Sold out masterpieces
Botticelli. "Adoration of the Magi." It was there, but it floated away!
All the features of the face suffered,
They made faces as if he was drunk.
-What happened to her?
- She was sold.
- Where to?
- There... over the ocean.
We are selling
And wood and leather,
But we lack beauty!
Vasily Fedorov “Sold Venus”, 1956
They made faces as if he was drunk.
-What happened to her?
- She was sold.
- Where to?
- There... over the ocean.
We are selling
And wood and leather,
But we lack beauty!
Vasily Fedorov “Sold Venus”, 1956
History and culture. Not long ago, VO published several articles about how the country’s property was sold off during the Gorbachev-Yeltsin era. People who “sold their homeland” wholesale and retail were condemned, and it is clear that there was mass condemnation of this phenomenon.
But let's think about what else can any country trade, except... itself. After all, as we say, “native land”, “native forests”, “native fields”, etc. Native is a derivative of the word “Motherland”. This means that wood from the forest is nothing more than a piece of “homeland”, isn’t it? Both oil and gas from the depths of the “native land” are the same as grain grown in the “native fields”.
Even a tank sold abroad, or a Kalashnikov assault rifle, are some kind of “pieces of the motherland”, because they contain metal, coal, mined on its soil, and the labor of people who ate the bread grown on it. That is, “one can,” it turns out, sell one’s homeland, and even one can and should.
The point, therefore, is not about what “cannot” be sold, but only about not underselling when selling. He sold his “piece of homeland” at a profit – well done! Cheap?! Punish the son of a bitch!
True, there is one more important circumstance. What resources are the sold parts of the homeland classified as: renewable or non-renewable. The forest can grow, and why not trade it? The main thing is to plant new forests. Nature produces grain every year, which means it is a good product. But oil... pumped out of the depths today, it will not appear there tomorrow. That is, when selling oil, you should think carefully so as not to sell it short, and at least leave something for your descendants.
The country’s non-renewable resources also include works of art and various treasures accumulated by our ancestors, which have negligible technological but enormous social value.
The same applies to paintings. They don’t drink or eat them, they don’t fuel airplanes, but masterpieces of painting are a very valuable asset of the country. They, of course, can also be sold, like anything else. But here it is especially important not to cheapen, because the country will no longer have such films. Meanwhile, it will be possible to earn money only from tourists who come to look at these paintings... for centuries, until they decay!
The 1918 decision banning the export of artistic treasures from the country. Photocopy of text from the newspaper Izvestia
And today we will tell you about one such episode related to the sale of works of art from our Hermitage in 1929–1934.
It was stated that money was needed for industrialization. And so, to earn them, 2 paintings were selected, and 880 of them were works of great artistic value, and 350 were masterpieces of world significance. They have been in the Hermitage since its founding by Catherine the Great, but now they have decided to sell them. Some of these paintings did not find a buyer, and they were able to return to the museum.
Here are just about 50 of the most famous masterpieces - including works by Jan Van Eyck, Titian, Rembrandt and Raphael - Russia has lost forever. There are no paintings by Van Eyck left in the Hermitage (and even in Russia), and of the works of Raphael, Botticelli and Perugino, only minor works of little value have survived. The collection of Rembrandt paintings from the Hermitage, considered the richest in the world, has now lost the palm to the collections of Amsterdam and New York.
A similar fate befell the collection of Dutch and Flemish paintings, which were collected and bequeathed to the Hermitage by P. P. Semyonov-Tyan-Shansky, as well as the masterpieces of the Stroganov Palace, nationalized after the October Revolution. As if all this were not enough, artistic silver and bronze, numismatic collections and precious enamels of Byzantium were sold abroad from the Hermitage.
Sorting of confiscated church valuables in Gokhran. By the way, church valuables also floated “there” - 60% of the icons circulating on the antiques sales market are from us, from Soviet Russia, sold there precisely in the 20s and 30s!
Already in our days, Hermitage employees regarded everything that happened at that time as a “tragedy and catastrophe”, they believed that it was “an ill-conceived, often inept, even senseless activity, and therefore deplorable in its results.” Well, let's see if it really was so.
From the very beginning of the revolution, that is, already in 1918, the export of artistic treasures abroad was prohibited as ... “theft of national property.” However, already in the first decade of Soviet power, active sales of nationalized works of art, as well as jewelry confiscated from the bourgeoisie, began to the West. But all of these were, in general, ordinary antiques, which it was not a pity to sell.
