Zelfira Tregulova

CHINA - RUSSIA: ON THE CROSSROADS OF CULTURES

Zelfira Tregulova, Tatyana Yudenkova
The Tretyakov Gallery. YESTERDAY, TODAY, TOMORROW

#3 2017 (56)

Founded at the end of the 19 th century by the Moscow merchants and art- collectors Pavel and Sergei Tretyakov, Russia’s largest museum of national art has became a symbol of the country’s consciousness and culture. Pavel Mikhailovich (1832-1898), the elder brother, remains much better-known than his younger sibling, and the Tretyakov Gallery directly owes its existence to him. Pavel Tretyakov made a promise to himself to establish in his native city “a National Gallery, in other words a gallery containing the works of Russian artists”[1] and worked relentlessly toward that goal all his life. He passed on his enthusiasm to his younger brother, Sergei Mikhailovich (1834-1892), who became one of the outstanding collectors of his era, assembling an unique collection of 19th century European paintings. In 1892, Pavel bequeathed to the city of Moscow both his own and his brother’s collections. It was an extraordinary precedent in the history of Russian philanthropy, and the united collection was officially named the “Pavel and Sergei Tretyakov City Gallery of Art”, becoming the nation’s major museum of the era.