage for Cartier, talks about the Russian life of the company.

— You have brought an exhibition of antique Cartier jewellery to St. Petersburg. When did you start collecting them?

— This is only a small part of what we have been able to find since 1983. We decided to create this collection to demonstrate the level of our style and our inspiration. Now it has more than 1,300 works. The selection of items for St. Petersburg has been very precise — we tried to match the place and the city. And to show how Russian techniques (such as enamel), Russian culture (such as Sergei Diaghilev's ballet) and Russian tastes influenced the work of Cartier's craftsmen. So we are showing Princess Yusupova's kokoshnik tiara, which was created based on motifs of the Russian crest.

— Which pieces are you particularly proud of?

— Recently at auction we were able to buy a diadem and broach belonging to Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna. Then there's the wonderful necklace of Princess Irina Yusupova. On the outside it is a bouquet of flowers, and on the inside a watch. The watch was once bought by an opera singer, who then sold it and bought herself something more interesting; the company turned the watch into a necklace and in the same year sold it to Felix Yusupov, who was looking for a present for his wife. Every object in this collection has its own history. Our relation-

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Pierre Rainero Director of Strateg y and Her itage for Car tier

ships with Russian clients did not end after the Revolution; that was when jewellery started flowing the other way. Many Russian aristocrats and members of the imperial family brought the jewels back. The Yusupovs sold things to us for many years, right up to the Second World War — works made of black pearl, which was more expensive than diamonds. They lived on this money and expanded their IrFe fashion house.

Maison Cartier left St. Petersburg in 1914, and voilà, 96 years later, here we are again. It's absolutely terrifying! The first step was the exhibition in the Hermitage in 1992. The first

of the Cartier brothers to visit Russia was Pierre, to do some research.

Louis Cartier obtained an audience with Nicholas II in the Winter Palace, which significantly strengthened the company's Russian connections.

— And how did relations work out with Faberge?

— It wasn't just competition — it was war! Once in Munich there was a wonderful exhibition, initiated by representatives of the Habsburg dynasty, of objects from private collections and titled “Cartier and Faberge: Jewellers to the Tsar and Rivals.” At an international exhibition in Paris in 1900, the Cartier brothers saw the works of Faberge.

Twelve Easter eggs were exhibited, along with works in metal and granite sculptures. This produced a twofold impression on them: firstly, they saw subtle works accomplished with exquisite taste, and secondly they realised that the Russian market had matured. That was when Pierre started talking about a visit to Russia. In 1904 he travelled around the Faberge workshops, getting to know their suppliers and sculptors. After that, he began to buy up enamels and miniature works in stone, with one sole purpose — to bring the technology to Paris. When Cartier became a supplier to the Russian court, Faberge organised a customs blockade against all French jewellery. And only thanks to Pierre's

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connections to the imperial family — and to Maria Pavlovna in particular — were they able to have the blockade lifted.

— Could we say that, when the city of Paris presented Nicholas II with an Easter egg, it was an expression of this covert war with Faberge?

— Not really — but I'm sure that the Cartier brothers were celebrating at that moment. Although they were all astonished by the craftsmanship of Faberge.

— Did Faberge's colour schemes appear in Cartier enamels?

— Faberge had bright, lively colours — reds and yellows — while Cartier consciously created muted pastel shades — greys and pinks, blues and greens, purples and greens.

— The Romanovs were Cartier’s first buyers...

— You know, the first Russian buyers included businesspeople as well — traders, manufacturers and industrialists. They bought small but exquisite items, such as breast-pins for corsets. The Russian aristocracy bought two types of jewellery — ceremonial and more intimate, for personal use.

— How exactly did the Russian aristocracy influence the style of Cartier?

— Primarily it was the influence of the rich and magnificent ceremonial life of the court. Commissions from the court were in a similar style — they frequently demanded the creation of works that were outside the traditional Cartier style. You could say that we adapted

specially to the tastes of our Russian clients. It seems to me that to some extent this developed the French style in ornaments. The characteristics of French decor are balance and a sense of proportion.

Think of Versailles in the 17th century — Louis XIV, who appreciated the theatricality of the Baroque, rejected its sumptuousness. That's French style. The influence of Russian tastes on Cartier is to some degree a move away from balance. The second sphere of influence is form.

For example, our collection includes a triple ring — the “Russian ring”.

The combination of metals in three colours is typical of the Russian jeweller's art. Or, for example, all of Cartier's watches have a pyramidshaped sapphire on their crown — that's also a classical Russian form.

C o mm e n t a r y

G alina G abriel art historian, historian of jewellery

PIN FOR A V EI L Platinum, round Rosa diamonds, pearl, milgren casing, 2 . 3 9 x 8 . 3 5 c m , 1 91 3 Belonged to Princess Z i n a i d a Yu s u p o v a 1913 wa s a ti me when lat e moder ne wa s ma k i ng way for a r t deco.

