Shchukin Sergey Ivanovich. The Shukin dynasty - abstract The further fate of S.I.

Mokhovaya, 20 - a beautiful four-story house, decorated with a portico with two Corinthian half-columns, a high porch, and huge windows with frequent sashes. The Psychological Institute lives in this building for a little while. less than a century. One of the most beautiful Moscow legends is associated with the one whose name he once bore.

Source of information: magazine "CARAVAN OF STORIES", December 1999.

Now they don’t build like that anymore: thick walls, high ceilings, wide flights of stairs, a labyrinth of corridors in which it’s easy for an outsider to get lost... The legend of the “lady in white” - a ghostly figure melting in the air, appearing in the evenings in one place , then at the other end of the building, passes from generation to generation of people working here. Those who know the history of the institute talk about Lydia Shchukina: her husband, major industrialist and the famous philanthropist Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin, built this building at the beginning of the century so that scientists, many of whom were then keen on spiritualism and other occult sciences, would help him see at least a shadow, at least the ghost of his beloved wife.

They say: her spirit cannot calm down, because the conditions under which Shchukin donated this building to Moscow University (he donated about 200 thousand rubles for its construction) were not fulfilled. The institute was to bear her name, the widower wanted to see her portrait in the foyer, Lydia Grigorievna’s birthday was to be considered an official holiday of the institute, the name of the deceased was to be embossed on the facade of the building.

With coming Soviet power I had to forget about it. The name of Shchukin, who lived out his life in exile, was never mentioned within the walls of the institute. His wife, whose memory he so wanted to perpetuate, would have been completely forgotten if those who worked at the Psychological Institute were not disturbed by a strange shadow - in the thirties, for the mere mention of the name of the one who once built this house, an employee of the institute They could very well have been imprisoned. And Shchukin lived out his life hoping that both he and his wife would be remembered in Russia: the eighty-year-old emigrant was very lonely in France.

It is not becoming for a very old man to be afraid of death, and Sergei Ivanovich waited for the end with the calm dignity of a deeply religious man. He died in his bed, in a warm, well-equipped house, surrounded by his relatives busy around him. Sergei Shchukin left them a good name and a faithful piece of bread - few of the emigrants who settled in Paris could boast of this. The Shchukins did not know the severe, hopeless poverty, when torn off soles slammed on the wet pavement and the autumn wind pierced a coat lined with fish fur - the money that Sergei Ivanovich kept in Western banks before the revolution provided them for many years to come. an old man he left knowing that he had fulfilled his duty to his loved ones. The contours of the room became fragmented, the faces of his granddaughters merged, the cross that the priest brought to his lips sparkled like the chandeliers in his Moscow palace...

He was the most agile and resourceful of the five Shchukin brothers. Their grandfather came to Moscow on foot from the city of Borovsk, their father himself made muslin and hid copper money under the floorboards, and then immediately enrolled in the first guild, acquired a large house, a luxurious trip and a music lover wife. (IN Bolshoi Theater Shchukin Sr. especially loved the sofa in the front lounge - he always slept well there.)

The children took after their mother - the educated and sophisticated Ekaterina Petrovna Botkina, a lady from the Moscow merchant aristocracy. Brother Nikolai collected antique silver, brother Peter collected porcelain, pearl embroidery, ancient books and enamels. Over time, he built his own museum in Moscow, donated it to the treasury and was awarded the rank of general. Brother Ivan lived his life in Paris - there he was called “Count Shchukin”... And Sergei himself increased the family capital all his life: business Moscow called Sergei Shchukin “Minister of Commerce” and “porcupine”.

Everything should have turned out differently. As a child, he was the weakest of the brothers: nervous, short, stuttering... Sergei Shchukin himself insisted that he too be taught commerce, strengthened his body with sports, became ruthless and calculating - competitors told legends about his scams and dizzying business combinations. (In 1905, when everyone was frightened by the revolution and commerce was not generating income, Shchukin bought up all the Moscow manufacturing and made a million from it.) His wife was the first beauty of Moscow, the eldest son showed great promise - his father saw him as his successor, the middle one became scientists, and only younger son Grigory, deaf from birth, forever withdrawn into his ghost world, was the pain and grief of the family... Thirty years ago, Sergei Shchukin considered himself a happy person - parting with this world, he tried to understand why he had angered the Lord, why an established, prosperous life collapsed and shattered into pieces.

In 1905, his seventeen-year-old son Sergei drowned himself. They said that he was a member of the suicide club that existed at that time: children of rich and noble parents committed suicide by lot. A revolver bullet, potassium cyanide, a jump in front of a train - the young people died one after another, and in the end it was his boy's turn... And then his wife died too.

When he married an eighteen-year-old girl, he was thirty-one years old. Lidochka Korenev came from an old noble family, and Moscow gossips whispered that, following the palace of the Governor General (it was once the Trubetskoy palace), the manufacturer also bought a noblewoman wife. " Good people“They told him what all of Moscow was gossiping about, but he just chuckled.

Lydia Koreneva, one of the first beauties of Moscow (behind her back they called her the “Queen of Shemakha”), did not think about Shchukin’s condition. She loved dresses and balls, and he led the life of an ascetic - he dined on potatoes and curdled milk, slept with the window open and winter mornings I woke up covered in snow - it wasn’t always easy for them to be together, but they loved each other.

Lidochka never got sick, but she burned out in three days. The doctors said it was something female disease. There were rumors in society that the deceased had poisoned herself. Allegedly, Lydia Shchukina did not forgive her husband for the death of her son, who, shortly before his death, stopped talking to his father. The families of his friends donated money to the revolution, and Sergei Shchukin fed the Black Hundred during the Moscow uprising... Then he ignored it, but two years later his son Grigory committed suicide. (Moscow gossips claimed that the merchant was overtaken by God's punishment, and the reason for this was Shchukin's godless hobbies: he allegedly hung the disgusting daub of Renoir and Picasso in the house church.) Several months passed, and brother Ivan shot himself, having long and unsuccessfully asked him for help. After that, the world turned black for him.

Ivan Shchukin did not like commerce. He lived in France and lectured at the Russian Higher School of Social Sciences. A bit of a journalist, a bit of an art critic (the French nevertheless awarded him the Legion of Honor), Ivan changed lovers like gloves, kept an open house and collected paintings by old masters - his collection of Goya and Velazquez was the largest in Paris.

The last passion pinched him pretty much. Every week he gave her a new dress and an expensive necklace. And then the New York stock exchange began to shake, and American copper stocks, in which their brother Nikolai had invested all his funds, went down sharply... For six months Nikolai sent Ivan money, then he advised him to sell some of the paintings, but the appraisers said that most of the collection - fakes.

A dark public had been hovering around Ivan for a long time: they showed him a letter from Spain - supposedly an original Velasquez had been discovered in a distant monastery, you could buy it cheaply and take it out of the country, replacing it with a fake... And Ivan Shchukin brought home a fake, and the scammers and the abbot shared the profits in half.

The brother had a huge debt hanging over him, which he could not pay off; there was nowhere to wait for help. And then Ivan decided that he would live as before. And when the remains of his fortune melted away, he last time received guests, walked them to the door late in the evening, went up to the office and put a bullet in his heart. Suicides were not buried in cemeteries then, and the funeral took place according to civil rites - Ivan Shchukin was cremated, and after that Sergei Shchukin turned gray. He, a deeply religious man, could not imagine anything more disgusting than cremation.

Now his turn has come. The second wife, sister-in-law, daughter were fussing around... It’s a pity that his beloved son Ivan is in distant Beirut - that means they will never say goodbye... It’s not scary: the main thing is that he grew up to be a good, worthy person, therefore, the name of the Shchukins will be to live - he will be remembered kindly even in Russia, which expelled them.

There are paintings left at home - dozens of paintings by Gauguin, Monet, Picasso, Matisse, Renoir, Rousseau, Sisley: modern Art it was his main passion, he gave both his life and fortune to the collection.

Picasso and Matisse lived on his money - if he had not bought their work, they might not have received their recognition. Because of this, Moscow, in love with the Wanderers, considered him crazy: several years ago Alexander Benois told him about it to his face. They said that Shchukin was freaking out, that his passion for the Impressionists was nothing more than Moscow tyranny, a wild merchant “draft”... And now his collection is worth tens of millions of dollars. It was nationalized immediately after October: his palace became the Museum of Modern Art, and he turned into a curator and guide, huddled right there, at his former meeting, in the cook’s room. It doesn’t matter: the main thing is that he and his family managed to escape from Russia, and the museum will preserve the collection better than the heirs.

His funeral gift also remained in his homeland, which he donated after a series of deaths befell him: in 1910, he gave two hundred thousand rubles for the construction of the Psychological Institute. The lady with whom he was then close introduced him to the young Kyiv professor Chelpanov. Shchukin decided that it was better to help science than to donate to the temple: maybe the professor will someday be able to explain why rich and beautiful, very young people decide to commit suicide...

At the front entrance hangs a board with Lydia’s profile - the institute bears her name and here now her name day will be celebrated every year... He felt the holy gifts touch his lips, felt the priest’s hand on his forehead, and then the walls of the room opened and he flew into some endless, shining abyss - Sergei Ivanovich never found out how his son’s fate turned out, what happened to his collection and the Psychological Institute, which bears the name of his wife, Lydia Shchukina.

His son Ivan Shchukin graduated from the Sorbonne, taught at Cairo University, studied medieval oriental art. He died in a plane accidentally shot down during the Lebanon War. (His rich library still lies unclaimed in the French embassy in Cairo.)

Museum of the New European art was abolished in the forties, during the fight against “adulation to the West.” Fortunately, the paintings, which could easily have been sold abroad, were saved - they are now in the Pushkin Museum. And the Psychological Institute is still considered one of the most serious scientific institutions in the world, and a memorial plaque with a woman’s profile again hangs at its main entrance.

Sergei Shchukin lies in the Mont-Martre cemetery - a wide pedestal, a massive granite slab... His children died, his great-grandchildren scattered all over the world, the Shchukin family nest no longer exists - but in distant Russia every year they celebrate the day of the angel of his beloved wife.

/ Friends of Matisse / Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin

Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin called Matisse “a modern Michelangelo” - whether this was irony or truth is known only to him. The Moscow merchant and collector, who passionately loved French painting, became attached to the artist’s works at first sight.

“Joy of Life”: from canvas to reality

In the spring of 1906, he saw the canvas “The Joy of Life” and wanted to meet the artist. It was an idealistic landscape in red and yellow colors, against which figures of naked bodies dancing and making love were depicted. This work touched Shchukin.

In those days, few people liked Matisse's paintings. He was called a rude, impudent dropout, but still it was Matisse who attracted the attention of Shchukin. The collector was so carried away that he began to correspond with the artist, although previously he was content with buying paintings from dealers.

Shchukin bought 37 works by Matisse and sent the same number of messages to the artist. Sergei Ivanovich bought paintings, taking them directly from the studio, sometimes they were unfinished, or even barely begun works.

Mansion of philanthropist Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin, Matisse Hall

In the summer of 1908, the collector liked the fresh painting “Balls Game” and two half-finished still lifes. While working on the latter, Matisse almost went bankrupt. It was a huge canvas (two meters long) called “The Red Room”, depicting a woman setting a table. The artist painted fruits from life, which he bought in Paris for a lot of money. To make them deteriorate more slowly, Matisse ventilated the room all the time, which is why he had to work in a coat and gloves all winter.

The ideal cartridge

Matisse considered Shchukin his “ideal patron,” since after meeting him the artist forgot about the long years of poverty. Sergei Ivanovich asked to be notified about each new job- rarely has anyone followed the master’s work like this!

Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin comes from an Old Believer merchant family. Brother of Dmitry and Peter Shchukin.

Higher education received in Germany (Higher Commercial Academy, Gera, Thuringia, ca. 1876). In the partnership "I. V. Shchukin with Sons” he became the successor of his father. He made his fortune during the all-Russian strike of 1905, buying up all manufactured goods in a moment of panic and thus seizing a monopoly on the market.

In the fall of 1919 he emigrated to Germany, then settled in Nice. Died in Paris in 1936.

Collection

Shchukin is one of the famous philanthropists Silver Age. Unlike most other Russian collectors at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries, Shchukin bought paintings to his own taste, preferring the Impressionists, and then the Post-Impressionists.

Shchukin's interests in post-impressionism turned after 1904, since that time he often travels to Paris and even transfers a separate large sum to a special account in Berlin in order to promptly pay for purchases - this money was very useful to him when Shchukin found himself in exile.

Since 1909, Shchukin opened his mansion to everyone who wanted to see the collection, which caused alarm among the teachers of the Moscow School of Painting, who were worried about the purity of vision of their students.

Beginning of collecting

In 1882, Shchukin bought the mansion of the Trubetskoy princes at Bolshoi Znamensky Lane, 8; then he sold off the princely collections of weapons and paintings of the Wanderers, purchasing in return several Norwegian landscapes by F. Thaulov, which became the embryo of a future collection.

Unlike his brothers, passionate collectors, Sergei Shchukin began to show interest in collecting only when he entered his fifties, focusing his attention exclusively on contemporary art, and after some time focusing on one French school. In a short time he became one of the most beloved clients of Parisian art dealers. Shchukin maintained contacts with the most famous of them, Paul Durand-Ruel (they were introduced by a distant relative, the artist Fyodor Botkin), and from Ambroise Vollard Shchukin acquired most of his Cezanne paintings (he had 8 of them in total).

Monet's paintings

It is believed that Monet’s first painting, which he bought in November 1898, was “Rocks at Belle-Ile” (Pushkin Museum). This was the first painting by Monet to appear in Russia.

By the mid-1900s, he acquired eleven paintings by the master (among them “Lilacs in the Sun” and “Rocks at Belle-Ile”), and a little later, the famous “Lunch on the Grass”.

Subsequently, his collection was enriched with paintings by J. Whistler, Puvis de Chavannes, P. Signac, and Henri Rousseau.

Matisse paintings

Shchukin developed a particularly close collaboration with Henri Matisse, to whom Shchukin ordered the panels “Music” and “Dance,” as well as “Harmony in Red (Red Room),” specially commissioned by Shchukin in 1908 for the dining room.

Matisse's paintings in the mansion, including "Ball Players", were placed under the supervision of the artist himself during his visit to Moscow.

Gauguin's paintings

In the dining room of the Shchukin mansion, 16 Gauguin paintings hung in a dense display - they were moved one to another so closely that at first the viewer did not even notice where one ended and the other began. It gave the impression of a fresco, an iconostasis, as Apollo magazine noted. 11 of them came from the collection of Gustav Faye; Shchukin bought them wholesale from the Druet Gallery. True, Shchukin was able to appreciate this artist only after some effort: having bought the first canvas, he hung it in his office and spent a long time getting used to it, looking at it alone. But, having tried it, I bought almost the entire Tahitian cycle.

Picasso paintings

Since Picasso refused to be exhibited, Shchukin became acquainted with his works by visiting private homes, in particular, the “salon” of Gertrude Stein and the collections of her brothers Leo and Michael. Shchukin’s purchases included: “Absinthe Lover”, “Old Jew with a Boy”, “Portrait of the Poet Sabartes”, other works of the pink and blue periods, as well as the cubist “Woman with a Fan”, “Factory in the Village of Horta de Ebro”. The Shchukin collection was replenished with Picasso from the Stein collection, sold in 1913.

The fate of the collection

1882 - Sergei Shchukin buys his first paintings.

1909 - the collector opens his halls to spectators.

1919, spring - the collection is open to the public under the name "The First Museum of New Western Painting."

1929 - the collection is combined with the Morozov collection (“Second Museum of New Western Painting”) and moved to the former mansion of Ivan Morozov, which is named GMNZI ( State Museum new Western art).

1948 - GMNZI is disbanded in the wake of the campaign against cosmopolitanism. Many paintings are in danger of being destroyed. But they are still divided between the Hermitage and the Pushkin Museum.

The highlight of the exhibition life in Paris at the end of 2016 and at the beginning of 2017 was the exhibition at the Louis Vuitton Foundation of the collection of Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin. It was truly an event for which the whole city gathered: people came from the United States. And we can say with regret that Paris did what Russia should have done - to show the collection of the great Russian collector as fully as possible and in such a way that it was clear what role it played for the development Russian art. But, to console ourselves, let’s say that in the person of Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin, Russia at one time did what Paris should have done. It was Sergei Ivanovich and his comrade Ivan Abramovich Morozov, who created another largest collection French painting in Moscow, acquired those works of modern French painting, without which it is no longer possible to imagine the history of art of the twentieth century.

In the second half of the 19th and early 20th centuries, private collecting in Russia flourished. Main role The dynamically developing bourgeoisie, primarily Moscow, played a role in this process. For her, collecting gradually became a patriotic mission, an example of which was Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov, who formed the museum of national art. But foreign art The 19th century in Russia was not very lucky: not many of our compatriots collected it. The exception here was Alexander Kushelev-Bezborodko, a St. Petersburg aristocrat who collected a good collection of French realists of the first half of the 19th century century, which even had . But this is rather an exception that confirms the rule. Western art of the 19th century is still represented in the collections of St. Petersburg and Moscow in fragments. By 1917, no more than a dozen Muscovites and St. Petersburg residents owned works of modern French painting, and most of these collections were not available to the public. Even among themselves, these people were rather the exception. In the collection of modern Western painting, the public saw the extreme degree of extravagance of Moscow merchants, famous for their miracles. And it is characteristic that if we were talking now about Western collectors, then the motive of speculation would dominate in the critical attitude towards them: these things are bought in order to then sell them at a profit. And regarding Moscow merchants gossips they said that Shchukin started moving. And Shchukin himself, we know from memories, showed off the newly acquired Gauguin, not without pride, saying to his interlocutor: “A madman wrote, a madman bought it.” This is also a characteristic motive - it is rather a motive for wasting money on incomprehensible things, rather than speculation.

In essence, in Moscow at the beginning of the twentieth century there were four people who were brave enough to buy unusual Western paintings. These four people belonged to two business families - the Morozovs and the Shchukins. Of these four, two left the stage - Mikhail Abramovich Morozov died at the age of 33, and his collection, at the behest of his widow, moved to the Tretyakov Gallery, where Muscovites could already see works of French realists from the collection of Sergei Mikhailovich Tretyakov. And Peter, the eldest of the two brothers, at some point lost interest in collecting modern French painting, and Sergei bought from him in 1912 those paintings that he liked.

So, the Moscow collecting of contemporary French art is, first of all, two people: Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin and Ivan Abramovich Morozov. They collected collections of art that were completely unique in volume and quality, which were completely unusual for most of the visitors to Moscow museums. Their role was all the greater in our country because, unlike Germany or even France, there were no private galleries in Russia that promoted contemporary art, especially foreign art, to the market. And if Shchukin and Morozov wanted to buy a new painting, they could not turn to a St. Petersburg or Moscow dealer, they did not even go to Berlin - they went straight to Paris. Moreover, in the Russian art space there was no museum that would dare to exhibit modern radical painting. If a Parisian could already look at the Impressionists in the Luxembourg Museum in the collection of Gustave Caillebotte since 1897; if in 1905 the Athenaeum Museum in Helsingfors (Helsinki) dared to buy Van Gogh, and this was the first Van Gogh in public collections in the world; if Hugo von Tschudi, guardian National Gallery in Berlin, in 1908 was forced to resign under pressure from the German Emperor himself because he was buying new French paintings - then none of the Russian state or public museums dared to show these paintings. The first place where impressionists could be seen in public space in our country was the personal museum of Pyotr Shchukin, opened in 1905 In 1905, Shchukin donated his collection to the Historical Museum, which formed an entire department called “Department of the Imperial Russian Historical Museum named after Emperor Alexander III. Museum of P.I. Shchukin." The private museum has been operating since 1895.. But the main thing is that the role of the museum was taken over by the collection of Sergei Shchukin, which he made public since 1909: on weekends it could be visited, sometimes even accompanied by Sergei Ivanovich himself. And the memoirists left an impressive description of these excursions.

Shchukin and Morozov were two people belonging to the same circle - these are Old Believers, that is, they are a very responsible, morally strong Russian bourgeoisie, who at the same time were so daring as to acquire art that did not have stable reputation. In this respect they are similar. The lists of names that made up their collection are also similar. In essence, they collected practically the same number of masters. But here the differences begin, the differences are fundamental, very important, determining for the Russian artistic process.

The Shchukin brothers made their first acquisitions in the very late XIX century: in 1898 they bought paintings by Pissarro and Monet. Then he lived in Paris, lived his life and collected his collection of them younger brother Ivan Shchukin, who also published in Russian magazines under the pseudonym Jean Brochet, Jean Shchuka. And it was such a bridge for Moscow collectors to Paris. The real Shchukin collection began with the Impressionists, but, as the Louis Vuitton exhibition very well showed, in fact Shchukin collected a lot, collected a motley picture of modern Western painting, but with more After acquiring impressionists, he gradually narrowed his taste and focused specifically on them. Further, his collecting resembled the takeoff of a Soviet space rocket, which shoots off a new stage as it rises. He began to become really interested in the Impressionists, then, around 1904, he almost completely switched to the Post-Impressionists and in about five years bought eight works by Cezanne, four by Van Gogh and 16 Gogh. genes, and extra-class Gauguins. Then he falls in love with Matisse: the first Matisse comes to him in 1906 - and then Picasso’s streak begins. In 1914, for obvious reasons, due to the outbreak of the World War, Sergei Ivanovich, like Ivan Abramovich, stopped buying paintings abroad - ordered things remained there, such as, for example, Matis Soviet "" from the Pompidou Center or Matisse's "Woman on a High Stool" from the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

If Shchukin is such a monogamous collector, very rarely returning to what he has already experienced (the exception was the purchase of impressionists from his brother in 1912), then Morozov is a person who collects very measuredly and strategically. He understands what he wants. Sergei Makovsky recalled that on the wall of Morozov’s collection for a long time there was an empty place, and when asked why you were holding it like that, Morozov said that “I see a blue Cezanne here.” And one day this gap was filled with an absolutely outstanding semi-abstract late Cezanne - a painting that is known as “Blue Landscape” and is now in the Hermitage. If we turn this thing around, then, in general, little will change, because only a very great visual effort will force us to make out in this series of strokes the contours of a tree, a mountain, a road and, perhaps, house there in the center. This is Cezanne, who is already freed from figurativeness. But what is important here is precisely that Morozov collects differently: he has a certain perfect image master, the ideal image of the collection and he is ready to sit in ambush in order to get the desired picture. Moreover, this is a very arbitrary, personal choice, because, for example, in 1912 in St. Petersburg it was exhibited and sold for a very large sum - 300 thousand francs - greatest painting impressionistic era "" by Edouard Manet. Benoit then very much regretted that none of the Russian collectors dared to exchange money for a masterpiece. Both Shchukin and Morozov could do this, but Shchukin no longer collected impressionists, and Morozov had his own idea of ​​what he wanted from Manet: he wanted a landscape, he wanted Manet as a plein air painter rather than an interior scene.

Differences continue in other areas. For example, Shchukin bought practically nothing from Russian art. Moreover, he was not particularly interested in art outside of France. He has works by other European artists, but against the general background they are completely lost, and the main thing is that they do not express the main tendency of his collecting. Morozov compiled a collection of Russian paintings, which is slightly inferior to his French collection. He collected a very wide spectrum - from late Russian realism, such the work of the union of Russian artists who depicted our nature, Vrubel, Serov, the Symbolists, Goncharov and Chagall - he was one of the first, if not the first Russian, who bought Shaga-la's thing. They were different financial strategy, their methods of choice. We know from Matisse that Morozov, coming to a dealer in Paris, said: “Show me the best Cezannes” - and made a choice among them. And Shchukin climbed into the store, into the gallery and looked through all the Cezannes he could find. Morozov was known in Paris as a Russian who does not bargain, and in one gallery he left a quarter of a million francs during his collection. Igor Grabar, not without irony, writes in his memoirs that Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin loved, rubbing his hands, to say: “ Nice pictures cheap". But in fact, it was Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin who paid a record amount on the market modern painting: in 1910, he paid 15 thousand francs for Matisse’s “Dance”, and 12 thousand for “Music”. True, he provided the document with the indication “the price is confidential.”

This diversity, which can be seen everywhere - Shchukin's expansiveness and Morozov's quietness, acquisition strategy, choice - would seem to stop where we move on to the list. They really brought together beautiful impressionists. True, there is practically no Edouard Manet in Russian collections. This is in a certain sense a mystery, because by this moment, when our compatriots began to collect, Edouard Manet was already an extra-class figure, he was a star. And Muratov once wrote that Edouard Manet is the first painter, for a full understanding of whom you need to swim across the ocean. That is, it doesn’t just disperse into collections - it goes to the United States, and American collectors for European and Russian ones in particular are such a disturbing object of irony: there are slippages from time to time There are references to Chicago pork traders who will come to Paris and buy everything. So, our compatriots somehow got along very casually with Edouard Manet. I’ve already talked about how we didn’t buy “The Bar at the Folies Bergere,” but apparently the point is that the ideal impressionist for the Russian viewer and Russian collector was not Edouard Manet , and Claude Monet. And there really was quite a lot of Claude Monet, a good one, in both Shchukin and Morozov. Then the differences begin, because Morozov, with his penchant for lyrical landscapes, loved Sisley. They collected practically the same post-pressionists, the great trinity - Cezanne, Gauguin and Van Gogh, and Morozov had a little less Gauguin than Shchukin, but the American art historian Alfred Barr believed that that the quality of Gauguin’s collection was almost higher. In fact, this is an extremely difficult competition, because the taste of these two merchants was extremely sophisticated, although different, and we are now approaching this fundamental difference.

It is significant that both loved Matisse, but if Shchukin survived the passion - 37 paintings - then Morozov bought 11, and of these there were quite a lot of early things, where Matisse was not yet a radical, where he was a very subtle and careful painter. sec. But Morozov had almost no Picasso: against more than 50 paintings by Shchukin, Morozov could exhibit only three paintings by Picasso - however, each of these paintings was a masterpiece characterizing a certain turn. This is “Harlequin and His Girlfriend” from the “blue” period; this is “,” which was sold by Gertrude Stein and bought by Ivan Morozov, a thing from the “pink” period; and this is a unique cubist “Portrait of Ambroise Vollard” from 1910: in my opinion, only two other portraits in the world are similar to this image - Wilhelm Houdet and Daniel Henri Kahnweiler. That is, here too, in Picasso, whom he did not like, Morozov made an absolutely sniper choice.

Morozov collected top-class and at the same time characteristic things, things with such a biography. For example, his 1873 “Boulevard of the Capuchines” by Claude Monet is very likely the same “Boulevard of the Capuchines” that was exhibited at the first impressionist exhibition at Nadar’s studio in 1874 There are two versions of “Capuzzi Boulevard”: one is kept in the State Museum. Pushkin in Moscow, the other is in the collection of the Nelson-Atkins Museum in Kansas City, Missouri, USA.. There are different opinions on this matter - American art experts prefer to call this painting “Boulevard of the Capuchines” from a museum in Kansas City, but the quality of the painting personally allows me to assume that there was exactly ours, that is, Moscow Monet. “Drying the Sails” by Derain from the collection of Ivan Morozov was precisely the painting that was reproduced on the spread of the magazine “Illustration” on November 4, 1905, along with other highlights of the Autumn Salon - works by the Fauves. And this list can be multiplied: Morozov really selected things with a biography.

What was the fundamental difference between these collections and how did this difference affect our art? Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin presented the development of modern French painting as a permanent revolution. He didn’t just choose things that were typical—he gave preference to things that were radical. When he started collecting Matisse and following Matisse's logic, the most important choice there was a choice of an elementary simple picture. On his European trip, while visiting the Folkwang Museum in the city of Hagen in the Ruhr region of Germany, Shchukin saw a thing that had just been made by order of Karl Ernst Osthaus, the owner and founder of this museum, essentially one of the first institutions dedicated strictly to modern art. Karl-Ernst Otshaus commissioned Matisse to paint a large painting, “Three Characters with a Turtle.” The plot is completely incomprehensible: three characters, three human-shaped creatures - there are even some ambiguities with gender - feed a turtle or play with it. The entire color gamut is reduced to blue, green and flesh; The drawing resembles a child's one. And this unheard-of simplicity of Shchukin absolutely captivated him - he wanted the same one, the result of which was the painting “Balls Game”, coloristically and from the point of view of drawing very close to the painting by Osthaus, where the turtle was no longer there and there were three boys rolling balls, as is customary in the South of France. And this thing, blatantly laconic and defiantly primitive, gave rise to the acquisition of Matisse’s radical works one after another: “The Red Room”, “The Conversation”. But of course, the culmination of these purchases is “Dance” and “Music”. The same can be said about Pi-casso. Shchukin acquired dozens of things from early Picasso, standing on the threshold of Cubism, 1908-1909; heavy, terrible, brown, green figures, as if carved with an ax from stone or wood. And here he was also biased, because entire periods of Picasso’s work passed by his attention, but the radicalism of primitive Picasso exceeded all other limits. He made a colossal impression on the Russian public, who formed their own image of this enfant terrible, this disturber of the peace of world painting.

Morozov bought the same artists, but chose different things. There is a classic example given at one time in the publications of art critic Albert Grigoryevich Kostenevich. Two landscapes from the collections of Shchukin and Morozo-va. They depict the same motif. Cezanne was very fond of painting Mount Sainte-Victoire in Provence, and if we look at the late work that belonged to Shchukin, we will hardly find the outlines of the mountain - it is rather a mosaic collection of strokes in which we must it is our will as a contemplator to construct this mountain, thus becoming a participant in the pictorial process. “Mount Sainte-Victoire,” written several decades earlier by Cézanne and acquired by Morozov, is a balanced, classically calm, clear picture, reminiscent of Cézanne’s desire to remake Poussin in accordance with nature. In short, Morozov presented French painting after impressionism as an evolution, Shchukin - as a revolution. And the fact is that the Morozov collection remained a mystery to the overwhelming majority of viewers and artists, because Ivan Abramovich was not a particularly hospitable collector. This collection was created not without the advice of his artist friends.

For example, one of his masterpieces, Van Gogh, “,” was purchased on the advice of Valentin Serov. But in general, the Morozov Palace on the Pre-chi-wall, where it is now located Russian Academy arts, was closed to visitors. But Sergei Ivanovich not only bequeathed the collection to the city, from 1909 he began to let everyone there, even before that he gladly invited students of the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture to show them his fresh acquisitions . The fact that it was the revolutionary concept of French art of Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin that was in plain sight and was discovered is, of course, the most important factor in the radicalization of the Russian avant-garde. David Burliuk, who returned from Moscow, wrote to Mikhail Matyushin:

“...we saw two collections of the French - S. I. Shchukin and I. A. Morozov. This is something without which I would not risk starting work. This is our third day at home - everything old has gone to pieces, and oh, how difficult and fun it is to start all over again..."

Here, in fact, is the best illustration for understanding what the collections of Moscow collectors were for the Russian avant-garde. It was a constant ferment, it was a constant irritant, it was a constant object of controversy.

Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin was a very enterprising businessman, brave, daring, and, apparently, this economic policy continued in his collecting activities. Well, for example, Shchukin, who was truly friendly with Matisse and helped him with pleasure - in fact, of course, paid for his work, for his works - Shchukin tried to ensure that Matisse received these money without giving up a commission to the gallery. The fact is that the leader of the Fauves became one of the first masters of modern painting who concluded such an integral agreement with his dealer Bernheim-Jeune that, in general, everything he produces belongs to the gallery and is sold through the gallery, for which, naturally, he was entitled to a substantial annual sum. But this agreement had exceptions. If the artist accepted an order directly from the buyer, bypassing the dealer, he was obliged to increase the amount, but portraits and decorative panels Matisse had the right to write directly, bypassing the gallery commission. And if we look at the Shchukin collection of Matisse, we will see that “Dance” and “Music”, the most expensive things, are panels, and the huge canvases, which, in general, of course, are not exactly portraits , for each of which Shchukin took 10 thousand francs out of his wallet, qualify exactly as portrait painting. For example, “Family portrait”, depicting members of the Matisse family; “Conversation”, which is a portrait of Matisse and his wife; some other things and, finally, the last Matisse, bought by Shchukin before the war, “Portrait of Madame Matisse” 1913, for 10 thousand francs too. So Shchukin very enterprisingly helped his favorite artist and friend, bypassing Bernheim-Jeune’s wallet.

Several memoirists have brought to us a description of Shchukin’s manner of conducting excursions. You can find an ironic portrait of a collector in Boris Zaitsev’s story “Blue Star”. There, the heroine, before a declaration of love suddenly occurs after visiting the gallery, listens to Shchukin’s excursion:

“Visitors of three kinds wandered through the halls: again artists, again young ladies and modest herds of sightseers, obediently listening to explanations. Mashura walked for quite a long time. She liked being alone, free from the pressure of tastes; she carefully examined the foggy, smoky London, the brightly colored Matisse, from which the living room became lighter, the yellow variegation of Van Gogh, the primitiveness of Gauguin. In one corner, in front of Cezanne's harlequin, a gray-haired old man in pince-nez, with a Moscow accent, said to a group of people around:
- Cézanne, sir, after everything else, like, for example, Mr. Monet, it’s like after sugar - a-rye bread-s…
<…>
The old man, the leader of the excursionists, took off his pince-nez and, waving it,
said:
- My last love, yes, Picasso, sir... When he’s in Paris for me
they showed, so I thought - either everyone had gone crazy, or I had gone crazy. It's like tearing your eyes out like a knife, sir. Or you walk barefoot on broken glass...
The sightseers buzzed merrily. The old man, apparently not the first time he had said this and knew his effects, waited and continued:
“But now, sir, nothing, sir... On the contrary, after the broken glass, everything else seems like marmalade to me...”

What distinguishes the collection of Ivan Morozov from the collection of Sergei Shchukin is Morozov’s focus on decorative ensembles. He had several of them, and if Morozov collected panels that were unusual for Claude Monet, depicting corners of the garden in Montgeron, from various galleries, then he ordered the rest of the ensembles himself. He was, in fact, the first in Russia to commission a complete monumental and decorative ensemble from a modern, prosperous painter with a not yet fully established reputation. In 1907, he agreed with Maurice Denis to create a cycle of picturesque panels for the dining room of his palace on the story of Psyche. The initial price of the project was 50 thousand francs - that's a lot. Five panels were to be made, which Denis, apparently, with the help of apprentices, completed almost within a year. When these panels arrived in Moscow, it became clear that they did not quite correspond to the interior, the artist had to come, and he decided to add eight more panels for 20 thousand on top, and then, on the advice of Morozov, put statues in this space the work of Maillol, and it was a very correct decision. When Alexander Benois, who at one time very much loved Maurice Denis and promoted his work in Russia, entered Morozov’s dining room, as he later recalls in his memoirs, he realized that this was exactly what should not have been done. Denis created the embodiment of a compromise modern art, painting, which one of the modern researchers called tourist, postcard views of Italy, caramel-sweet painting. But the very fact of the appearance in Moscow of a complete ensemble made by a modern French artist, it seems to me, caused a polemical reaction from Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin.

It is against the background of Maurice Denis that we must consider the extremely radical Matisse. Actually, after Maurice Denis, who appeared at Morozov’s, Shchukin commissioned “Dance” and “Music” as the most avant-garde response to the art of compromise. “Dance” and “Music” are placed by Shchukin on the stairs of his mansion, that is, in public space. And this is a terribly important place, because a person entering the Shchukin Museum immediately receives a very distinct tuning fork: everything that then begins after “Dance” and “Music” will be perceived through the prism of “Dance” Tsa" and "Music", through the prism of the most radical artistic decision at that time. And all art that can be perceived as the art of evolution will go under the sign of revolution. But Morozov, it seems to me, did not remain in debt. Not being a radical and not being prone to such sharp gestures as Shchukin, he, in my opinion, acted in his best traditions, but no less radical. In the early 1910s, a triptych by Pierre Bonnard “By the Mediterranean Sea” also appeared on the stairs of his mansion, that is, in an almost public space. Pierre Bonnard by this point has the least reputation as a radical. Pierre Bonnard creates paintings that are very pleasant, sweet, enveloping, generating a feeling, especially this triptych, a feeling of the warm comfort of a Mediterranean summer. But as Gloria Groom has well shown in her study of turn-of-the-century decorative aesthetics, Bonnard's triptych, centered on the Japanese screen, actually questions the basic principles of European painting to a much greater extent than Matisse's Dance. and "Music". Matisse’s “Dance” and “Music,” while denying very much in the pictorial language, in the pictorial vocabulary, never question the centripetal idea of ​​composition, a distinct, clear, essentially geometric structure. And Bonnard, in his focus on Japanese tradition production erodes this very centrality. We can put five more panels on different sides, and the feeling of integrity will not disappear. And in this sense, it seems to me that Morozov’s answer to Shchuka is very subtle and very accurate.

I said that Shchukin was not interested in decorative ensembles, but this problem of synthetic art, which plagued the early twentieth century, did not pass by Shchukin’s collection. In his collection, Gauguin was concentrated in the large dining room, in the same place where Matisse also hung; on the same wall where Gauguin hung Van Gogh. And we know from photographs and from the testimony of contemporaries that Gauguin’s paintings were hung very tightly. Actually, Shchukin in his big palace there was not much space for paintings: the collection was growing. But the density of this display was connected not only with the tradition of hanging paintings end to end at exhibitions of that time, but, obviously, also with the fact that Shchukin intuitively understood the synthetic nature of Gauguin’s work. Hung next to dozens of Gauguin's paintings, they appeared as something integral, like a fresco. It is no coincidence that Yakov Tugendhold insightfully called this installation “Gauguin’s icon-no-stas.” He hit the mark - in fact, he, as a Russian critic of that time, already understood very well in 1914 what a Russian icon is, how much it simultaneously returns spirituality to art and is part of the integral ensemble of the temple. And in this respect, the Shchukin collection, despite the fact that it does not follow Morozov’s tendency, in general, participates in the same process - an attempt to create holistic, integral, synthetic art on the basis of modern painting.

Shchukin's collection was an absolute problem for the Russian viewer. The art that was presented there was extremely unusual, it violated conventions, it destroyed ideas about harmony, and it, in essence, denied huge layers of modern Russian painting. With all this, we will not find a large number of negative reviews about Shchukin in the Russian press. Still, it seems to me that the collector, even a weirdo, belonging to an extremely influential economic clan, was spared from direct attacks in the press. There are exceptions, they are significant. For example, in 1910, the wife of Ilya Efimovich Repin, Natalya Borisovna Nordman, who wrote under the pseudonym Severov, published what we can now classify as a “Live Journal” or blog - the book “ Intimate pages”, in which intimacy means exactly trust, this is what seems to distinguish these Internet forms of modernity. The book told about travels, about visiting Yasnaya Polyana, but, in particular, there is a very interesting episode that tells how Repin and Nordman came to Shchukin in the collector’s absence and visited his museum. We know that Repin reacted extremely painfully to modern French painting. But what is important here is the intonation of a person who, in general, conveys the ideas of a politically and socially advanced section of the Russian intelligentsia, which still keeps the legacy of the second half of the 19th century. Contemporaries were shocked by this book and, in particular, by the description of Shchukin’s visit, I would say, due to such an absolutely devoid of self-criticism tendentiousness of the statement:

“Shchukin is a philanthropist. He has weekly concerts, and he loves the latest in music (Scriabin is his favorite composer). It’s the same in life. But he collects only the French... The latest fashion items hang in his office, but as soon as they begin to be replaced by new names on the French market, they are immediately moved further, to other rooms. The movement is constant. Who knows what names are hanging in his bathroom?
<…>
In all the beautiful old rooms the walls are completely covered with paintings. IN big hall We have seen many Monet landscapes, which have their own charm. Hanging on the side is Sizelet - the picture up close depicts different colored squares, but from a distance it’s a monochromatic mountain.”

Here I must explain that there is no artist Sizelet, and, most likely, Natalya Nordman describes the painting “Mount Sainte-Victoire” by Cezanne. The excursionists are led by a housekeeper, who, having released all her bewilderment and mixed up the names, suddenly became dull and bored and asked her son Shchukin for help.

“And here in front of us is a young man of about 22 years old, he puts his hands in his pockets somehow in Parisian style. Why? Listen - and he speaks Russian with a burr, like a Parisian. What is this? Raised abroad.
Afterwards we found out that there were 4 brothers - they didn’t stick anywhere, they didn’t believe in anything.<…>The Shchukins from a French lyceum with Russian millions - this strange mixture deprived them of their roots.”

Let me explain that there is nothing close to the truth in this characteristic. Both the education and professional experience of the Shchukin brothers do not provide any grounds for speaking about their rootlessness or superficial Frenchness. Before us is the image of a collector of modern French art, reflecting the stereotypes of a significant part of the Russian intelligentsia, feeding on the heritage of the 19th century:

“Shapeless, rude and arrogant Matisse, like the others, will fade into the background. And here is a grimace of suffering on the artist’s face - his soul is sad, tormented, Paris’s mockery of the Russians. And they, these weak Slavs, so willingly allow themselves to be hypnotized. Stick your nose in and lead where you want, just lead. I want to quickly leave this house, where there is no harmony of life, where the king’s new dress reigns.”

After visiting Shchukin, the Repin family went to a student exhibition at the School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, and there a very significant conversation took place, about which Nordman actually writes very insightfully:

“After visiting Shchukin’s house, the key to modern Moscow art was found. Student exhibition at the school of painting and sculpture - especially strong symptom. “What did Repin say?” - curious faces reached out to me. I said nothing. “Do you often visit Shchukin’s gallery?” I suddenly asked. They looked at each other, looked at me, and we all laughed. Of course, as almost always happens, we laughed about different things. “Often, Shchukin constantly invites us in groups. What, do you see imitation?” I remained silent again. Just this, and suddenly I felt somehow even angry: “I don’t want to pass into the offspring of green, or black, or blue.” Pity for me was expressed to the point of contempt on the faces of the students: “You are demanding the impossible!”

When Natalya Severova and Repin exchanged opinions about what they saw:

“I think their demands are huge - they want complete liberation from traditions. They are looking for spontaneity, super forms, super colors. They want genius." “No,” I said, “that’s not it.” They want a revolution. Every Russian person, no matter who he is, wants to overturn and tear off something that is suffocating and crushing him. So he rebels."

Here, in a striking way, a person who is completely out of tune when describing the collection, looking over the heads of his interlocutors, defines the very mission that the Shchukin collection fulfilled in the Russian context. This was truly a collection that personified the revolution.

But the problem of explaining the Shchukin meeting remained. In fact, there was a war for the Shchukino assembly. The avant-garde artists really wanted to offer the public their vision of Shchukin’s collection as a kingdom of experiment and revolution, and on the other hand, to prove that their art does not owe everything to Shchukin. But supporters of the modernist compromise position turned out to be more successful, primarily critics of the Apollo magazine, who were able to form the rhetoric that allowed relatively to a wide circle readers will reconcile and even fall in love with the masters from Shchukin. The only way along this path was to prove that the choice of collectors, Shchukin or Moro-zov, is not based simply on whim, but is in fact based on subtle traditional taste. Therefore, when we read reviews of the collections of Shchukin and Morozov, written by Muratov, Tugendhold, Benois and other critics of this circle, we are constantly faced with images of the museum. This is a museum of personal taste, it is also a museum of the history of painting. The second important aspect is the image of the collector. And in this sense, what Benoit writes about Shchukin is extremely important:

“What did this man have to endure for his “quirks”? For years they looked at him as if he were crazy, like a maniac who threw money out the window and allowed himself to be “hoodwinked” by Parisian swindlers. But Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin did not pay any attention to these screams and laughter and walked with complete sincerity along the path he had once chosen.<…>Shchukin didn’t just throw money around, didn’t just buy what was recommended in the leading shops. Each of his purchases was a kind of feat associated with painful hesitation in essence...<…>Shchukin did not take what he liked, but took what he thought he should like. Shchukin, with some kind of ascetic method, just like Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov in his time, educated himself on acquisitions and somehow forcibly broke through the barriers that arose between him and the worldview of the masters who interested him.<…>Perhaps in other cases he was wrong, but in general outline now emerges victorious. He surrounded himself with things that, through a slow and constant influence on him, illuminated for him the real state of modern artistic affairs, which taught him to rejoice in what our time has created that is truly joyful.”

Russian merchants acquired and preserved priceless treasures of domestic and world culture for Russia, but time erased many names from the memory of posterity. Unfortunately, people have short memories. But art has eternal life.

The Tretyakov Gallery, the Bakhrushin Theater Museum, the Shchukin collection of French impressionists, the Morozov Handicraft Museum, gymnasiums, hospitals, shelters, institutes - all these are gifts of the Moscow merchants hometown. The historian M. Pogodin set Moscow merchants-philanthropists as an example to tight-fisted European entrepreneurs: “If we count all their donations for the current century alone, they would amount to a figure that Europe should bow to.”

Tretyakovs

Among Moscow patrons of the arts, the name of Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov has a special place: it is to him that we owe the unique collection of paintings stored in the famous Tretyakov Gallery. The Tretyakov merchant family could not boast of special wealth, but Pavel Mikhailovich did not spare money to purchase paintings. Over the course of 42 years, he spent an impressive amount of money on them at that time - over a million rubles. Unfortunately, Pavel’s brother, Sergei Mikhailovich, is much less known to our contemporaries. He collected Western European painting, and after his death in 1892, all the paintings he acquired passed, according to his will, into the possession of Pavel Mikhailovich. They were also donated to the city. On August 15, 1893, a new museum appeared in Moscow - the City Art Gallery of Pavel and Sergei Tretyakov. At that time, the collection consisted of 1,362 paintings, 593 drawings and 15 sculptures. Art critic V. Stasov wrote about it: “An art gallery... is not a random collection of paintings, it is the result of knowledge, considerations, strict weighing and, most of all, deep love for one’s dear business.”

Bakhrushins

The Bakhrushins came from the city of Zaraysk and were engaged in leather and cloth making. Both in Zaraysk and in Moscow the family donated large sums those in need. In the mother throne, the Bakhrushins were called “professional philanthropists” from whom “donations pour in like from a cornucopia.” Judge for yourself, they built and maintained: a city hospital, a house of free apartments for the poor, a shelter for orphans, a vocational school for boys, a home for elderly artists... For this, the city authorities made the Bakhrushins honorary citizens of Moscow, they offered nobility, but proud merchants abandoned their titles. Alexey Petrovich Bakhrushin was a passionate collector, collecting Russian medals, porcelain, paintings, icons and ancient books. He bequeathed his collection to the Historical Museum, and several museum halls were named after him. Alexey Petrovich's uncle, Alexey Alexandrovich Bakhrushin, collected everything related to the theater: old posters, programs, photographs famous actors, stage costumes. Based on his collection in Moscow, in 1894, the world's only Theater Museum named after. Bakhrushin. It is still in effect today.

The Khludov family, who came from Yegoryevsk, owned cotton factories and built railways. Alexey Ivanovich Khludov collected unique collection ancient Russian manuscripts and early printed books. Among them are the works of Maxim the Greek, “The Source of Knowledge” by John of Damascus, translated and with comments by Prince Kurbsky (the author of angry letters to Ivan the Terrible). In total, the collection consisted of more than a thousand books. In 1882, after the death of Khludov, the precious collection, according to his will, was transferred to the St. Nicholas Monastery of Edinoverie in Moscow. Alexei's brother, Gerasim Ivanovich, was also an avid collector: he collected paintings by Russian artists. The Khludovs, like the Bakhrushins, did not spare money for charity: they built an almshouse, free apartments for the poor, wards for terminally ill women and a children's hospital with their own funds.

This dynasty gave Russia a lot talented people: industrialists, doctors, diplomats. Let us at least remember Pyotr Kononovich, the pioneer of the tea business in Russia, or Sergei Petrovich, the famous Russian aesculapian. Many Botkins were collectors. Privy Councilor and artist Mikhail Petrovich collected Western European paintings, terracotta figurines, Italian majolica of the 15th-17th centuries, as well as Russian enamel for almost 50 years. He was keenly interested in the work of the artist Ivanov: he bought sketches and even published his biography. Vasily Petrovich and Dmitry Petrovich Botkin collected paintings by European masters and were friends of Pavel Tretyakov.

Mamontovs

The rich and populous merchant family of the Mamontovs “rose up” in the wine farming industry. Fyodor Ivanovich is still in late XVIII centuries, he was known as a generous philanthropist, for which he was awarded a posthumous monument from the grateful residents of Zvenigorod. However, the most outstanding figure among the Mamontovs was Savva Ivanovich. Nature generously endowed him with talents: singer (studied in Italy), sculptor, theater director, playwright. It was Savva who discovered the talent of Chaliapin, Mussorgsky and Rimsky-Korsakov to the world. In his own theater he staged operas, the scenery for which was written by Polenov, Vasnetsov, Serov, Korovin. Savva Ivanovich helped achieve recognition for Vrubel: at his own expense he built a pavilion for the artist and exhibited his paintings in it. The estate of Savva Ivanovich, Abramtsevo, became “a haven of peace, work and inspiration” for many talented artists and performers.

Morozovs

The range of cultural activities of the Morozov dynasty is enormous: they were extremely talented people. Savva Timofeevich Morozov did a lot for Art Theater(MHT). He was passionate about the revolutionary movement and idolized Maxim Gorky. Moscow owes the creation of the Handicraft Museum to Savva’s brother, Sergei Timofeevich. He collected works of Russian decorative and applied art of the 17th-19th centuries, trying to preserve their national flavor and traditions. After the revolution, the museum was renamed the Museum as a sign of respect for his services. folk art them. S.T. Morozova. Mikhail Abramovich Morozov with youth collected Russian and French paintings, but, alas, died at the age of 33. His collection was transferred to the Tretyakov Gallery. Famous philanthropist There was also Ivan Abramovich Morozov, it was he who became the first patron of the unknown Vitebsk artist Marc Chagall. In 1918, Ivan Abramovich left Russia. His rich collection of paintings was distributed among the Museum fine arts them. Pushkin and the Hermitage.

Representatives of the Shchukin family have preserved truly unique treasures for us. Pyotr Ivanovich was the largest collector of Russian antiquities. There was everything in his collection: rare books, ancient Russian icons and coins, silver jewelry. In 1905, Pyotr Ivanovich donated his collection to Moscow; the catalog of valuables included 23,911 items! The canvases of Dutch painters Dmitry Ivanovich Shchukin are a pearl to this day Pushkin Museum. And a whole generation of Russian avant-garde artists grew up on the paintings of French impressionists acquired by Sergei Ivanovich Shchukin. He had an amazing sense of talent. When Shchukin met Picasso in Paris, he was an unknown poor artist. But even then the insightful Russian merchant said: “This is the future.” For six years, Sergei Ivanovich sponsored Picasso, buying his paintings. Thanks to Shchukin, paintings by Monet, Matisse, and Gauguin appeared in Russia - artists considered “outcast” in France. But after the revolution in Russia, Shchukin turned out to be an “outcast”, and he had to emigrate to France. Bitter irony of fate. At the end of the 1920s. There was a rumor among Russian emigrants that Shchukin was demanding the return of his nationalized collection from the Bolsheviks. But Sergei Ivanovich denied the speculation: “I collected not only and not so much for myself, but for my country and my people. Whatever is on our land, my collections must remain there.”

Dmitry Kazennov