Hermitage Days in Vladivostok 2020

Participating in the opening ceremony were Alena Datsenko, Director of the Primorye State Picture Gallery’ Natalya Levdanskaya, its Deputy Director; Yekaterina Sharova, Head of the State Hermitage’s Department of Information Projects; and Yevgeny Feodorov, Head of Hermitage’s Project Finance Sector. The ceremony was preceded by a press conference devoted to collaboration between the State Hermitage and the Primorye (Maritime) State Picture Gallery, which is serving as a base for the Hermitage Days for the fifth time.

“This is already the fifth year that our premises are the venue for the Hermitage Days that are connected with one of the world’s greatest museums – the State Hermitage,” Alena Datsenko said at the start of the ceremony. “The programme this year is, as always, full: it includes both professional events and events for all the inhabitants of Vladivostok. Each year it acquaints us with how the Hermitage lives. This year that live has been extraordinary – the halls stood silent, without visitors, and the majority of the work moved online. For that reason, we are very pleased to be presenting the Hermitage Online project to you.”

Mikhail Piotrovsky, General Director of the State Hermitage, sent video greetings to the gathering: “I am very glad that our work in Vladivostok is progressing so well and that all the directions that have already become firmly established for the Hermitage Days in Vladivostok are developing – splendid master classes on restoration, children’s art, an exhibition from the Hermitage, lectures, the Hermitage library, the cinema… This time we have also brought a lot from the experience that we acquired during the pandemic that came down upon us and, all things considered, has still not gone away. Many things furthered the development of our technological refinements. We will be telling you about the Hermitage Online, about new ways of interacting with the public, about new types of filming – and we will be discussing with you what has worked and what hasn’t. In our activities in Vladivostok we are advancing further and further. We are expanding what we do. I hope that very soon we will be celebrating Hermitage Days in new premises: first in one place – in the centre, and then in a second – up on the hill. We have very big plans and I am very glad that the Hermitage’s first major outing, after we have stopped hiding away from the pandemic altogether, has been to Vladivostok in particular. There is great meaning to that. I wish you all the best and wonderful Hermitage Days, of which there will be many more. The Hermitage Days in Vladivostok are a splendid tradition of which we are all very fond.”

The programme for the Hermitage Days 2020 began with the solemn ceremony of franking a postcard for the Hermitage Days in Vladivostok. By tradition, a postcard is issued that features one of the exhibits that the Primorye State Picture Gallery acquired in the 1930s from the State Hermitage. This time, the card carries a reproduction of Landscape with Ruins by Giovanni Paolo Panini (1691–1765).

The professional programme started as usual with a master class in restoration as part of the “Preserving Cultural Heritage Together” project operated jointly by the Hermitage and the Coca-Cola system in Russia. The theme of the master class was the basics of using analytical scientific methods of study in restoration. Sharing their experience in pre-restoration research were Kamila Burkhanovna Kalinina, a leading researcher in the Laboratory for the Scientific Restoration of Easel Paintings, and Marina Valeryevna Michri, an artist-restorer of the highest category in the Laboratory for the Scientific Restoration of Works of Applied Art Made from Organic Materials.

An important part of the programme is the Hermitage Cinema. This year its main theme is to be the work of museums during the pandemic. Each day, visitors to the gallery will be able to acquaint themselves with instalments of the Hermitage Online that were produced between March and September 2020. For the daily showings, the project curators have selected around 80 broadcasts that tell about the most diverse aspects of the Hermitage’s life. Each day of the week is devoted to a particular topic: the videos allow people to visit the restoration laboratories, to acquaint themselves with the life of researchers and curators, and also to find out about the life of the museum under quarantine and while emerging from it.

On 23 September, the whole day was devoted to the “Hermitage Visiting Colleagues” series that presents interaction and mutual assistance between museums during the pandemic: viewers will be able to join the Hermitage in virtual visits to a whole variety of museums in Saint Petersburg and beyond, as well as getting to know the Hermitage’s satellite centres. That day at 1 pm Moscow Time (8 pm in Vladivostok), the Hermitage Online visited the capital of Russia’s Far Eastern Maritime Territory in a new instalment devoted to the collaboration between the Hermitage and the Primorye State Picture Gallery and the programme for the Hermitage Days in Vladivostok.

From 22 September, the gallery will be hosting an exhibition of children’s art entitled “The Ancient World through the Eyes of Children” presenting the results of the competition “Encounters in the Hermitage. The Invincible Heroes of Ancient Greece” held as part of the Days of Classical Antiquity in the State Hermitage festival for youngsters. This year, for the first time, the festival was held online, making it possible to expand the geography of competition entries, with children from Vladivostok and Magadan to Rome and Amsterdam participating.

On 25 September, the exhibition “Catherine the Great’s Romance with Stone. Glyptic Art from the Collection of the State Hermitage” will open, presenting 30 engraved stones that give an idea of the history of collecting and the development of the stone-cutter’s art from the Archaic era of Ancient Greece to the Modern Era in Western Europe and Russia. The exhibition curator is Yelena Igorevna Arsentyeva, a researcher in the State Hermitage’s Department of Classical Antiquity, who also gives a series of lectures on the art of carved stones in the Hermitage Lecture Hall.

By tradition, during the Hermitage Days, visitors to the gallery will have access to the exhibition “The Hermitage Library”, where they can acquaint themselves with new publications from the State Hermitage: scholarly works, catalogues of the collections and exhibitions. This year particular emphasis is placed on publications on art for children. The programme is also planned to include a video conference between volunteers at the Gallery and the Hermitage, the annual “The Hermitage Is Getting Closer” action and much more.

The Hermitage Days in Vladivostok will end on 27 September with another annual event – “Vladivostok Antiquity. We read Homer”.

The Hermitage Days in Vladivostok are taking place from 21 to 27 September 2020.