In th i s object we ca n see how the bouquet st yle i s on it s way out, w ith a much more geometr ica l for m com i ng t o ta ke it s place i n the foreg rou nd. I f i nd the elega nt com bi nation of Celtic a nd A ncient for m s ver y str i k i ng, a nd the way that the d ia mond s work.

A nd a s for the way Ca r tier ma na ged t o com bi ne pea rl s a nd d iamond s — it 's a mazi ng!

CIGA RET TE CA SE Gold, jade, black enamel, silk cord, 1 1 . 0 x 6 . 5 c m , 1 914 Belonged to Nancy Leeds, widow of an American tin tycoon Ciga rett e ca ses or the fa mou s cosmetics ca ses that Ca r tier a nd Va n Cleef a nd Boucheron put out have a lways a mazed me, not ju st becau se of the abi lit y of the jewel ler s t o work w ith st ones (th i s ciga r ca se, for exa mple, wa s ca r ved from a piece of jade, wh ich i s u nbel ievably d i ff icu lt), but a l so becau se of how ergonom ic they a re. T hey f it ver y com for tably i n the ha nd — I f i nd it a plea su re t o hold them. T hese ciga rett e ca ses made of jade a nd ony x a re beauti f u l ly orga n i sed i nt er na l ly — there's space for the ciga rett es, a nd nex t t o it a section for mat ches. T he black a nd the g reen com bi ne wonder f u l ly.

T hese a re ver y elega nt object s, wh ich i s ex tremely i mpor ta nt. At that ti me — the post-wa r yea r s — lad ies bega n t o go ever y where w ith ciga rett e ca ses — they were ver y bold smoker s.

KOKO SHN IK TI A R A P l a t i n u m , 15 p e a r shaped diamonds, round diamonds, pearl; height i n t he c ent r e 5 c m , 19 0 8 Moder ne a nd a r t deco were t wo br i l l ia nt per iod s of Ca r tier's h i st or y, a nd tia r a s were the compa ny's f i r st major brea k th rough.

Ca r tier br i l l ia ntly com bi ned the Eu ropea n tia r a a nd the Ru ssia n kokosh n i k. Int eresti ngly, i n 1834 Nichola s I had publ i shed a n order prescr ibi ng that fema le cou r tier s shou ld wea r the kokosh n i k. In Ca r tier's work we ca n see the evolution of th i s ador nment — a subtle for m, rem i n i scent of a Byza nti ne ha lo, a nd u nbel ievably beauti f u l pea r-shaped d ia mond s mou nt ed i n a n i nv i sible setti ng shaped l i ke a n i nver t ed l i ly. It 's a cla s sic Ca r tier work i n t er m s of clea n nes s of st yle, beaut y a nd qua l it y — you don' t need t o add a ny th i ng or ta ke a ny th i ng away. A l l you need t o do i s i ma g i ne a n a s sem bly or women wea r i ng such tia r a s — they' d have been dazz l i ng from hu nd red s of met er s away!

PE ACOCK BROOCH Gold, platinum, Cabochon sapphire, white and green enamel, 5 . 5 x 2 . 0 x 0 . 5 c m , 1 91 3 .

Belonged to Countess Hohenzoller n T h i s i s a n object from the ti me when Ca r tier wa s ma k i ng jeweller y i n a Ch i nese/Japa nese st yle.

T h i s wa s the f i r st sig n i f ica nt appea r a nce of colou r i n the work s of Ca r tier — a l l these wonder f u l cabochon s, g reen ena mel — the a r ti st s have put a l l thei r sk i l l a nd subtle ta st e i nt o these work s.

Give the Ca r tier jewel ler s thei r due — they never restr a i ned thei r work s, never.

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f r o m 15 m ay t o 15 s e p t e m b e r Exhibitions

Entrance Hall Through Sunday, 23 May

s tat e h e r m i tage museum

Roger Fenton: Back to Russia For International Museums Day Roger Fenton was one of the outstanding photographers of the 19th century.

One of the museum's key acquisitions in recent years was a collection

2 Palace Square St. Petersbu rg Te l . (812) 571 3 4 2 0 , 5 7 1 3 4 6 5 , 7 10 9 6 2 5 Metro station: Nevsky Prospect O p en i n g hou r s: T ue s d ay– S a t u r d a y 10 : 3 0 a m – 6 : 0 0 p m ,

The exhibition presents “Honey,” a book published by the Rare Books From St. Petersburg publishing house, as well as four mosaic panels created

by Marco Bravura based on drawings

by Tonino Guerra.

