Russian Museums to Open Diplomatic Offensive in UK

The relations between the UK and the Russian Federation have been better. The murder of former KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko in London a few months ago started a rapid decline in the diplomatic temperature between the two. However, there is always an avenue for improvement if one is willing to look for it. On Monday, the art world learned that a major loan to the Royal Academy from Russian Museums will open at the end of January. It is a place to start, along with a real trial for Mr. Litvinenko’s killers.

Arifa Akbar, arts reporter for The Independent wrote, “More than a hundred masterpieces by artists such as Gauguin, Cezanne and Chagall, many which have never before been seen in Britain, are to be lent to the Royal Academy by Russia’s most prominent museums,” including the state Hermitage, the state Russian Museum in St Petersburg, the State Tretyakov in Moscow and the State Pushkin Museum.

Since some of the pieces were confiscated during the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, and since Britain has no law on the books granting immunity from seizure, the loan represents something of a risk for the Russian arts crowd. Descendants could apply to the British courts to have “their” property returned. The British government has written what is known as a “letter of comfort” to the Russians addressing this point. While it has no real legal standing, the general non-cooperation of the British government with any attempt to reclaim any painting would be enough to ensure the work would go back to Russia after the exhibition.

Henri Matisse’s wall-sized “The Dance,” is the show's centerpiece. Exhibition co-curator Ann Dumas told reporters that was painted textile merchant Sergei Shchukin, who commissioned it for the staircase of his Moscow mansion. Mr. Shchukin is often credited with getting Mr. Matisse’s career off the ground. The piece itself, as best on can judge, is on its first journey outside Russia.

During the latter half of the 19th Century and into the First World War, the ties between French artists and their Russian counterparts were deep and powerful. Chagall, Kandinsky, Natalia Goncharova, Tatlin and Malevich all took from Renoir, Cézanne, Van Gogh and Gauguin and gave back something astonishing in return. And if that isn’t enough to make the British and Russian governments start behaving nicely toward one another, there are worse ways to spend a February afternoon in London.

“From Russia: French and Russian Master Paintings 1870 – 1925 From Moscow and St Petersburg,” opens on 26 January until 18 April 2008 will be at Burlington House from January 26 until April 18. To book tickets in advance, visit royalacademy.org.uk or call 0870 8488484.

© Copyright 2007 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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