Actual practices of contemporary art (Yuri Shabelnikov). State Museum of New Western Art State Museum of New Western Art

Museum of New Western Art

Museum of New Western Art a collection of works of Western European painting and sculpture (mainly French) from the beginning of the 60s. 19th century E. Manet, O. Renoir, E. Degas, C. Monet, V. van Gogh, P. Gauguin, C. Pizarro, A. Toulouse-Lautrec, P. Cezanne, A. Matisse, P. Picasso, O. Rodin and others. The collection of S.I. Schukin and I.A. Morozov. The Shchukin collection was opened in 1918 as the 1st Museum of New Western Painting (Bolshoy Znamensky lane, 8); collection of Morozov in 1919 as the 2nd Museum of New Western Painting (Prechistenka Street, 21). In 1923, both museums were merged into the Museum of New Western Art, which since 1925 became a branch of the Museum of Fine Arts (see the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts). In 1928, the funds were concentrated in one building (Prechistenka Street, 21), after the liquidation of the museum in 1948, they were distributed between the Museum of Fine Arts and the Hermitage.

Literature: State Museum of New Western Art. Illustrated catalogue, M., 1928.

Exhibition halls on the 1st floor
The State Museum of A.S. Pushkin. Prechistenka, 12/2

Western European art
in the collection of the State Museum of A.S. Pushkin
(Painting, graphics, sculpture)

“Do you want to be an art connoisseur? -
Winckelman says. - Try to love the artist,
look for the beauty in his creations."
A.S. Pushkin - ABOUT CRITIQUE.

The exhibition opening in the halls of the State Museum of A.S. Pushkin, for the first time presents a collection of Western European art, which in the last decade has been actively formed by the museum. About 120 exhibits - works of painting, drawing, sculpture, decorative art, more than 50 names of artists who worked in the 2nd half of the 17th - 19th centuries - this is only a small part of the collection collected by the museum. Much is presented at permanent exhibitions - on Prechistenka, in the Memorial apartment of A.S. Pushkin on the Arbat, in the Museum of I.S. Turgenev on Ostozhenka.

The beginning of the collection of Western European art, which is typical for our Pushkinmuseum, put gifts. In 1968, as part of the collection of the Moscow collector A.S. Golovina received two paintings: “Landscape with Ruins” (late 17th - early 18th century) by the Austrian painter A. Faistenberg and “Peasant House” by an unknown Flemish master of the 17th century - “variegated rubbish of the Flemish school”. INIn the 1970s, the collection of the then very young museum, as from a cornucopia, “fell down” works of the so-called escheattransferred by the State Museum Fund: the works of the Dutch landscape and animal painter S. van der Doye (1653/1654-1718), the famous French painters C. Couvassegue (1802-1877), J. Courbet (1819-1877), the Austrian genre painter K. Schleicher (1855‑1871) and the German artist K.E. Forberg (1844-1915) and other masters.

In the 1970s-1990s, a collection of graphic portraits was actively completed - acquaintances and contemporaries of A.S. Pushkin.The museum collection received more than 50 works by masters of "rossiki", foreign artists who worked in Russia or abroad onRussian orders: A. Molinari, C. Perrgo, A. Lagrené, K. Bardou, E. Rossi, F. Kruger, K. Mather, T. Wright, L. Fischer, M. Zichy and others. Many of them are presented at the exhibition.

Many rare genre and landscape graphic works entered the museum's collection as part of albums. So among the 60 works in the album, owned by P.P. and E.A. Bakunin, which began to fill in at the end of the 18th century -drawing by the famous Italian portraitist S. Tonchi, sepia by the French architect, draftsman and painter J. Thomas de Thomon, watercolor by the French artist and traveler J.B. Leprince, a beautiful drawing of a female head, made in the style of English masters of the last quarter of the 18th century, possibly the work of the famous English portrait painter T. Lawrence and other sheets requiring further study.

Among recent acquisitions, of particular interest is the drawing “Cupids Merchant” (1803) by the French artist P.M.K. Bare de Comone. At the heart of the plot, which became popular in the 2nd half of the 18th - early 19th centuries and was repeatedly interpreted, is a fresco,found in 1759 during excavations at the villa of Ariadne in Stabiae.

In the last decade, the museum has been acquiring not only paintings and graphic works of Pushkin's time, but also works of the 18th and 2nd half of the 19th century. First of all, this is due to the opening of our branches - museums dedicated to I.S. Turgenev and V.L. Pushkin. Unlike Alexander Pushkin, both of them were "travelers", especially Turgenev, who spent most of his life abroad. The exhibition presents picturesque views of Western European cities and portraits of the writer's contemporaries, which will later be exhibited at the Museum of I.S. Turgenev.