Hermitage Theatre Foyer Wednesday, 19 May to Sunday, 30 May

S u n d a y 10 : 3 0 a m – 5 : 0 0 p m .

Ticket off ice shuts one hour

From Gothic to Ma nnerism

before the museu m closes. w w w. h e r m i t a g e m u s e u m . o r g

65th Anniversary of Victory in the Second World War A project begun by the architect A.S. Nikolsky at the Hermitage during the Siege of Leningrad in 1942. The exhibition includes drawings from a series made by Nikolsky between October 1941 and February 1942, during the Siege of Leningrad.

Armorial Hall Through Wednesday, 19 May

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Early Dutch Drawings from the 15th to the 16th Centuries in the Hermitage Collection Hall of Twelve Columns Tuesday, 18 May to Sunday, 1 August

of 22 photographs that Fenton took between 1852 and 1855.

Arab Hall Friday, 14 May to Sunday, 23 May Exhibition for the publication of “Honey,” a book

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Picasso. From the collection of the Picasso Museum, Paris Major works by the great Spanish artist are on a world tour for a whole year while the Picasso Museum in Paris undergoes refurbishment. The Hermitage will present the largest retrospective of Picasso's work to date.

See article, p. 68

GALA RECEPTION

Watercolour portraits and porcelain works of art Ninety–two portraits executed in watercolour and more than 140 works of art in porcelain from the collection of the renowned Parisian gallery Popov & Co., acquired by the Hermitage at the end of 2009.

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the Neolithic Period to the early 20th century, including exhibits classified as national treasures.

See article on p. 76 Nikolaevsky Hall Tuesday 1 June to Sunday 5 September Extended visiting hours: Tuesday–Sunday 6:15pm–9:00pm

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“Wind in the Pines...”.

5,000 Years of Korean Art From the National Museum of Korea.

In Russia for the first time — masterpieces from the National Museum of Korea, from

Fifth International Charity Gala Reception in the Winter Palace Funds collected thanks to the Gala Reception will be used to finance the restoration project of the South Wing of the General Staff building and the creation in it of a new museum of art from the 19th to the 21st centuries.

State Hermitage Museum Friday, 25 June S u m m e r 1–2 (15 ) 2 0 10

s e a s o n Field Marshals' Room, Armorial Hall, Picket Room, East Gallery, room 152, and rooms on the second floor of the Winter Palace.

Saturday, 19 June to Saturday, 4 September.

Extended visiting hours: Tuesday–Sunday 6:15pm–9:00pm

The Factory of Great Ideas Sevres. Modern Porcelain Grand Hall Tuesday, 15 June to Sunday, 12 September

gener a l s ta f f bu ilding

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CALENDaR

St. Petersbu rg (812) 571 3 4 2 0 , 5 7 1 3 4 6 5 , 7 10 9 6 2 5 Metro: Lomonosovskaya T ue s d ay– S u nd ay 10 : 3 0 a m – 6 : 0 0 p m , S u n d a y 10 : 3 0 a m – 5 : 0 0 p m Ticket off ice shuts one hou r before

GARDENING In 2002, the Dutch friends of the Hermitage made a gift to the museum of 30,000 bulbs, including the Hermitage variety of tulip. The descendents of these bulbs, as well as trees and bushes from the Hermitage's Hanging Gardens have been planted at the Staraya Derevnya Storage Centre for the duration of restoration work.

the museum closes

Permanent collection

EVENTS “But if you really like tobacco so much...”

Snuff–boxes, pipes and smoking accessories from the Hermitage's collection Blue Bedroom Friday, 25 June to Sunday, 10 October Swiss Stained Glass of the 16th–18th Centuries from the Hermitage Collection Stained glass from town halls and private homes, as well as cabinet pieces.

Russian Culture Rooms Tuesday, 6 July to Sunday, 3 October

menshikov pa l a c e

Fr om M atis s e to Ma levich Pioneer s o f c o n t e m p o r a ry art

Seventy–six artworks from one of the world's best collections of 20th–century French art.

Through Friday, 17 September

6/8 Palace Square St. Petersbu rg

15 U n i v e r s i t y E m b a n k m e n t

(812) 571 3 4 2 0 , 571

St. Petersbu rg

3 4 6 5 , 7 10 9 6 2 5

(812) 571 3 4 2 0 , 571

Metro: Nevsky Prospect

3 4 6 5 , 7 10 9 6 2 5

Closed for refu rbish ment

M e t r o : Va s i l e o s t r o v s k a y a

s t a r ay a de r e v n ya r e s t or at ion a n d st or age centre 3 7a Z a u s a d e b n a y a

Ticket off ice shuts one hou r before the

15 P r o s p e c t

E x c u r s i o n : (812) 3 4 4 9 2 2 6

museum closes.

