ANTIQUE ART. The collection of Michael and Elena Karisalov

Venue: Main building, 16 hall.

Curator: Olga Vilenovna Tugusheva, Deputy Head of the Department of Art and Archeology of the Ancient World, Pushkin Museum. A.S. Pushkin

The antique collection of Mikhail and Elena Karisalov formed over several decades. Her first exhibits were bronze helmets, which were collected by Irina Karisalova, mother of Mikhail. A teacher of a music school, she, according to her son, was an addicted person, "constantly looking for something new." It was she who began to collect objects of applied art, painting, furniture, infecting her son with this passion. Today, the ancient collection includes nearly 90 monuments: in addition to helmets, it includes bronze rings, painted ancient Greek vases and two sculptural portraits.

At the exhibition will be presented: 13 bronze helmets of masters of the Kuban region and the North Caucasus of the 3rd – 1st c. BC e., 6 painted clay vases, 68 rings, which are one of the most common types of massive bronze rings in the ancient era with a shield decorated with an embossed or embossed image, a female terracotta head and a marble head of a philosopher of the 2nd century Antoninov era. n e.

The history of the Pushkin Museum is inextricably linked with the history of philanthropy. The founder of the museum and its first director, Ivan Vladimirovich Tsvetaev, from the very beginning attracted wealthy people to realize his plan, who understood the need for the undertaking he planned. In 1898, the Museum Creation Committee was founded, which was involved in the collection of donations and gifts. The construction of the museum was supported by K.S. Popov, M.A. Morozov, F.O. Shekhtel, Z.N. and F.F. Yusupovs, brothers Armand, A.D. Maine, A.A. Shcherbatov, D.A. Khomyakov, P.M. Tretyakov, K.T. Soldiers and others. Yu.S. became the main donor for the construction of the building and the acquisition of exhibits. Nechaev-Maltsov, a large industrialist and courtier, who donated about half of the total construction cost to the museum.

Mikhail Karisalov is a well-known collector and philanthropist who actively supports Russian museums. His collection is rich and diverse - more than two hundred pieces of antique furniture, the second largest in the country (after the Hermitage collection) collection of carved bones, Russian portraiture of the 19th century, including works by Kiprensky, Levitsky, Borovikovsky, Tropinin and other artists. A special place is occupied by ancient art, which was collected by Mikhail’s mother, Irina Karisalova, who passed on to her son a passion for collecting objects of applied art, painting and furniture.

Mikhail Karisalov, together with the custodians, helps to find and return works that once belonged to museums. Thanks to him, the Tsarskoye Selo State Museum-Reserve returned a set of three Chinese-style vases that were once part of the decoration of the Alexander Palace, a portrait of Aristarch Petrovich Kashkin, managing the Tsarskoye Selo Palace Board under Catherine II, a dish from the Wedgwood factory from the interiors of the Imperial Farm, a vase from the Korgon porphyry, a side table at the end of the 18th century and many other objects of art. The collector presented historical portraits to the Russian Museum, the portrait of Felix Yusupov to the Yusupov Palace on the Moika, and A.S. State Museum Pushkin - autograph of Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev and a bureau cylinder made by Russian masters at the end of the 18th century, the Peterhof State Museum-Reserve - a number of paintings and pieces of antique furniture, the Borodino Battle Panorama Museum - portraits of the participants of the Battle of Borodino, the State Historical Museum - ten unique carved caskets by masters of the Russian North, the State Memorial Museum of Defense and the Siege of Leningrad - more than one hundred and twenty photographs from the time of the war. In 2019, Mikhail Karisalov submitted a number of documents to I.S. Turgenev from the collection of I.S. Silberstein: 38 letters from the writer of 1857–1882, 13 letters by Gustave Flaubert to Turgenev for the period 1873–1879, and 2 letters from Emil Zola to Turgenev dating from 1867 and 1883.

Antique collection of the Karisalov family donated to the A.S. State Museum of Fine Arts Pushkin, was formed over several decades. Its first exhibits were bronze helmets, which were collected by Irina Karisalova.

The exhibition shows helmets of the 3rd – 1st centuries BC, made by masters of the Kuban region and the North Caucasus and showing the traditions of the craft of ancient gunsmiths. The works of painted ceramics represent the major centers of its production: Etruria - alpoy with friezes typical of these vessels, filled with figures of panthers and birds; Attica - a red-figure crater with the image of Hercules and satyrs. Four vessels of the collection belong to the products of the leading vase-painting centers of Southern Italy - Puglia and Campania, and are made in the characteristic style of murals in the heyday of these schools. Two sculptural monuments - the votive head of a woman (late IV - early III century BC), which served as a thank-you gift to the deity, and the marble head of the philosopher (second half of the II century BC) mark important stages in the development of the antique portrait. The bronze rings displayed at the exhibition could be amulets testifying to the patronage of a deity, were used as personal seals of the owner, served as a sign of belonging to a religious, political or military community. Chronologically, the exhibits in this section of the collection cover the period from the 5th century BC. 3rd century AD

The collection of antique art is the third gift of the Karisalov family of the Pushkin Museum to them. A.S. Pushkin. The first was two unique funeral urns of Maya Quiche culture of the 7th – 12th centuries. In 2016, the philanthropist helped return to the collection of the Pushkin Museum a 17th-century painting “Love Scene in the Palace Interior” by an unknown artist. The work once belonged to Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna, the daughter of Nicholas I, the wife of Duke Maximilian Leuchtenberg, and was kept at the Pushkin Museum from 1925 to 1931.