Acquisition, including works of Western European art,is also associated with the expansion of the subject of exhibition projects, in particular foreign ones, the number of which is steadily growing. Currently, the museum has the opportunity to exhibit at such exhibitions the works of foreign artists, previously not in demand.

The leitmotif of the exhibition, offered to the attention of visitors, is Pushkin, his life and work. The exposition presents portraits of the poet's acquaintances: Princess V.F. Gagarina, Princess Z.A.Volkonskaya, Countess E.P. Ricci, Count V.A. Sollogub, His Serene Highness Prince G.A. Gruzinsky, Princess E.A. Clary i Aldringen,among which are images of two emperors - Alexander I and Nicholas I; his contemporaries: A.R. Tomilov, Baron A.K. Tipolt, A.I. Overa, D.D. Shepelev, Baron N.P. Nicholas. A special place in this portrait gallery is occupied by images of William Shakespeare. And Pushkin's contemporaries - Friedrich Schiller and Heinrich Heine.The poet was well acquainted with their work, each of them, to a greater or lesser extent, influenced the development of his talent.

Pushkin's inexhaustible work reflected the history, culture, nature of many countries, the way of life and customs of the peoples inhabiting them - be it Spain, France, Germany, Italy ... That is why the exhibition of works by Western European artists is so natural and harmonious in the halls of the Pushkin Museum.

The decoration of the exhibition is a few objects of decorative and applied arts, made in the styles of Rococo, Classicism, Empire, Historicism and presented by such famous names as K.M. Clodion, and P.F. Tomir, anonymous craftsmen, as well as talented model masters of the Sevres Porcelain Manufactory. The exhibition features works by sculptors of the late 18th-19th centuries. Among them, the portrait of I.V. Goethe by H.D. Rauch, an outstanding German master of the era of classicism, the founder of the Berlin school of sculptors, a portrait of Emperor Peter I, made in the 1770s by M.A. Kollo, a talented student of the great E.M. Falcone; portrait of the notorious Countess M.Zh. Dubarry (1858). This is a beautifully executed copy by an anonymous Western European master after the original by the gifted French sculptor O. Page (1773).

Currently, the museum is preparing for publication the album “Western European Art in the Collection of the State Museum of A.S. Pushkin”, which will present about 200 of the most interesting works of painting, miniatures, graphics, including the edition - unique sheets of the 18th - early 19th centuries.

State Museum of A.S. Pushkina expresses her gratitude to her colleagues - employees of the State Museum of Fine Arts named after A.S. Pushkina L.Yu. Savinskaya, V.A. Mishin, V.A. Sadkov; experts of the All-Russian Art and Science Center named after Academician I.E. Grabar A.R. Kiseleva, O.S. Glebova, A.A. Makhotina; expert of the State Research Institute of Restoration M.M. Krasilin; art critic R.M. Kirsanova, historian A.M. Valkovich; Moscow collector S.A. Podstanitsky, Irakli Kupatadze - who assisted in the attribution of works.

Ivan Morozov's mansion in Moscow. Room with panels by Maurice Denis. Photo

On May 21, 2013, the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation hosted an expanded meeting of the Expert Council under the Ministry of Culture, the working group on museum activities of the Public Council under the Ministry of Culture and the Presidium of the Union of Museums of Russia. The museum's Areopagus gathered to discuss the issue of recreating the State Museum of New Western Art, which was liquidated in 1948 (the GMNZI collection was divided between the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts and the State Hermitage Museum). The question, we recall, was posed directly to President Vladimir Putin by Irina Alexandrovna Antonova, director of the Pushkin Museum im. A.S. Pushkin. After Antonova's appeal to the president, passions around the restoration of the GMNZI boiled up with renewed vigor, although this idea has been around for quite a few years. The director of the Pushkin Museum at her press conference spoke enthusiastically about the restoration of historical justice. The director of the Hermitage, in turn, defended the inviolability and indivisibility of museum collections. Museum experts honed their arguments in the press. And finally, everyone gathered to carry out the President's order to "consider the issue." Looking ahead, we note that nothing significant happened at the museum fronts during the meeting: no one came up with new arguments “for” or “against”, and most experts repeated what was already obvious to the entire museum community. But nevertheless, these arguments were once again “voiced”, and to the whole country: they spoke under the guns of television cameras, there was a live broadcast on the Russia 24 TV channel. And what did they say?