Obu k hovskoi Oborny

Permanent collection

10 : 3 0 a m – 6 : 0 0 p m , S u n d a y 10 : 3 0 a m – 5 : 0 0 p m

STARS On Bastille Day, the orbit of the Louvre will intersect the orbit of the Hermitage.

Wednesday 14 July

St. Peter sbu r g

m useu m of the imperial porcel a in fa c t o r y

T ue s d ay– S u nd ay

BACK FROM RESTORATION Jan Gossart's “Descent from the Cross” was put back on show in April. Over the course of the summer, Bartolomé Esteban Murillo's “The Angel and St. Elijah” and Degas's “Place de la Concorde” will return from planned restoration work.

(812) 3 4 4 9 2 71 Metro: Staraya Derev nya We d n e s d a y – S u n d a y 1 1 : 0 0 a m , 1:00 pm, 1:30 pm, 3:30 pm

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winter pa l a c e of peter t h e gr e at 32 Pa l a ce Em ba n k ment St. Petersbu rg (812) 571 3 4 2 0 , 571 3 4 6 5 , 7 10 9 6 2 5 Metro: Nevsky Prospect, Gorkovskaya T ue s d ay– S u nd ay

h e r m i tage– kazan ex hibition centre

h e r m i tage– a msterda m ex hibition centre

PO Box 20, K rem lin,

A m s t e l 51

Kazan, Tatarstan

Amsterdam

( 8 4 3) 5 6 7 8 0 3 2 ,

The Netherlands

567 80 34

+ 3 1 ( 0 ) 2 0 5 3 0 74 8 8

T ue s d ay– S u nd ay

T h u r s d a y –T u e s d a y

10 : 0 0 a m –7 : 0 0 p m

10 : 0 0 a m – 5 : 0 0 p m ,

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We d n e s d a y 10 : 0 0 a m – 8 : 0 0 p m

10 : 3 0 a m – 5 : 0 0 p m , S u n d a y 10 : 3 0 a m – 4 : 0 0 p m Ticket off ice shuts

Th e Gr eat N o r t h e r n Wa r

one hou r before the museum closes.

Permanent collection

key dates

12 MAY 2010 During repair work on the first f loor of the Church Staircase, a sculpture entitled “Runaway Slave” was discovered. Sculptures, previously thought lost, had been walled up in the 1940s.

Next to the sculptures were discovered an old calendar and notes that said that the sculpture had been walled up in February 1947.

affiliates

h e r m i tage– v y borg ex hibition centre

18 MAY International Museums Day The Hermitage sends postcards made by scholars from its art studio to museums of the world.

1 Ladanova Vyb or g T ue s d ay– S u nd ay 10 : 3 0 a m –7 : 0 0 p m Ticket off ice shuts one hou r before the museum closes.

The Great Catherine An exhibition dedicated to Empress Catherine II that conjures up a vivid image of her age and provides a picture of the development of Russian culture in the late 18th century.

The exhibition includes 213 items from the History of Russian Culture Department, the Numismatics Department, and the Department of the History of Western European Figurative Art. Wednesday, 16 June to February 2011 h

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An exhibition dedicated to 300th anniversary of the taking of Vyborg by Peter the Great’s forces.

The Hermitage–Vyborg Centre from Saturday, 19 June

French art of the 17th and 18th centuries from the Hermitage Collection More than 140 sculptures and works of applied art create an impression of the artistic life of France at the time when it was becoming the law–giver for European artistic fashion.

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27 MAY St. Petersburg City Day. JUNE Start of the second phase of restoration work on the General Staff building.

C l o s e d 2 5 D e c e m b e r, 1 Januar y and 30 Apr i l w w w. h e r m i t a g e . n l

TRAVELLING EXHIBITIONS

reiss engelhorn museum

9 JUNE 1672 Birthday of Peter the Great.

Zeughaus C5 S u m m e r 1–2 (15 ) 2 0 10

s e a s o n Mannheim Germany +49 (0) 62 12 93 31

Sarmatian Treasures Gold of the Steppe Through Tuesday, 25 May

a l l –r u s s i a n ex hibition centre

The Embroiderer's Art Western European embroidery from the 16th to early 20th centuries for clothes and interior design Through 29 August

to

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Sunday, 12 December

key dates

CONCERTS Music of the Grand Hermitage Celebrating the 400th anniversary of the death of Michelangelo Caravaggio A concert of ancient

16 JUNE 2010 Opening of the Hermitage–Vyborg centre. Events dedicated to the celebration of the 300th anniversary of the town. On the same day, the exhibition “The Great Catherine” opens in the new affiliate.

