Подмосковные вечера

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8LjuCMETO8&feature=related

Hmmmm....what to do on a cloudy, crisp late summer evening?  A trip to the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts is in order, I do believe.  Which building shall we visit, I wonder?  Well, let’s try this one as I know that Mr. Unmentionable prefers the works of the XVIII and XIX centuries.

For the modest fee of 300 руб (60 руб if you are a resident of Moscow or free if you are an orphan) you can visit these hallowed halls Tuesday through Sunday.  Sadly, there were no photos allowed so you’ll have to make do with my description of the visit.

Here is the official website’s version of the collections housed here:

European Painting of the Early and Mid — XIX Century

The first half of the XIX century was marked in Europe by a great variety of artistic trends. While classicism still held its ground, romanticism and realism were shaping up. The great French romantic masters — Gericault and Delacroix — are represented here by small yet characteristic works. The Museum also has excellent works by the reformers of the European landscape painting — Constable, Corot, and the Barbizon school, as well as some works by Courbet, Millet, and Friedrich, many of them from the collection of S.M.Tretyakov.

Painting of the Late XIX — Early XX Centuries.

The unique collection of French painting of the late XIX — early XX centuries possessed by the Museum is world-renowned. After Moscow's former Museum of the New Western Art was closed down in 1948 its collection was divided between the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts (Moscow) and the Hermitage (St.Petersburg, then Leningrad). Originally it had been made up of two excellent private collections assembled about the turn of the century by S.I.Shchukin and I.A.Morozov. Thus the Pushkin Museum was enriched with paintings of rare artistic value including masterpieces by Monet, Renoir, Degas, Pissarro, Sisley, Cezanne, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Bonnard, Vuillard, Denis, Matisse, and Picasso.
http://www.museum.ru/gmii/defengl.htm


Here is my version of the collections housed here:

*ahem*
When they casually say they have “works by...”, I think that qualifies as the understatement of the century.  I have to admit I was literally moved to tears while walking through room after room of absolutely exquisite masterworks.  The paintings in the collection (remember I can only speak about those that were on view - I can’t imagine what is in storage or on loan) are not insignificant works, either.  Often in museum collections you will find one or two large canvases or significant works by an artist and a series of prints, drawings or even studies but that is not the case here.  At the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, the visitor is presented with a feast for the eyes with canvas after canvas after canvas of works by each artist serving nothing less than ambrosia for the senses.

This collection of what can only be described as jewels of the XIX and XX centuries is modestly displayed in a beautiful, yet unassuming, building facing Christ The Redeemer Cathedral in central Moscow.  The simple flow of one intimate gallery space into another allows the viewer to concentrate on the plethora of stunning artworks that adorn simple, white walls.  The quiet volunteers sit patiently in their chairs, observing passersby and sharing intimate conversations in hushed tones lest they disturb the tranquil and reverent atmosphere evoked by the canvases.  Each artwork possesses a power and energy all to itself and at the same time each salon resonates with such a force as to engulf the viewer in the collective power of each of the vignettes that line the walls. 

Sculptures by Rodin punctuate the galleries and afford you the rare opportunity to see, close up, this Master’s art.  The play of light and shadow on marble surfaces lovingly polished to a glow or roughed up just enough to appear as delicate as silk remind you (once you realize that what you are looking at is a sculpture teased from a single block of stone) of how exquisite the human form can be.  Rarely do we have the chance to observe a body at rest, immobile.  Rodin has given us this ability through the work of his gifted hands and exceptional vision.

The experience is intoxicating.

The Exercise Yard or The Convict Prison
Vincent Van Gogh, 1890