The action consisted of two parts with an epilogue. First, Irina Antonova was bombarded with questions in a blitz mode, then experts spoke, and in the epilogue, the moderator of the meeting, Deputy Minister of Culture Alla Manilova, quoted the documents received “on the case” and summed up the results. "Artguide" prepared something like a synopsis of the speeches of the meeting participants.

Director of the State Museum of Fine Arts named after A.S. Pushkin Irina Antonova answers questions from experts. Photo: Ekaterina Allenova / Artguide

Part one. Questions and answers

Alexey Lebedev, Head of the Museum Design Laboratory of the Russian Institute of Cultural Studies: We are talking about the transfer of part of the Hermitage collection to a new museum, which is planned to be created in the city of Moscow. My question comes down to the legal aspect. In 1996, largely through the efforts of the museum community, the 54th Federal Law (“On the Museum Fund of the Russian Federation and Museums in the Russian Federation.” - “Artgid”) was adopted, article 15 of which explicitly states: “The museum collection is indivisible” . Question: how does Irina Alexandrovna consider it necessary to overcome the obvious contradiction between her proposal and the current legislation?

Irina Antonova: The law that is cited is the law of the indivisibility of collections. I propose to combine the collection, divided into two parts, again.

Elena Gagarina, Director of the Moscow Kremlin Museums: Is the Pushkin Museum ready to part with its part of the [Shchukin and Morozov] collection in order to create a new museum?

Irina Antonova: We talked about this from the very beginning. We are ready to provide our part of the collection, which ended up in our museum after the division. We are ready, because we understand what will bring the city, and not only the city, but also the Russian museum business, by uniting into one museum.

Larisa Zelkova, General Director of the V. Potanin Charitable Foundation: The majority of colleagues evaluate the decision to create this museum as an absolutely voluntaristic, political decision. Stalin accepted it, he also disbanded this museum. Why do we need to recreate an institution today that was the fruit of arbitrariness?

Irina Antonova: So that there is no more arbitrariness! It seems obvious to me. Works moved during the revolution and nationalization, but it was a revolution. However, some decrees concerned not only the destruction of museums, but also their enrichment. So it was with our museum. It was a museum of casts, but it was decided to make a museum of the world history of art, including painting. And we received not only from the Hermitage, but also from the Tretyakov Gallery, from the Historical Museum about forty collections. The period from 1924 to 1930 was a period of redistribution, and it was a process of redistribution to enrich the museums of Russia. Incidentally, this process is now taking place in Western Europe. The Louvre gives part of the collections to the city of Metz, London museums move their collections to other, less rich museums in Great Britain. And if you look at the museum business broadly, then this process should not be put to a categorical end. Why not? We have many museums where sometimes, I don't know, for centuries there are valuables that no one has ever seen, they are not available to anyone. But to move them to museums, where they will be available ... I will say right away: it depends on the buildings and conditions in cities where art values ​​can be transferred. And there is no crime in this.

Cezanne Hall in the house of Ivan Morozov. Around 1923. Photograph

Natalia Karovskaya, Director of the Rostov Kremlin Museum-Reserve: Are you afraid of the domino principle? We are afraid that the precedent that may now occur will allow other museums to apply for returns as well.

Irina Antonova: Your question is very important, and it comes up in many speeches. Most importantly: there is no precedent! I want it to be clear! We are talking about one resolution in which the museum was destroyed for u-beige-de-ni-ya! This is purely an ideological problem! This is not a problem of redistribution of artistic values! This is completely different! If a decision is made to recreate the museum, there is no danger. No precedent! Therefore, there are no fears that someone will say that it is also necessary to transfer this there ... They simply do not exist. You cannot point me to another such museum that was so liquidated. (Voices from the audience: "Leningrad Defense Museum!"). But what are the reasons? We need to look at the wording. (Voices from the audience: “They are exactly the same!”). Well, then you need to consider it, I don’t know ...

Alexander Sholokhov, Director of the Museum-Reserve M.A. Sholokhov: A question was asked about the 54th law. Any decision, resolution must somehow be consistent with the current legislation. For ideological, political, whatever reasons, we will now be forced to bypass the current legislation. How are we going to do it?

Irina Antonova: In the 54th law, we are talking about indivisibility, and not about unification. It's still different things. Second: I think that this law… Well, I cannot fully agree with it! Because transfers from museum to museum always exist.

Alexander Sholokhov: That is, it is more correct to say that the 54th law is imperfect?

Irina Antonova: I think so, of course.

Elizaveta Fokina, director of the Association of Cultural Managers: What team can implement this project, what are its stages and terms and, finally, financial resources?

