New halls of Peter the Great Gallery opened to State Hermitage Museum visitors
RELEASE
Release
The opening ceremony for three new halls of The Peter the Great Gallery was held today at the State Hermitage Museum.
Taking part in the event were Sergey Kupriyanov, Head of Department at Gazprom – Press Secretary to Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee, and Mikhail Piotrovsky, Director General of the State Hermitage Museum.
Sergey Kupriyanov (left) and Mikhail Piotrovsky, Director General of State Hermitage Museum (center). Photo by Alexey Bronnikov, State Hermitage Museum
Eight out of eleven halls of The Peter the Great Gallery – a permanent exhibition created with support from Gazprom – are now open to the visitors of the State Hermitage Museum.
The three new halls show how the transformations initiated by Peter I further evolved in the art and culture of the Russian empire during the reign of Empresses Anna Ioannovna and Elizabeth Petrovna.
On display in the halls are paintings by famous Russian artists of the period from 1730 to 1760, as well as by foreign masters who worked in Russia during that period. The portraits depict members of the imperial family, statesmen and representatives of the Russian nobility.
One of the halls is devoted to the great Russian scholar Mikhail Lomonosov. The museum visitors will be able to see a mosaic portrait of Peter I created personally by Mikhail Lomonosov, as well as glass bead and mosaic panels manufactured at the Ust-Ruditskaya factory near St. Petersburg, which was founded by the scholar.
The new exhibition features items made using the traditional Russian technique of bone carving; a table and a chair made of steel, which were manufactured for the Empress Elizabeth Petrovna by craftsmen of Tula arms plants; and a number of snuffboxes created at the Neva Porcelain Manufactory (the Imperial Porcelain Manufactory).
The halls are open for visitors since December 13.
Background
In 2021, Gazprom and the State Hermitage Museum signed the Agreement of Intent. The document outlines the main areas of cooperation, in particular, the implementation of joint social-and-cultural projects which cover, inter alia, activities related to exhibitions, expositions, and education.
In 2022, as part of the celebration of the 350th anniversary of the birth of Peter I, the first halls of the permanent exhibition named “The Peter the Great Gallery” showcasing unique objects from the era of Peter I and the exposition displaying the recreated flags of the Preobrazhensky Life-Guards Regiment were open in the State Hermitage Museum with support from Gazprom.