This is the first time that an exhibition focusing on this particular period in Russian art - the second half of the 19th century up to the end of the tsarist regime in 1917 - has been shown in France and, whilst the early 20th century Avant-garde has been the subject of remarkable exhibitions (Paris-Moscou, Musée national d'art moderne - Centre Georges Pompidou, 1979, L'Avant-Garde russe 1905-1925, Nantes, musée des Beaux-Arts, 1993), this earlier period is largely unknown in this country.
The exhibition combines numerous disciplines (painting, sculpture, decorative arts, graphics, architecture and photography) with many of the pieces being exhibited here for the first time thanks to special loans in particular from the Tretyakov gallery in Moscow, the State Reserve-Museum in Smolensk and the Lev Tolstoy State Museum in Moscow.
Rather than providing an all encompassing panorama of the art of the period, the exhibition aims to explore the conditions which led to the emergence of a distinctively Russian art. All important in this process were Russia’s geography, natural environment and the sense of the land - "Mother Russia" - as is wonderfully demonstrated in the magnificent landscapes by Kouindji, Levitan and Nesterov. In examining Russia’s return to her roots; exploring her myths, history and folk art in all their diversity, the exhibition sheds light on the impact that the emerging awareness of a Russian identity made on the arts.
This quest for identity reached its peak with the Neo-Russian movement which influenced all the artistic disciplines. The final years of the 19th century were to see a complete reassessment of Russia’s folk heritage and a rediscovery of the art of ancient Russia.
One of the highlights of the exhibition is the section devoted to the Neo-Russian Movement, a movement which drew enthusiasm from architects (Ropet), painters (Vasnetsov, Roerich), draughtsmen (Bilibin, Polenova), sculptors (Konenkov), and decorative artists (Maloutin, Vashkov). In drawing its inspiration from folk sources the movement constitutes the most explicit link between the arts and the Russian national consciousness.