Irina Antonova: When we considered this museum project, we had in mind that it was a joint project of the State Hermitage Museum and the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts. We had in mind the reconstruction of the museum, the rehabilitation of the museum - the museum of the repressed. It was a task. We were going to do it together, sort of. And the questions of who will be the director there or some other such matters - this is already later, it is not so important. The most important thing is the reconstruction of the museum itself. A joint.

Part two. Expert speeches

When reading this abstract, it is easy to notice that both in the questions asked by Irina Aleksandrovna and in the speeches of experts, there are leitmotifs and variable repetitions, which, nevertheless, we tried not to stop, so that the fact of the unanimity of the museum community on the issue of recreating the GMNZI in Moscow became more obvious.

Director of the State Historical Museum Alexei Levykin says that he is afraid of a precedent. Photo: Ekaterina Allenova/Artguide

Alexei Levykin, director of the State Historical Museum: The Museum of New Western Art was created at the level of repression, from confiscated collections. The people who created the Museum of New Western Art in the 1920s operated within a certain historical framework. And to return to these historical frameworks - it will not turn out to be a museum of new Western art, but something else. And how will this correlate with the creation of the State Museum of Modern Art, which is being created now and for which a place has even been determined? And yet I emphasize once again: I am afraid of a precedent. Because it could again bring up the topic that we fear the most, which is the topic of restitution. External, because Western museums can also demand "their own", and internal. And we will be forced to give things to those countries to which they used to belong, or to the heirs, or the church.

Yakov Gordin, editor-in-chief of the St. Petersburg magazine Zvezda, also speaks of the danger. Photo: Ekaterina Allenova / Artguide

Yakov Gordin, editor-in-chief of Zvezda magazine: If you can take an entire floor of a great museum and move it 800 kilometers, then why not? We are thus entering upon very dangerous ground. And regardless of what happens, the very active discussion of this problem can distort the consciousness of both those who are “for” and those who are “against”, because either there are certain rules and boundaries, or everything or almost everything is possible. Dangerous, in my opinion, dangerous. And we need to think about how this affects the state of public consciousness.

Ivan Tuchkov, Head of the Department of General History of Art at Moscow State University, on the right of precedent. Photo: Ekaterina Allenova / Artguide

Ivan Tuchkov, Head of the Department of General History of Art, Moscow State University: What is being discussed looks very attractive outwardly: we are recreating something and paying tribute to memory. But behind this superficial appeal lies a number of problems that raise serious and complex questions. Are we recreating things that people would never see otherwise? No, all these things are presented in excellent expositions, they can be viewed, they can participate in exhibitions, that is, they are available to viewers. Further, we cannot recreate the Museum of New Western Art in its entirety, since many items from it have been sold, and we cannot return what is sold. That is, again, the idea of ​​"recreation" is inadequate. And once again I will say about the right of precedent. Having begun to divide something, we will inevitably face the situation of continuing this division, and, for example, a new noble idea will arise: let's recreate the Rumyantsev Museum. Or the Tretyakov Gallery in its entirety, including Western things as well. And finally, the last thing: the museum is an integral organism. If we remove items from the Shchukin and Morozov collection from the Hermitage, no matter how blasphemous it may sound, the Hermitage will eventually survive. But if we remove the complete collection of Western art from the Pushkin Museum, it will lose its face and cease to be the wonderful museum it is today.

Yulia Kantor, adviser to the director of the State Hermitage Museum, cites a letter from the director of the Pushkin Museum im. A.S. Pushkin in 1944-1949 by Sergei Merkurov. Photo: Ekaterina Allenova / Artguide

Yulia Kantor, Advisor to the Director of the State Hermitage Museum: Some figures of silence seem strange to me, which have been constantly appearing for a month now since the "straight line" with the president. Meanwhile, history is an exact science. And when we say that in 1948 an artificially created museum was repressed, consisting of two artificially combined collections, we forget about what structure and who initiated the liquidation of this museum before 1948. I have in my hands a letter from the director of the Pushkin Museum Merkurov to the Secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, Comrade Malenkov, it was written on June 15, 1945 (the original is kept in the Russian Archive of the Socio-Political History of Russia, a copy is in the Hermitage). This letter gave an impetus, as was customary in Stalin's times, to raise the issue on a "direct line", to the top leadership of the country. It is proposed to transform the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts into the Museum of World Art of the USSR. And the first paragraph of this document: "In order to replenish the exposition of Western European art, we consider it absolutely necessary to transfer to our museum the collections of the Museum of New Western Art." Three years later, the famous decision was made. Therefore, it seems to me incorrect, when speaking about rehabilitation, to forget about the historical continuity of these two events. If the repressed museum, disbanded in 1948, was a monument, then it was a monument to the Bolshevik robbery or, if you like in civilized terms, nationalization. If we create a legal precedent, then where is the guarantee that Western countries will not turn to us, as it already happened in the case of Poland, and the heirs (and there have already been cases with the heirs)? We ourselves cut the branch on which we sit.