119 P r o s p e c t M i r a Moscow (4 9 5 ) 74 8 3 5 0 8 w w w. i n t e r m u s e u m . r u

r a dishchev museum 75 Per vom a i sk aya U l it s a S a r a t o v, R u s s i a (8 4 52) 2 6 12 0 9

Intermuseum 2 01 0 — R u s s i a n Nationa l M u s e u m s F e s t i va l

19 JUNE 2009 Anniversary of the ceremonial opening of the Hermitage on the Amstel. The affiliate in the Netherlands was opened by Queen Beatrix and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

w w w. r a d m u s e u m a r t . r u

Spanish art of the 16th–17th centuries from the Hermitage Collection June 2010

26 JUNE 2010 The first edition of the new–look Hermitage magazine is published.

sh a ngh a i museum

26 JUNE 2010 Start of the Cirque du Soleil tour in St. Petersburg.

2 01 R en M i n D a D a o Shangha, China +8 6 (0)21 6 372 35 0 0 T ue s d ay–F r id ay 9: 0 0 a m– 5:00 pm, Su nday 9:00am–8:00pm

The exhibition presents the unique Victory Vase, made by the Imperial Porcelain Factory 30 May through 7 June

29 JUNE 125th anniversary of the Radishchev Musem in Saratov.

w w w. s h a n g h a i m u s e u m . o r g

Treasures of the Russian Court August to October

k a liningr a d obl a st art hist ory museum 1 K linicheskaya U litsa Kaliningrad, Russia (0112) 4 5 3 8 4 4

k a liningr a d amber museum 1 P l o s h c h a d Va s i l e v s k o g o Kaliningrad, Russia (4 0 1 2 ) 4 6 1 5 6 3

Amber in ancient cultures Tuesday. 14 September

music featuring Renata Fusco (soprano), Maurizio Piantelli (theorbo) and Maurizio Less (viola da gamba) Supported by the Italian Cultural Institute in St. Petersburg Large Italian Skylight Hall, New Hermitage Saturday, 3 July, 7:00pm

JULY 1941 Two military trains removed 1.117 million exhibits from the Hermitage to Sverdlovsk.

A third train was unable to leave, after the besieging forces encircled the city.

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The State Her mitage M useu m in v ite s ev eryone w ho lov e s the m useu m a nd u nder sta nds the va lu e of its c ontr ibu tion to wor ld cu ltu r e to be c ome its Fr iend International Hermitage Friends' Club is a special program, operating in St. Petersburg since 1996, which was the first in Russia to unite Friends around the museum. Each year the State Hermitage Museum implements numerous museum development projects (education, research, restoration, and exhibition) with the support of its Friends all around the world:

frien ds ofice (f r o m t h e P a l a c e S q u a r e s i d e)

frien ds of the hermitage, lon don The Hermitage Rooms,

the state hermitage m useu m fou n dation of ca na da inc.

T e l e p h o n e : ( 0 0 7 8 1 2 ) 7 10 9 0 0 5 Fa x : (0 0 7 812) 571 95 2 8

Somerset House, Strand

900 Greenbank Road

E–m a i l : f r iend sclu b@

L o n d o n W C 2 R 0 RN

S u i t # 6 16

hermitage.ru

UK

Ottawa, Ontar io

Posta l add ress: The State

T e l . (4 4 ) 0 2 0 7 8 4 5 4 6 3 5

Canada K2J 4P6

Her m itage Museu m

F a x (4 4 ) 0 2 0 7 8 4 5 4 6 3 7

T e l . ( 1 6 1 3) 4 8 9 0 7 9 4

34 Dvor tsovaya emb., 34

www.hermitagefriends.org

Komendantsky entrance t o t he Wi nt er Pa l a c e

19 0 0 0 0 S t . Pe t e r s b u r g Russia

fou n dation hermitage frien ds in the n etherl a n ds

hermitage m useu m fou n dation (usa)

F a x ( 1 6 1 3) 4 8 9 0 8 3 5 www.hermitagemuseum.ca

5 0 5 P a r k Av e n u e , 2 0 t h F l o o r N e w Yo r k ,

P. O . b o x 1 16 7 5 ,

NY 10 0 2 2 U S A

10 0 1 GR A m s t e r d a m

T e l . ( 1 2 1 2 ) 8 2 6 3 0 74

The Netherlands

F a x (1 212) 8 8 8 4 018

T e l . (3 1) 2 0 5 3 0 8 7 5 5

www.hermitagemuseumfoundation.org

F a x (3 1) 2 0 5 3 0 8 7 5 0 www.hermitage.nl

The State Hermitage Museum regularly organizes various special events and meetings exclusively for the Hermitage Friends. A very interesting program is prepared for the members of the Hermitage Friends' Club for the new season 2010–2011.

