Reshaping old museums for the new Russia

Art in America, Feb, 1998 by Lee Rosenbaum

American and Dutch "friends" groups have become important conduits for foreign support to the Hermitage. The Netherlands Foundation of the Friends of the State Hermitage last fall donated $1 million for repair of the roof over the museum's renowned collection of Dutch old masters, and the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam is restoring more than 650 of the Hermitage's Rembrandt engravings, with funds from the government in The Hague. The New York-based American Friends of the State Hermitage, which hosted a gala dinner, replete with vodka and caviar, last November at the Russian consulate in New York, has donated about $190,000.

Both the Hermitage and Russian Museum stand to benefit from the World Barks new cultural fund for St. Petersburg, which will divide $1 million in bank loans among 11 major federally supported institutions. To be repaid by the Russian government, the loans will support specific projects (not yet selected at this writing) that are designed to improve the institutions' revenue-generating ability.

Cultural Diplomacy and Strange Alliances

St. Petersburg's museums are increasingly looking to the West not only for money but also for expertise and partnerships. These contacts have ranged from the distinguished to the dubious. The Hermitage regularly seeks the counsel of its international advisory board of highly respected foreign museum professionals, chaired by Edmund Pillsbury, director of the Kimbell Museum, Fort Worth. St. Petersburg's efforts to forge ties with the international cultural" community are being aided by the St. Petersburg 2003 project of the New York-based CEC (formerly Citizen Exchange Council) International Partners, which promotes "Russian-American efforts ... to build an arts and tourism infrastructure" in anticipation of the city's 300th anniversary celebration. Among CEC-assisted projects is the creation of a National Center for Contemporary Art, which win focus on foreign, rather than Russian artists. Zakhar Kolovsky, director of the planned center, met last September with officials from cultural institutions in New York, Chicago, Pittsburgh and Washington, D.C., to discuss possible partnerships and programs. The center is slated to open in 1999 in a renovated commercial space not far from the Russian Museum.

CEC also sponsored a recent three-year professional exchange program between the Metropolitan Museum and the Hermitage. With funds from the New York-based Trust for Mutual Understanding, representatives from the Met's security, budget, development and press offices have advised their Russian counterparts on bringing the Hermitage's operations up to international standards. "When the country was a police state, there wasn't much crime," observed Luers of the Met. "But now they have to think about having guards and doing things to secure the building that are much more costly technologically."

The most conspicuous contacts with the West are international loan shows that serve not only as vehicles for cultural exchange but, increasingly, as magnets for hard cash. "Russian museums are at a point where one of their greatest assets is a lot of great art," Luers commented. "They are trying to determine how to get their collections out and how to get some money out of them." He observed, however, that the Met and most other traditional museums won't participate in art-for-money deals. There is a quid pro quo in their relations with sister institutions, governed by collegial courtesy: Lenders can get reciprocal loans but little financial compensation beyond actual costs in preparing a show. But even traditionally structured shows can help to augment the Russian museums' income or enhance their own exhibition programs. In connection with last year's "British Art Treasures from Russian Imperial Collections in the Hermitage" (which opened at the Yale Center for British Art and traveled to the Toledo Museum and the St. Louis Art Museum), the Hermitage received $100,000 from the Paul Mellon Foundation for refurbishing its entrance. In exchange for its "Italian Baroque Terracottas from the Hermitage" [Art Institute of Chicago, Feb. 28-May 3, 1998; Philadelphia Museum of Art, May 16-Aug. 2], the Hermitage will receive an Irving Penn show. For these two shows, the Hermitage's fees covered the cost of researching, preparing and displaying the exhibition itself. Restoration costs are sometimes also covered by institutions receiving loans from the Hermitage, The Russian Museum is now trying to set up an American tour of its major 1997 exhibition, "The Color Red in Russian Art," consisting of over 400 objects from six centuries -- everything from icons to Suprematist works and examples of Stalin-happy Social Realism.