A wall with paintings by Vincent van Gogh at the State Museum of New Western Painting in the former mansion of Ivan Morozov on Prechistenka in Moscow. Bottom row, center, Van Gogh's Night Cafe, sold in 1933 to Stephen Clark (now the Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven)

Natalia Sipovskaya, director of the State Institute of Art Studies: For me, it is indisputable that the State Museum of New Western Art is the largest event in our artistic history, it needs to be talked about, and taken seriously. But I can only think of this in terms of a powerful intellectual project that should enrich our museum practice. The transfer of the conversation to an administrative channel immediately deprived this project of its intellectual component. We embarked on the path of mutual grievances and memories. I cannot but say: Merkurov's letter was caused by the fact that the museum was already planned to be repressed, and Merkurov thus tried to leave these works in the collections of the state museum fund. Therefore, there is no need to distort and declare the Pushkin Museum the initiator of the ruin of the Museum of New Western Art. Let's get back to professional positions. We haven't had serious convertible exhibition programs in our country for a long time. To show what our 1920-1930s were from the point of view of museum construction (and in the history of the creation of museums of modernism this is really the first and, perhaps, unique experience), to show the program that Ternovets and Efros carried out, to show the contribution of Moscow collectors, St. colleagues who restored and saved works, in general, the history of the formation and popularization of the modernist tradition in Russia - that should be the goal.

Gauguin Hall (Large Dining Room) in the house of Sergei Shchukin on Znamenka in Moscow. 1913. Photography

Vasily Tsereteli, director of the Moscow Museum of Modern Art: When a new museum is opened or created, a new architectural solution is created and a collection for this museum is purchased. Thus, state funds are replenished, and the country grows richer. We do not replenish the wealth of the Russian Federation in any way by moving valuables from one museum to another. Plus, now it is being built, which should develop. Therefore, my proposal is to replenish the collections by purchasing new works, and not to bring ruin.

Director of the Moscow Kremlin Museums Elena Gagarina about the fact that it is unfair to deprive museums of sources of income. Photo: Ekaterina Allenova / Artguide

Elena Gagarina: As a former employee of the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, I am very familiar with what the exposition of the Museum of New Western Art was like and what its concept was. It makes no sense to recreate the museum as it was, also because from the point of view of the modern viewer, the concept of the museum would now be simply quite amusing. But besides those aspects that have already been discussed today, there is another important aspect. The fact is that museums have parts of collections that are important to them from a material point of view. We know that organizing exhibitions is an extremely costly process. But there are such collections, the display of which brings serious income to the museum. And these are precisely the collections of the Pushkin Museum and the Hermitage that we are talking about. And it seems to me unfair to deprive both museums of such a significant commercial component, since our museums are not so well funded by the state. And combining these collections to create some kind of separate structure is absolutely inexpedient.

Aleksey Lebedev, head of the Museum Design Laboratory of the Russian Institute of Cultural Studies, again speaks about the danger. Photo: Ekaterina Allenova / Artguide

Alexey Lebedev: When we “restore historical justice”, we must understand for what year we are restoring it. It turns out, for 1937. The second thesis, in which I agree with my colleagues, is that the domino principle will work. Claims of various levels will be poured in from the former countries of the Soviet Union, from museums to each other, from individuals both in our country and abroad, and this is extremely dangerous.

General Director of Sotheby's Russia and CIS Mikhail Kamensky on the creation of an avant-garde museum. Photo: Ekaterina Allenova / Artguide