Among other events, we plan a visit to the Open Storage Facility Staraya Derevnya, a center for restoration, preservation and display of works of art, which is unique for Russia and Europe. The Friends will continue their acquaintance with this location, learning about the perspectives of its development at the current stage of construction and visiting new premises, buildings and storages.

The Hermitage — Vyborg, new exhibition center of the State Hermitage Museum opens its doors in summer 2010, and the Friends will have an opportunity to visit one more Hermitage branch for free and without waiting in the line, as they do in The Hermitage Amsterdam and The Hermitage — Kazan. We hope that our Friends will be among the first visitors of this new Hermitage venue.

Looking forward to seeing you in Vyborg!

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Picasso From the collection of the National Picasso Museum, Paris Catalogue

Meridion Guitar Quartet (Sweden) Music by Piazzolla, Fernando Sora, Albeniz and Granados.

Large Italian Skylight Hall, New Hermitage Thursday, 8 July, 7:00pm

Publication date

16 June 2010 O.G. Kostyuk “But if you really like tobacco so much...”

Bastille Day at the Hermitage.

Part of the Year of France in Russia Performances

by France's Lo'Jo ensemble and St. Petersburg dance group Top 9; masque costume competition; fire–brigade demonstration; drummers; French attractions.

Supported by the Institut Francais in St. Petersburg Large Courtyard, Winter Palace Wednesday, 14 July, 8:00pm

work s from t h e s tat e h e r m i tage The World's Museums in the 21st Century: Reconstruction, Re–exhibiting Materials from the international conference in two volumes

Music of the Bolshoi H e r m i ta g e Ja s s – F u s i o n i n t h e Op e n A i r

BOOKS

s tat e h e r m i tage publishing house

Andrei Kondakov (piano), Randy Brecker (USA, trumpet), Loran Robin (France, drums), Andrei Svetlov (bass), Yakov Kremensky (guitar).

Courtyard of the New Hermitage Sunday, 11 June, 8 p.m.

A.O. Larionov From Gothic to Mannerism Early Netherlandish Drawings from the 15th to the 16th Centuries in the Hermitage Collection Catalogue

Catalogue Publication date

27 June 2010

Publication date

18 May 2010 E.A. Shlikevich Swiss Stained Glass of the 16th–18th Centuries Catalogue

“Wind in the Pines...”.

5,000 Years of Korean Art Catalogue Publication date

Publication date

1 June 2010

6 July 2010

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Material from anniversary readings dedicated to the memories of A. K. Markov and A. I. Ilyin.

key dates

3 JULY 2010 Opening of the festival Music of the Bolshoi Hermitage.

23 AUGUST 2010 Fifth anniversary of the Hermitage–Kazan centre.

24 AUGUST 2009 Hermitage Director Mikhail Piotrovsky launched a public appeal to canvas public opinion on the future colour of the Winter Palace. The survey demonstrated the conservative attitudes of city residents. The majority said they were unable to accept the unfamiliar sandy yellow colour, regardless of its historical authenticity.

DECEMBER 2010 End of the first phase of reconstruction of the General Staff building.

S u m m e r 1–2 (15 ) 2 0 10

Advertisment

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arch publishing house

and 18th Century from the Hermitage Collections Catalogue Publication date

br a nches of the friends of the h e r m i tage club

N. M. Gol, I. G. Mamonov, M. B. Khaltunen Gods, People, Dogs

29 June 2010

Publication date

Publication date

C o m m a n d a n t 's E n t r a n c e ,

15 Aug. 2010

14 Sept. 2010

Wi nt er Pa l a c e (f r om

Amber in ancient cultures Catalogue

Central off ice 34 Palace Embankment

P a l a c e S q u a r e)

N. M. Gol, E. M. Lestr, M. L. Melshikova, M. V. Uspensky.

Dragons, Great and Fearful

+1 ( 2 1 2 ) 8 2 6 3 0 74 , f a x +1 ( 2 1 2 ) 8 8 8 4 0 1 8 masha@hermitagemuseum fou ndation.org w w w. h e r m i t a g e m u s e u m fou ndation.org

ca na di a n friends of the h e r m i tage National and Membership Off ice,

M aster pie ce s of Eu ropea n J e w e l ry o f t h e 16 t h t o 19 t h centuries