At first, Western collectors bought works of art at auctions held in Soviet Russia
But in February 1928, the Hermitage and the Russian Museum demanded a list of works of art worth a total of 2 million rubles for sale abroad. In Leningrad, a special agency “Antikvariat” was created for this purpose, subordinate to the People's Commissariat for Education. The Hermitage was supposed to sell 250 paintings at a price of about 5 rubles each, and also sell engravings, weapon and even items of unique Scythian gold.
Moreover, the selection of paintings was not carried out by experienced professional art critics, but by people very far from art: the special commissioner of the People's Commissariat of Trade and the managing director of "Antiques" A. M. Ginzburg and N. S. Angarsky. And all this was resolved by Y. E. Rudzutak. Accordingly, a new director of the Hermitage, G. V. Lazaris, a former official of the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, was appointed.
As a result, by October 26, 1928, the Hermitage lost 732 items with a total value of 1 million 400 thousand rubles. And from January 1 to June 7, 1929, Antikvariat received from the Hermitage already 1 objects of art for sale. They were presented at Berlin and London auctions, and...
The appetite came while eating: already in July 1929, 5 objects were removed from the Hermitage in seven weeks; 521 for 2 days of June and for July – 504, that is, much more than for almost the entire previous year. And, as already noted, they sold not only paintings. Thus, from the numismatics department of the Hermitage, 19 gold and 3 platinum coins went to the West, and from the weapons fund a cuirass and a helmet, as well as a complete set of knightly armor made by German gunsmiths of the 017th century. As if they didn’t have enough armor there? So you can imagine how little it was sold for!
Calouste Gulbenkian
Andrew Mellon
As has often happened in the past, we decided to carry out the matter secretly. However, the information that “The Soviets are selling Rembrandt” immediately spread among select Western art dealers.
And their first buyer was Calouste Gulbenkian, the same one who founded the Iraq Petroleum Company, which also traded oil with Soviet Russia. He prepared a list that included, for example, such paintings as “Judith” by Giorgione, “The Return of the Prodigal Son” by Rembrandt and “Perseus and Andromeda” by Rubens. But the deal to sell these paintings did not take place.
But then the Great Depression came, and people, even the very rich, had no time for paintings. That is, the timing for selling works of art was chosen extremely poorly. But what became even worse was that the release of so many masterpieces onto the market at once by Antiques simply oversaturated it and led to... dumping.
Then, in 1930, they decided to focus on masterpieces, so to speak, of the first class, since they were guaranteed to find a buyer. But the main thing is that it was possible to ask a high price for them in order to fulfill the plan for foreign currency earnings. It was then that they remembered Gulbenkian.
As a result, he bought 51 Hermitage exhibits for the amount of 278 pounds, but lost four paintings to the Parisian antique dealer Nathan Wildenstein. Most of these acquisitions are now on display in the museum in Lisbon, which was founded by the Gulbenkian Foundation.
Titian. "Venus in front of the mirror." Now in the National Gallery of Art, Washington
And then something very funny began. In quotes, of course, because in reality it was a real tragedy of “Dunka and Europe.”
The sellers felt that they had been cheap, but Gulbenkian considered the actions of the Soviet agents stupid and unprofessional and even went so far as to write a memorandum letter directly to the Soviet leadership. In it he wrote: “Trade whatever you want, but not what is in museum exhibitions. The sale of something that constitutes a national treasure gives rise to a very serious diagnosis.”
It turns out that this capitalist cared more about the image of our country than its then leaders. The main thing for them was currency! And it was obviously indifferent to them how the same workers in England, France and the USA would look at it, and among them there were quite a few people who were quite educated and understood what was what.
Velazquez Circle. Portrait of Pope Innocent X. Circa 1650. Now in the National Gallery of Art, Washington
But “a holy place is never empty.” Our management found another companion, Francis Mattison, a German art dealer. But before trading with him, she asked him to make a list of those paintings from Russian collections that cannot be sold because of their cultural and artistic value. That is, we ended up where we should have started!
He started compiling this list, looked, and some of the paintings from his list were already in Gulbenkian’s collection in Paris. He invited him to become his agent in relations with Russia, but Mattison decided to work himself. Organized a consortium together with Colnaghi and Knoedlerand Company from New York, after which in 1930–1931. together they bought 21 paintings, which were then bought by Andrew Mellon, a major American banker, government official and collector. This is how the famous Mellon collection came into being.
Through Mattison, he bought “The Annunciation” by Jan Van Eyck and “Madonna of Alba” by Raphael, the latter costing $1, which in those years was the largest amount paid for a painting. And in total, by the end of 166, he paid $400 for paintings from Russia.
And here’s what’s important: Mellon did not leave them to his descendants, but bequeathed his collection to the US government. And after his death it ended up in the National Gallery of Art in Washington.
From Gulbenkian's letter to the Soviet leadership regarding these sales:
“There is already a lot of talk in the public about these sales, which, in my opinion, cause great damage to your prestige (especially the sales to Mr. Mellon, who is very visible). It is possible that in some cases in America you will be able to achieve higher prices than those offered by me. However, the disadvantage of transactions made in this way is so significant from the point of view of prestige, propaganda and publicity that I can only be surprised that you still go for them.”
H. Averkamp. "Scene on Ice" It was sold to an unknown buyer and has been in the National Gallery of Art in Washington since 1967. There are no more works by Averkamp left in the Hermitage
True, the Hermitage staff still managed to save from sale the silver shrine of Alexander Nevsky, Sassanian silver (XNUMXrd–XNUMXth centuries AD), Scythian gold and Leonardo da Vinci’s Benois Madonna.
Finally, on April 25, 1931, the Politburo decided to create a list of masterpieces that could not be sold. So in 1932, some unsold rarities did return from the Antikvariat warehouses to the Hermitage.
In the same year, Sasanian silver was defended for the third time, and then only thanks to a letter from the Deputy Director of the Hermitage Orbeli to Stalin himself. He responded and in a letter to Orbeli mentioned the East, saying there is no need to sell everything. But the word “East” was heard. And the Hermitage employees (God clearly did not offend them with cunning!) began to classify as “oriental” almost any work of art where at least the edge of a Turkish carpet was visible in the same picture.
For quite a long time, information about the sale of masterpieces was kept secret, but on November 4, 1933, the New York Times published an article about the acquisition by the Metropolitan Museum of paintings “The Crucifixion” and “The Last Judgment” by Van Eyck. The reaction in the West to the trade in artistic values was extremely negative. So, in the newspaper “Segodnya” (admittedly, it was an emigrant newspaper, but many people still read it) a cartoon was published with a painting by Lorenzo Lotto “The Spouses” put up for sale. But instead of two spouses, Stalin and an antique dealer were drawn there. “Pay little!” - Stalin is indignant. “They always pay half for stolen goods,” the antique dealer replies.
The position of the country's leading museum was also made easier by the joint Plenum of the Central Committee and the Central Control Commission of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, which took place in mid-January 1933, at which they announced the early end of the first five-year plan, for which the foreign currency funds from the sale of exhibits were used. In addition, the Nazis came to power in Germany, and the German market for antiques was closed, and besides, he himself (due to the unprofessionalism of his employees) worked worse and worse.
Finally, at a meeting of the plenum of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks on November 15, 1933, the following decision was made:
“About the Hermitage.
Stop the export of paintings from the Hermitage and other museums without the consent of the commission consisting of vol. Bubnov, Rosengoltz, Stetsky and Voroshilov.”
Stop the export of paintings from the Hermitage and other museums without the consent of the commission consisting of vol. Bubnov, Rosengoltz, Stetsky and Voroshilov.”
By the way, Stetsky would later be shot in 1938...
The result of this whole epic was this: the income from the sale of the Hermitage collections provided no more than one percent of the country’s gross income. It is clear that this did not have a noticeable impact on industrialization, but the damage to the cultural heritage of the country and the international reputation of the USSR was simply enormous.
Who was its main initiator?
But who is A.I. Mikoyan, head of the People's Commissariat of Trade since 1926. And at the XV, XVI congresses of the CPSU (b) and party conferences, his People's Commissariat was very criticized for the lack of foreign exchange earnings. So he decided, together with the director of Antikvariat Ginzburg, to “patch the hole.”
As a result, more than six thousand tons (!) of cultural property were sold abroad through the People's Commissariat of Trade. And of course, this brought down the price on them. And the revenue amounted to less than 20 million rubles - three rubles per “kilogram of Rembrandt.”
By the way, the same Torgsin, without touching the treasures of the Hermitage, gave as much as 287 million rubles in gold for the needs of industrialization. The biggest profits from the sale of Hermitage antiques were made by German antique firms, who bought them cheaply and then resold them at exorbitant prices.
And then Hitler came and confiscated all their valuables, after which the Nazis began to sell them, earning foreign currency for the treasury of the Third Reich.
This is what haste in decision-making, lack of marketing research of trade operations and market research, the practice of “simple solutions” and, most importantly, the lack of culture among the country’s leaders, in the broad sense of the word, lead to!
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