Mikhail Kamensky, General Director of Sotheby' Russia and CIS: I don't think it's right to recreate a museum, I think it's right to create a museum, a museum of the avant-garde. We need a museum that logically continues the fundamental exhibitions "Moscow - Paris", "Moscow - Berlin", dedicated to the avant-garde art of the twentieth century and fully reflects the artistic ties between Western and Russian culture. In domestic education and upbringing, a break in the spiritual connection with modern European culture is noticeable. Our society does not understand the visual codes of modernity, does not understand the language of modern culture and art. To close this gap, we need a museum dedicated to the contemporary culture of the 20th century. We need a museum in which Russian art of the 20th century will show itself as an integral part of the history of world art. We need a museum in which Chagall, Kandinsky, Yavlensky, Malevich, Rodchenko, Klyun, Popova, Shterenberg, Falk, Tyshler, Pirosmani, Goncharova, Larionov, Tatlin, Zdanevich, Grigoriev, Yakovlev, Shukhaev, Deineka, Samokhvalov, Pimenov, Williams, Labas will be on a par with the masterpieces of world art. Museums should and are obliged, from my point of view, to participate in the creation of this new direction on the principles of inter-museum partnership. This, from my point of view, should be a national project, a line in the budget, hardly inferior in importance to the Olympiad. Why is it possible to find hundreds of millions for the construction of stadiums and ski slopes, but not for the creation of such a collection? Why was almost 150 million dollars found for the acquisition of the Rostropovich and Vishnevskaya and Lobanov-Rostovsky collections, while no comparable funds were found to create a museum of the world avant-garde? In the era of the global economic crisis, the market has everything. You can buy almost any masterpieces. Today all over the world there is a process of creation of new important museum institutions. Of course, these are mainly the BRIC countries, primarily China, and the Middle East, like the Louvre in Abu Dhabi. That is, those countries in which the created museums will play the role of innovative public mechanisms. We need such a museum in the country, we need such a museum in Moscow. It will contribute to the public rethinking of the place and role of Russia in the world and will reshape the existing cultural and political map.

Epilogue

After all this, Irina Antonova looked, frankly, somewhat upset and even confused. Nevertheless, she tried to answer the above. The laconic Mikhail Piotrovsky also uttered his few words.

Irina Antonova: I was very surprised that you did not invite anyone who supports this project - for example, Professor Sarabyanov, or Our Heritage magazine, or other comrades - I could make you a whole list. This fear and horror of some kind of restitution, the emergence of all kinds of claims in this regard, seem to me absolutely unjustified and simply have no reason! Here they tried to call the attempt to rehabilitate this museum a political gesture. Well, what is this political gesture? We are talking about the reconstruction of the great museum of the twentieth century, by the way, the first museum of contemporary art in the world. It's ridiculous to talk about political gestures here. Any indication that this will cause confusion, that this is a “genie in a bottle”, is due to the wrong formulation of the question in the press, and even here: there is only one side here, there are no people who support this museum.

Alla Manilova: The Ministry and the Department of Cultural Heritage invited to today's meeting members of the expert council - once, members of the working group on museum activities of the Public Council under the President of the Russian Federation - two, and members of the Presidium of the Council of Museums of Russia. Information about today's meeting was posted in advance on all information resources, including ministerial ones. And there was not a single case when one of the cultural figures or representatives of the media who would like to take part in the meeting was refused. We didn't close the doors to anyone.

Director of the State Hermitage Mikhail Piotrovsky is ready to show super things all over Russia. Photo: Ekaterina Allenova / Artguide

Mikhail Piotrovsky, Director of the State Hermitage: There is still a provision on especially valuable state objects. The transfer of valuables between museums is subject to the consent of both museums. And there are many ways to share. We are ready to participate in the creation of a program of exhibitions of these super things throughout Russia. Of course, this requires super money, super transport, special planes, state guarantees of insurance - and then we will show exceptional things, super things, and this will be an explosion of cultural space. And I support the wonderful project of creating exhibitions about the artistic life of the 1920s and 1930s, about those initiatives that were born, about those museums that were born, disappeared, swam one into another, including the Museum of New Western Art.

Minister of Culture of the Russian Federation Vladimir Medinsky says that we underestimate the interest of the population in culture. Photo: Ekaterina Allenova / Artguide

Vladimir Medinsky, Minister of Culture of the Russian Federation: There is great benefit in all of this. You see how many cameras are here, how much they write about it. At the very least, the Russians will finally find out who Shchukin and Morozov were - these are people who felt the trend of contemporary art more than a hundred years ago and created the world's best collection of contemporary art. And we should honor it and be proud of it. Speaking frankly, I am convinced that then, in 1948, a big mistake was made, and this museum should not have been liquidated. But I'm not sure that fixing this bug can't be an even bigger bug. In general, correcting mistakes is a very painful thing, very difficult. The problem that Irina Alexandrovna raised highlights an important aspect: public discussion, tens of thousands of signatures that are collected “for” and “against”, publicity, which quite unexpectedly began to surround this seemingly intra-museum issue - this suggests that people have a huge interest in culture. We underestimate this interest. The preservation of cultural heritage is only one of the functions of the museum. Another function is promotional and educational. And we will evaluate the effectiveness of museums not only from the point of view of heritage preservation, but also from the point of view of interaction with society - with universities, schools, kindergartens. Because people have to go to the museum. I don’t want to anticipate the ministry’s position on this issue now, but it seems to me that the biggest result of our social activities should be that tens, hundreds of thousands of people will want to go to the Hermitage, the Pushkin Museum, and our other museums.