Publication date

15 Aug. 2010 D. P. Aleksinsky, O. Ya. Neverov, M. B. Piotrovsky.

The State Hermitage Museum Boxed edition in two volumes

15 0 0 B a n k S t r e e t , Suite №302, O t t a w a , ON K 1 H 1 B 8 +1 6 1 3 4 8 9 0 7 9 4 , f a x +1 6 1 3 4 8 9 0 8 3 5 friends@hermitagemuseum.ca w w w. h e r m i t a g e m u s e u m . c a

lon don friends of the h e r m i tage The Hermitage Rooms,

Publication date

Somerset House

15 Sept. 2010

The Strand L o n d o n W C 2 R 0 RN

V. M. Uspensky Kuzma Petrov–Vodkin: Maternity From the series “1,001 Masterpieces”

+4 4 (0)2 0 78 4 5 4 6 35, f a x +4 4 (0)2 0 78 4 5 4 6 37 i n fo@her m itagefr iends.org w w w. h e r m i t a g e f r i e n d s . o r g

Publication date

1 June 2010 Masterpieces of European Jewelry of the 16th to 19th centuries from the Hermitage collection. Album

E. Yu. Andreyeva Kazimir Malevich: Black Square From the series “1,001 Masterpieces” Publication date 1 June 2010

P O B o x 1 16 7 5 10 0 1 GR A m s t e r d a m +31 (0)2 0 53 0 87 55 , ф а к с

SCIENTIFIC CONFERENCES

s l av i y a publishing house

International Conference on Military Medals Assembly Hall September

The Great Catherine Catalogue Publication date 16 June 2010

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vrienden@hermitage.nl

friendsclub@hermitage.ru

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h e r m i tage museum f ou n dat ion (u s a ) 5 0 5 P a r k Av e n u e , 2 0 t h F l o o r

FRIENDS OF THE HERMITAGE EVENTS

Spanish Art of the 17th h

h e r m i tage friends in the netherlands f ou n dat ion

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Alexei Melamid evening at the Phillips de Pury gallery.

Lecture: “Sources of the Hermitage: Why has the name of the greatest museum S u m m e r 1–2 (15 ) 2 0 10

Do IT AnD BELIEvE IN IT L'Ermite, "hermit", is the name given to the red and white 2006 M. Chapoutier Ermitage L'Ermite being among the best wines of the M.Chapoutier House. They demonstrate what can be achieved at the ancient appellation Hermitage when combining a innovative principles of bio dynamics and the human factor in the person of Michel Chapoutier, the winemaker who is guided in his work by the family motto Fac et spera — "Do it and believe in it".

Representing the seventh generation o f t h e f a m i l y, M i c h e l C h a p o u t i e r, t h e president of the House, headed the c o m p a n y s i n c e 19 9 0 . He c o n s i d e r s t h e transfer to bio dy nam ic cu ltivation a nd t he c r e at ion of t he «Wi ne a nd Hea lth» A ssociation acting in cooperation with the French Blood Center and engaged in managing the issues of bone marrow donation, to be his main achievements.

S i n c e 19 9 6 a l l t h e w i n e b o t t l e s of M.Chapoutier have w i ne labels in Braille. There are two reasons for th is. Mau r ice de La Sizeran ne, one of the for mer ow ners of the M.Chapoutier v i neyards, wa s bl i nd and helped the visually challenged people a lot. As to Michel Chapoutier himself, once he heard a reproach from a blind singer who complained that he could not choose a bottle of wine by himself. So, the wine labels in Braille appeared on the b o t t l e s o f M .C h a p o u t i e r, a s w i n e i s a joy for a l l people. A nd a tex tu red label is designed to remind sighted people of those who cannot see.

F i ne a nd pebbly sa nd st one

L oes sia l soi l

T h e M.C h a p o u t i e r Ho u s e fo u n d e d i n 18 0 8 o w n o f t h e most extensive vineyards in the Hermitage appel lation.

T h e r e d w i n e M.C h a p o u t i e r 2 0 0 6 E r m i t a g e L’ E r m i t e i s c h a r a c t e r i z e d by a bouquet of sage leaves, w i ld berr y and sandal wood, together with sweet and smoky blend of tobacco, cherr y and olives.

FIGURES 18 0 8 — fo u n d a u t i o n the M.Chapoutier Wi ne Hou s e 10 0 % w i n e s a r e b o t t l e d at the winer y 80 0 0 g r ape–v i ne s per one hectare — density at the M.Chapoutier vineyards 19 9 0 — t h e c o m p a n y is headed by Michel Chapoutier

L evee t er r aces Pebbles Pl ioci ne m a rl

3.5 mln bottles per annum — tota l output of the M.Chapoutier House 40% of bottles are drunk in France

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Black m ica g r a n it e

M iocene sa nd st one

The Hermitage appel lation in the Rhone valley was already known to t he R om a n s by t he n a me " Vien ne W i n e s ". T h e t e r m " H e r m i t a g e " a p p e a r e d i n t h e X V II c e n t u r y, when a legend about a knight, who settled on those hills after a crusade, became widespread.

The vineyards of M.Chapoutier are located i n 10 a p p e l l a t i o n s i n the Rhone valley The wh ite M.Chapoutier 2 0 0 6 E r m i t a g e L' E r m i t e gained 99 pounts from a p o s s i b l e 10 0 i n t h e rating of Robert Parker

www.mbg–wine.ru

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in Russia acquired such fame?”

London Friends of the Hermitage Friday 28 May

Central Asia archaeological expedition, Republic of Khakasiya, Republic of Buryatia July–August

White Nights tour (New York– St. Petersburg) Hermitage Banquet Gala, 25 June Hermitage Museum Foundation (USA) Wednesday 23–Tuesday 29 June

Ancient Rus archaeological expedition, Alexandrov,

expedition, Berezan island, Ukraine July–September Mirmekiiskaya archaelogical expedition, Kerch, Ukraine July–September

THE STABIA ARCHAEOLO G ICAL E X P EDITION

Lecture by Sjeng Scheijen. Lecture: Diaghilev the Man Hermitage Museum Foundation (USA) Thursday 9–Saturday 11 September

Slavic–Scythian expedition, Bryansk Oblast July–August North–western archaeological expedition, Smolensk Oblast June–September Castellammare di Stabia, Italy from June to July

Trans–Kuban archaeological expedition, Adygea Republic, Maikopsky district, Kamennomostky village, Krasnodar Region, station Kostromskaya August–September

Moscow July–October Architectural and archaeological expedition, Ukraine May–November Berezan (Nizhneburg) archaeological

South Siberian archaeological expedition, Altai, Republic of Tuva June–September e e

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Golden Horde (Old Crimean) archaeological expedition, Old Crimea, Ukraine July–September Bukhara archaeological expedition, Paikend (Uzbekistan), Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan June–October Central Caucasus archaeological expedition, Republic of Kabardino–Balkariya, Zolsky district July–August

ARCHAEOLOGICAL EXPEDITIONS

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South Crimean archaeological expedition, Balaklava, Urkaine July–August

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Nimfeiskaya archaelogical expedition, Kerch, Ukraine July–September Comprehensive Antiquity archaeological expedition, Kerch, Ukraine April–August

Upper Dvina archaeological expedition, Pskov Oblast, Kuninsky district June–September Pendzhikent archaeological expedition, Pendzhikent, Khisorak, Tajikistan June–September South–West Crimean archaeological expedition, Sudak, Ukraine August–September S u m m e r 1–2 (15 ) 2 0 10

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View of the Hermitage Theatre Sketch of a Cur tain Gonzaga, Pietro di Gottardo.

Italy — Russia. After 1802

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The partnership between BDO Russia and the State Hermitage started in the year 2007 when BDO Group was awarded the status of the museum’s official consultant.

It was followed with initiation and maintenance of the Hermitage 21st Century Foundation. The Endowment Found., with donations in support of children’s programs of the museum. The next step of cooperation was partnership with the Hermitage Museum in 2010.

BDO, the largest international audit and consulting group, supports Russian and international cultural and charitable initiatives and fundraising programs of the State Hermitage.

Reliable Support o f R u ss i a n C u lt u r e Leader among Russian audit and consulting companies; member of BDO, international association of independent companies, being the 5th in the world according to the consolidated revenue Official consultant of the State Hermitage on administration of Russian and international projects Official consultant of the largest cultural and educative organizations and events of Russia

BDO – the most local of the 5 global Resources: • Rating of the largest audit and consulting groups for the year 2009 (Agency “Expert RA”)largest • Accountancy Age 2009 Top 30 Accounting Networks and Associations.

• Rating “Expert-400. The largest”

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From the correspondence of the Hermitage with the Central Directorate for Scientific and Museum Establishments of the People’s Education Commissariat. The Leningrad branch of the Directorate was not far from the Hermitage, on Palace Embankment.

“To the Com mu na l Ser v ices Depa r tment, With the fol low i ng, the Stat e Her m ita ge request s a d i rective on the i s su i ng from the wa rehou se of the Stat e F u nd of 107 pa i r s of wa r m u ndercloth i ng for the a r med n ight wat ch men, the ga l ler y per son nel of the H i st or ic Room s, the Electr icit y Station a nd the ya rd clea ner s. T he a l locat ed u ndercloth i ng wa s i s sued by the Stat e F u nd wa rehou se i n May of 1923 from the Ma i n M i l ita r y Supply Di rect or at e.

At the present ti me, the it em s a re i n pos ses sion of the wa rehou se. T he i nd icat ed cat egor ies of worker s rea l ly a re out i n the cold, wh ich i s g reatly ref lect ed i n the hea lth of each a nd ever y one of them.

Ad m i n i str at or /Su slov/ ” h

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