Dmitry Medvedev stated this initiative during a visit to the Pavlovsk Palace and Park Museum near St Petersburg.
After visiting the museum, Mr Medvedev discussed the funding of museums with Museum Director Nikolai Tretyakov and Chief Curator Marina Flit. The President noted, in particular, the need to clarify procedures for providing budget financing to museums and procedures for raising money from private investors. Mr Medvedev said that the opening of the Russian State Hermitage Museum branch in Amsterdam, the Hermitage on the Amstel, on June 20, is an example of how every big Russian museum should have its own endowment to help it to carry out its work.
The Pavlovsk Palace and Park Museum is home to a significant artistic collection of world importance. The main part of the collection is the decorative and applied arts objects and paintings from the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries collected by the estate’s owners. The museum’s collections come to around 47,000 items, including paintings, costumes, fabrics, sculptures, manuscripts, books, photographs, weapons, horse harnesses, items of decorative and applied arts, and furniture.
Chief Curator of Pavlovsk Park Marina Flit received the 2008 Russian National Award for her outstanding contribution to the preservation of the world cultural heritage and the revival of a unique monument of landscape art.
Mr Medvedev’s mother worked at the Palace and Park Museum as a guide in the past, and the President often visited Pavlovsk when he was a child.