In conclusion, Alla Manilova, Deputy Minister of Culture, read out an excerpt from a document entitled “Minutes of the discussion by the Presidium of the Union of Museums of Russia and the Council of Representatives of the Union of Museums of Russia of the question of the advisability of recreating the Museum of New Western (Contemporary) Art in Moscow.” Here is a quote from it: “The proposal to recreate the Museum of New Western Art in Moscow is devoid of any historical, cultural and legal grounds, its implementation is capable of provoking a massive redistribution of museum collections, which will lead to a sharp decrease in the effectiveness of museum activities in the country, and will create a threat to the safety and integrity Museum Fund of the Russian Federation.

Ivan Morozov's mansion in Moscow. Room with panels by Maurice Denis and statues by Aristide Maillol. Photo

Alla Manilova also reported on an expert legal opinion, according to which "there are no norms in the current legislation that allow the removal and redistribution of museum objects from indivisible museum collections that are in the operational management of state museums." The executive secretary of the Patriarchal Council for Culture, a member of the Public Council under the Ministry of Culture, Archimandrite Tikhon, also sent his conclusion: “In our opinion, the creation of a new museum on a restitution basis is devoid of any sense, since this path is fraught with museum chaos,” the letter says. – In addition, we must not forget that the State Museum of New Western Art was created in 1923 when the 1st and 2nd Museums of New Western Painting were merged. Each of them was in its own building and maintained the integrity of the collections - S.I. Schukin and I.A. Morozov. So, perhaps, it is necessary to restore historical justice in relation to the collectors who made up two remarkable collections? We think it's a dead end."

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(program for young artists)

The MODERN ART course is a one-year program designed for young artists who want to develop in the field of contemporary art. The school provides an opportunity for artists who already have a certain technical background not only to develop intellectually in the context of contemporary art, but also to join the professional community.

There are no applied classes in painting, sculpture and other media at the School. Students of the course perform practical tasks during extracurricular time. However, in the classroom there is a discussion and analysis of the work done. The mandatory program includes courses on the history and theory of art, various media, lectures and seminars on the philosophy of art, workshops on portfolio design and self-promotion, interaction with institutions. Be sure to attend master classes with famous artists, curators, cultural figures who share their experiences and answer questions from course participants.

The main objective of the course is to show the ways of development and demonstrate to the author the possibilities of artistic language, immerse them in the theory and philosophy of culture, and let them into the community.

Lecturers from the leading liberal arts universities in Moscow (Moscow State University named after M.V. Lomonosov, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Russian State University for the Humanities, Moscow State Academy of Art and Industry named after S.G. Stroganov) are invited as lecturers. also practicing specialists - researchers of the Moscow Museum of Modern Art from various departments (scientific, exhibition, funds department), artists, institutional and independent curators, media editors.

During the academic year, personal consultations are held with the teachers of the School on the creation and implementation of personal and group projects.

THEORETICAL COURSES:

PRACTICES:

After the October Revolution, at the end of the collection, they were nationalized by decrees of the Soviet government and turned into state museums, which were merged into one. Thus, the GMNZI also became the world's first museum of contemporary art, overtaking the famous New York Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) by five years. The uniqueness of the situation was that both Shchukin and Morozov became interested in the works of the Impressionists, Cezanne, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Matisse and early Picasso before French museums and museums in other countries appreciated this art and began to acquire it - collectors often go ahead of museums. Russian collectors were thus able to bring to Russia the most characteristic works of the most famous masters. “(...) None of the museums, none of the private galleries, except perhaps the Barnes Museum-Institute in Philadelphia, gives such a diverse and rich picture of the development of French painting over the past 50 years,” the director wrote in 1933 Museum Boris Nikolaevich Ternovets, - The significance of the museum is not only in the completeness of its collections, but also in their unusually high level; most of the leading masters of the 19th and 20th centuries, such as Monet, Renoir, Gauguin, Cezanne, Van Gogh, Matisse, Picasso, Derain and others, are represented in the museum by first-class, sometimes even central works in their work; hence that brightness, that concentration of impressions that embraces the visitor and keeps him in unrelenting artistic and aesthetic tension. The influence of works from the GMNZI on the creative development of Soviet artists was great, many considered the museum to be their professional school. Those who were older saw many paintings even before the revolution in the house of S.I. Shchukin, who opened his collection to the public. The museum was also widely known abroad, as were the collections of Shchukin and Morozov before the First World War, and therefore was visited by foreigners who came to the USSR.

