Accompanied by Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia, Vladimir Putin toured the exhibition “History of Russia as seen by artists: Towards the 800th birth anniversary of Alexander Nevsky.” The exhibition brought together about 100 pieces of art from 37 Russian museums and three private collections as well as rare historical artefacts. The exhibits include historical paintings dated late 18th – early 19th century dedicated to the most important events in the history of Russia from the Baptism of Rus to World War I.
In addition, the President and the Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church toured the exhibition “Dreams of Freedom: Romanticism in Russia and Germany”, one of the largest international exhibition projects in the history of the Tretyakov Gallery and the first attempt in the Russian and international museum practice to unite two countries’ Romanticism masterpieces at one venue. Over 300 works, including 200 paintings, as well as drawings, archive materials and unique exhibits from dozens of Russian and German collections tell the story of this artistic style in all its complexity and outline the similarities and differences in the art of Russia and Germany. The exhibition includes the works of the greatest artists of the first quarter of the 19th century: Caspar David Friedrich, Philipp Otto Runge, Johann Friedrich Overbeck, Alexander Ivanov, Alexei Venetsianov, Orest Kiprensky, and Karl Bryullov among others. This large project consists of two exhibitions: one in Moscow and one in Dresden.
During the tour, Metropolitan Tikhon of Pskov and Porkhov, Chair of the Patriarch’s Council for Culture, and General Director of the State Tretyakov Gallery Zelfira Tregulova commented on the exhibits.