IZO

Nikolai Ge's painting The Synhedrion Court, removed from exhibition in the C19 on the grounds that it insulted the Church, has been restored and is on display at the Tretyakov Gallery until 18 January (Grigori Revzin/Kommersant, in Russian).

The collection of Japanese art dealer Tadamasa Hayashi, who inspired the Impressionists by introducing Japanese wood-block prints to Europe, has been kept in the Hermitage since World War II, when it was taken from Berlin; some of it will be shown to the public next year (Mainichi Daily News).

Boris Grebenshchikov has cancelled all concerts for unspecified medical reasons (NEWSmusic, in Russian).

One of the striking effects of the Crisis is the virtual closure of Igor Markin's museum. He has given an interview to Bolshoi Gorod on the near future (BG, in Russian):

We're going to drink cheap wine again, the sort of stuff a sane person is afraid to put in his mouth. We're going to visit basement spaces and drink all sorts of crap. That's what's going to happen. But that situation will pass, any crisis is temporary. ... I've suffered from the crisis. I'm not going to buy anything for at least a year. I'm already not buying, I'm paying my debts from the summer sales. ... my basic business, plastic windows, no longer pays me dividends, I'm having to sack people, cut production.

The Russian Museum will cut exhibitions because of a decrease in income from the city and private sources (Lenta.ru, in Russian).

In the Kyrgyz national art gallery valuable works of art are falling into decay: the equipment controlling the micro-climate and temperature in the stores is broken, and no paintings have been restored for the last 13 years - because there are no restorers (centrasia.ru, in Russian).

Neither the Tretyakov Gallery nor the artists' union which jointly occupy the Central House of the Artist are happy with the proposed reconstruction plans (Fellton, in Russan).

Mayor Yuri Luzhkov's plans for the Proviant Stores (IZO, earlier) now include an extra building, a glass dome over the courtyard and multi-storey car-parking, all of which is causing widespread consternation; architect Evgeni Ass, for example, calls Luzhkov's plan of putting a museum of Moscow's history in the Stores "nonsense" (Kommersant, in Russian).

Minister of Culture Alexander Avdeev has declared that Andrei Rublev's Trinity icon will travel to the monastery in Sergiev Posad (IZO, earlier) only if the Tretyakov Gallery gives its written permission (Open Space, in Russian).

The Russian government is to review the "legality" of sales by the Soviet state of works from Soviet museums in the 1920s (John Varoli/Bloomberg). It seems like the review could be used as a bargaining chip:

“The Hermitage has no plans to demand the return of artworks from anyone,” said [Mikhail] Piotrovsky [director of the Hermitage Museum]. “This is not possible today. However, we plan to resist attempts to make us return items, whether it is Germany or the Russian Orthodox Church, which have claims against Russian museums. Museum items, wherever they are, should remain in their museum collections.”

Stolen Caravaggio (IZO, earlier): painting found and organiser of theft found dead (Rosbalt, in Russian)?

To protect the investigation, where and how the picture was found is not being revealed. There is no information on the condition of the canvas. According to some reports, the organiser of the theft, on whose trail the detectives have been for several months, has been found dead.

But the museum to which the painting belongs cannot confirm that it has been found (Vesti, in Russian).

MOCA Los Angeles may have to close because of its budget deficit; its endowment has shrunk from $50 million in 1999 to $6 million (NY Times).

Cool! Andy Freeberg's Guardians: Russian Art Museum Guards (Andy Freeberg).

The Russian word on the streets of London is that Igor Markin's window-frame business has suffered in a big way from the economic downturn in Russia and this explains the virtual closure of his museum (IZO, earlier).

From the new year, Igor Markin's museum will be open only on Fridays 11.00-20.00 (art4-ru, in Russian):

More importantly, we won't have any exhibitions
it's not only a matter of money
mass-cultural events are not worth it at the moment

Why the about-face? Maybe he's upset by the collapse of the contemporary maket in London this week, with a corresponding fall, of course, in the market-value of his collection. It's his own money he's spending here: unless the expenses are underpinned by a perceived growth in the value of the collection, caution and retrenchment is understandable.

Marat Guelman writes (galerist, in Russian):

The foundation which promised to pay for the exhibition Russian Povera in the Russian Museum says, "You'll have to wait a little." The foundation's connected to Gazprom. So basically, Kiev, pay for your gas, it's very important.

Every cloud has a silver lining: moving Rublev's Trinity icon (IZO, earlier) safely requires a special soft-ride vehicle, cost $200,000. Tretyakov Gallery director Valentin Rodionov hopes that a sponsor will provide one (ANN, in Russian).

Early C20 art from the Russian Museum is on view now and through January 18 at Caixa Girona Fontana d'Or Cultural Center (Artdaily).

Email received:

Dear Friends and Colleagues, if you are traveling to NY… You are cordially invited to From Non-Conformism to Feminisms: Russian Women Artists from the Kolodzei Art Foundation. Curated by Natalia Kolodzei. Opening Reception Tuesday, December 9, 2008, from 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm.
The exhibition is from November 13, 2008 to February 7, 2009 at Chelsea Art Museum, Home of The Miotte Foundation, 556 West 22nd Street (@ 11th Ave), New York, New York 10011. Tuesday through Saturday 11 to 6, Thursday 11 to 8. + 1.212.255.0719, www.chelseaartmuseum.org

Levon Nersesyan, the chief scholar in the Tretyakov Gallery's department of ancient Russian art is profoundly opposed to the planned removal from the gallery's safe environment of Andrei Rublev's fragile Trinity icon. The plan is to display it temporarily at its original site, the Trinity Sergius Monastery in Sergiev Posad, near Moscow. Nersesyan has published an open letter explaining the fragile state of the icon and the risks it would face. In his description of the situation, the Tretyakov Gallery has caved in to pressure from the Orthodox Church and agreed to lend the icon despite widespread misgivings (_corso_, in Russian). Now rumours are flying that Nersesyan has been sacked.

The Hermitage may be repainted in the colour "pearl", according to its director; apparently this would be its historic colour (MIGnews, in Russian).

Nikolai Voronov, Moment (Мгновение) and Lady (Госпожа).

The Hermitage is expanding into the east wing of the Empire-style General Staff building on Palace Square. Phase one of the restoration will be completed in 2009, and all the works in 2014. Part of the accommodation will be given over to contemporary art (mk.ru, in Russian).

More from John Varoli:

I had hoped that today this story would go on The Art Newspaper's web site. Unfortunately, it hasn't. However, it is on the front page of the November issue.
Stella Art Foundation Plans to Open Art Museum in Other Melnikov Garage
The 11,000 square metre garage, located close to the Kazan Train Station in the city centre, is currently used by a city-run bus company, which must be relocated before renovations begin. The museum is tentatively set to open in 2014, and will initially display art from Kesaeva's collection, which has about 600 works, most of which are Russian postwar art. The museum will be a joint publc-private venture, and it's hoped  the state will provide money for new acquisitions, said Kesaeva. The museum will also have Russia's first contemporary art academy, and a concert hall for contemporary music.
Kesaeva is head of the Moscow-based Stella Art Foundation, founded in 2004. She previously went by the name, Stella Kay, which she used to maintain her family's privacy, especially her husband who heads, Mercury Group, which has interests in retail trade, mining, oil, and real estate. Mercury Group is the main supporter of Stella's foundation, and will support the Garage project. It has no relation to Mercury, the Moscow luxury goods company that bought a stake in Phillips de Pury in early October.

UPDATE: now online (Art Newspaper).

Igor Markin writes that despite 24 screws in her spine viketz (IZO, earlier) is in good spirits (art4-ru, in Russian). He also relates his crisis experiences: sacking staff from his museum (art4-ru, in Russian) (leaving, according to the comments, only two???) and this cautionary tale (art4-ru, in Russian):

my friends and I built a factory
a fine advanced factory
for the production of aluminium profiles
we worked at it for two years
invested money, fussed over it
we joined the market leaders
then I sold my share in the boom
for a pretty good price
and gave all the money to my wife a year ago
when we got divorced

she put it into shares
and lost nearly all of it

John Varoli has sent a precis of his Russian-related articles in the November Art Newspaper; not all available online; see below the cut. I was interested in this about the Melnikov Garage:

"The relationship is very straightforward,'' said Erica Bolton, GCCC spokesperson. "The Museum of Tolerance will be housed on the 1st floor and GCCC will be on the ground floor. So they will not interfere with each other.''

A further look at the background to the Bakhmetevsky Garage (Jessica Bachmann/Moscow Times) (and see IZO, earlier). It's unclear to me if the Garage is intended to become a Russian Jewish Museum or, as sometimes suggested, a Museum of Tolerance and, if the latter, what it might mean.

An exhibition of damaged paintings from the National Art Gallery of South Ossetia is taking place in St Petersburg (NTV, with video; in Russian).

Interview with Sir Norman Rosenthal, ex-head of the Royal Academy, in Moscow (Kommersant, in Russian). Apparently he flew in for the Kabakov show, found he didn't have a proper visa, and ended up stuck in the VIP transit room.

Who should decide [questions of censorship]? The police, puritans, critics?

The artist. He should decide whether whst he has created is intelligent and constructive or non-constructive and vulgar. I am for beauty, not vulgarity. You know, Beuys said, "Truth is beauty." Before him I think Lenin said it, and still earlier, Dostoevsky?

Well, I don't know who said it, any more than Sir Norman does. But I do think all the best art is at least a teeny bit vulgar.

The Springville Museum of Art has an extensive collection of Soviet realism and impressionism; there are a few masterpieces of their kind, such as the 1952 Kitaev (Springville Museum of Art). Unfortunately many paintings aren't illustrated. I counted a few I sold in the nineties.