Decoration of the museum building for the 19th anniversary of the October Revolution
1936

To justify its name, the Museum of Contemporary Western Art had to develop and replenish its collections, keep abreast of new phenomena in the art of Europe and America, however, the state museum could not dream of those annual large-scale acquisitions that Shchukin and Morozov could afford: in the country there was a physical famine and a monetary famine. From museums and libraries, the authorities selected for export the best works of art, ancient manuscripts, unique books, crown jewels of the Russian royal dynasty to finance the construction of socialism. And the GMNZI suffered in this campaign, losing some of its masterpieces. All that was left for the museum was to replenish its collections with paintings and sculptures from private collections nationalized during the revolution, in which, however, there were also very significant works, through purchases from exhibitions, through gifts, as well as by receiving paintings and drawings by contemporary European artists. in exchange for works by Soviet artists. At the same time, the reverse process was going on - by order of the People's Commissariat of Education, some of the paintings, including the best examples, were transferred from the GMNZI to the Hermitage, which did not have art of the corresponding period in its collections.

The museum popularized its collection by trying, with the help of explanations placed under the paintings, in conversations with visitors and in brochures dedicated to individual artists, in an accessible form to explain to the aesthetically unprepared viewer the meaning and artistic value of the exhibited works. However, in accordance with the requirements of the Soviet ideology and the international political situation, the museum had to turn from a purely artistic museum into a museum of the revolutionary art of the West, serve election campaigns and political holidays and dates, and at the same time the GMNZI had to constantly defend its right to exist. Until the end of 1928, the museum's collections retained their original mansions, adapted by their owners for the convenience of exhibiting (there was no talk of building new buildings for museums in those years). In 1928, one of the buildings was selected, and the collections were concentrated in the premises of the former Morozov mansion on Kropotkinskaya Street, which was cramped for the museum. (now Prechistenka), 21.

During the Great Patriotic War collections. After returning to Moscow in 1944, the exposition was not restored. In 1946, the era of the "Iron Curtain" began in international politics, and soon a struggle against cosmopolitanism began in the USSR. The issue with the GMNZI was resolved at the very top - it was liquidated by the decision of the Council of Ministers of the USSR dated March 6, 1948, No. 672. In this decree, the collections of the museum, but the most valuable and brightest part of them, mainly what Shchukin and Morozov had once acquired, were called "a hotbed of formalist views and cringing before the decadent bourgeois culture of the era of imperialism" and it was argued that they "caused a great harm to the development of Russian and Soviet art. The collection, which was characterized as "an exceptional collection of great European masters", which "by its high artistic value is of national importance in the matter of public education" was now declared socially harmful and socially dangerous.

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Sheet one

Text of the "Resolution of the Council of Ministers of the USSR on the liquidation of the State Museum of New Western Art" dated March 6, 1948
Sheet two

The repressions that have been going on in the country, either growing or weakening since the 1920s, claiming many hundreds of human lives and deleting Yesenin, Shostakovich, Akhmatova and Zoshchenko from the national culture for ideological reasons, have now touched this art museum. Painting, sculptural collections and objects of applied art of the GMNZI were divided between and and went to the storerooms; The building of the GMNZI on Prechistenka went to the newly created Academy of Arts of the USSR - the main ideologist and conductor of the method of socialist realism in the visual arts. Works that would have done honor to any museum were sent under a bushel because of ideological prejudices and, perhaps, not without the help of some influential Soviet artists, who hated any manifestation of free creativity out of fear and envy. A comparison with the fate of the works of the Russian avant-garde, back in 1936 and for many decades seized from the expositions of the Tretyakov Gallery and the Russian Museum, suggests itself.

So Moscow has lost a museum whose famous collections were once born in its cultural environment, a museum that is unique not only on the scale of one country. This fact remains, fortunately, the only one in the history of Soviet art museums. Today, Yesenin, and Shostakovich, and Akhmatova and many others from the "black list", including the art of the Russian avant-garde, have long been restored in their rights. It's time to remember the Museum of New Western Art and its dramatic fate and try to understand how and for what it was destroyed during the period of domination of the totalitarian regime in the USSR, to think about the future fate of the divided and ideologically "stigmatized" works of art and that nothing this could not be repeated in the future. The State Museum of New Western Art in Moscow must be brought out of oblivion and finally rehabilitated.

Documentary about history
State Museum of New Western Art (1918 - 1948)

Interview with I.A. Antonova, President of the State Museum of Fine Arts named after A.S. Pushkin:

Interview with M.B. Piotrovsky, Director of the State Hermitage: