Gosudarstvennyi Ermitazh. Muzeinye rasprodazhi 1928 – 1929 godov: arkhivnye dokumenty (The State Hermitage Museum: Archival Documents on Museum Sales of 1928 and 1929)
St. Petersburg: Herm, 2006. sewn cl., These written and visual records, most published here for the first time, pertain to the Soviet state’s decision to disperse paintings from the country’s greatest collection of world art, steadfastly built since the middle of the eighteenth century and opened as a public museum during the reign of Nicholas I (1825–55). Themes arise that have timeless bearing on the role of museums: the connection between a country’s artistic heritage (created and acquired) and its identity as a culture, the difficulty of deeming some works of art dispensable, the ephemeral benefits of monetary gain compared with the permanent damage to cultural heritage. The importance of publishing in detail the record of the sales is twofold: aware of Russia’s grievous experience, other cultural institutions can better husband their heritage; establishing the extent of the losses and defining the process of selling, the authors dispense with careless historiography both of the apologists of the state’s decisions and of the zealots who exaggerate the sales as a typical crime of the Soviet regime. 532 pp., 6 x 9 ins., 57 b-&-w illus., Rus., Series: Pages in the History of the Hermitage (Stranitsy istorii Ermitazha ). Item #577
ISBN: 5935721155
Price: $65.00