Russians thinking about Sarah Palin (newsweek.washingtonpost.com) (thanks, MK).

The article further discussed Palin's publicity stunt of visiting the Minneapolis Museum of Russian Art in early September and noted that journalists present at the scene somehow failed to probe her familiarity with Russian artwork.

Well, it was quite possibly a facility-rental kind of thing: I blogged that moment (IZO, earlier) and I'm not even sure there was a Russian show on at the time.

A new Zurab Tsereteli-run space, the Russian Museum of Contemporary Art, will open in a house on Gogol Boulevard in early 2009; prior to the opening, 16-19 October, Sotheby's will mount a show of top-lots there (gazeta.ru, in Russian).

I'm told that Russian-Ukrainian oligarch Konstantin Grigorishin, who has been collecting since the early 90s and is a particular fan of Alexander Bogomazov (by whom he owns about twenty paintings), plans to open a private museum of some kind in the Moscow region. Grigorishin is reckoned to have a major collection.

Viktor Pinchuk bought work by Damien Hirst at the recent auction (IZO, earlier), appoints new director of his art centre (John Varoli/Bloomberg).

The Stalin Museum in Gori, Georgia, will be converted into a Museum of Russian Aggression (Georgian Times) (thanks, MK).

Prime Minister Putin has visited the Shilov art gallery in Moscow (Rossiiskaya Gazeta, in Russian).

Dairy-products magnate David Yakobashvili (he co-owns Wimm-Bill-Dann) is preparing a museum of mechanical toys and self-playing musical instruments; looks impressive (RIA Novosti, video; in Russian).

The Santori Temposan museum in Japan has cancelled at the last moment a show of Russian avant-garde art from the Moscow Museum of Contemporary Art because, in the opinion of experts, the exhibition contains seven fakes (gazeta.ru, in Russian). This scandal has been brewing for a little while, and it appears that more than one Japanese museum is unhappy (IZO, earlier). There is in fact, considerable scepticism in the Moscow art world about the authenticity of avant-garde works bought - all comparatively recently - for the Moscow Museum of Contemporary Art.

On Igor Markin's blog today (art4-ru, in Russian):

yesterday I met an extremely serious man
who is also into contemporary art up to his ears
to such an extent that he's already buying a huge space in the centre of Moscow
30,000 m2
as a museum and exhibition space
in comparison with which the Garage seems like the childish amusement of a bored nymphette.
I'm not naming names yet
but it's turning into an epidemic.

A Carl Faberge museum will open in Moscow in 2012, created by the Link of Time foundation (Pravda, in Russian). That would be Viktor Vekselberg's money.

It seems that the next thing Sarah Palin did after her speech at the Republican convention in St Paul last week was to attend a (non-art-related) lunch at the Museum of Russian Art, Minneapolis (LA Times).

Businessman Aslan Chekhoev plans to open a private museum of contemporary art in St Petersburg (Delovoi Peterburg, in Russian).

A Japanese museum has removed three paintings claimed to be by Mark Chagall from display (ABC News):

The Bunkamura Museum of Art in Tokyo was informed by the Paris-based Marc Chagall Committee that the three works were not genuine because the painting techniques were dubious, museum spokesman Masao Kotani said.

Mr Kotani said the paintings - Portrait Of A Woman (1908), Family (1911-1912) and Fiddler (1917) - were lent by the Moscow Museum of Modern Art, which insisted the paintings were real.

"We are going to leave it to the two of them to discuss the paintings' authenticity," Mr Kotani said.

Construction of the world's biggest Jewish museum to begin at the Melnikov garage early next year (Haaretz). It's not clear whether the Jewish museum will replace the contemporary art space or exist alongside it. I guess the latter.

Ilya and Emilia Kabakov are planning to open a Kabakov museum on Long Island. Apparently, until prices rose dramatically last year, they were buying works back (Open Space, in Russian). The Kabakovs are not unique in this: I recently got an email from someone representing Julian Schnabel, who wanted to buy back a painting I have.

Full details of the extensive Ilya and Emilia Kabakov show which opens in Moscow on 16 September (Lenta.ru, in Russian).

Yuri Samodurov, director of the Sakharov Centre, has resigned (gazeta.ru, in Russian); a further hearing in the Forbidden Art case, in which Samodurov is accused of stirring up racial hatred, is due on 29 August, I read somewhere.

Pocket-size DJ "scratch-pad" by Russian designer Art Lebedev: impress the girls or what?

In Kiev, the National Art Museum and a commercial organisation that wants to build a business centre are fighting for possession of a prime spot on Insititutskaya Street (Kiyani Oboz, in Russian).

The situation in Tskhinvali vis-a-vis art-work is reminiscent, I guess, of that in Grozny ten or fifteen years ago, or Baghdad more recently.  The likelihood is that the art museums have been damaged or destroyed and are being, or shortly will be, ransacked. Apparently out of 340,000 items in the Chechen National Museum in 1991 only 20,000 remain today (regnum.ru, in Russian).