Since 1954 the Department has regularly sent out expeditions to various regions of the Russian Federation, in order to discover and collect examples of ancient Russian art. As a result, the Museum came into possession of over 150 works of early Russian art, including some thirteenth-century icons, such as a Si Nicholas by a painter of the Novgorod school, a group of fifteenth- to seventeenth-century icons by northern artists, and a sixteenth-century Our Lady of Smolensk, an icon from the Yaroslavl region.
Since 1958 the Department has been carrying on archaeological excavations in Pskov. Among the more remarkable recent findings are over 500 specimens of pendant seals — lead plaques with stamped designs and inscriptions — dating from the thirteenth to sixteenth centuries. In 1974 the archaeologists uncovered some precious late fourteenth- and early fifteenth-century frescoes on the walls of the Church of the Intercession, built in 1398. The church was almost completely buried under earth fortifications constructed in 1701, and this saved both the building and its frescoes from subsequent destruction.
One of the most important sources of new accessions is the work of the Hermitage Purchasing Commission; another, donations made by private collectors. Among the more recent acquisitions, a collection of works by Russian craftsmen, bequested to the Museum by Sergei Pavlov, Corresponding Member of the Academy of Sciences, deserves particular attention. It contains forty-eight beautiful pieces of eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century glassware, and over thirty pieces of silverwork, some of which bear the marks of well-known silversmiths.
During the last decade alone, the collections of the Department have almost doubled in size and now number over 285,000 items. In their present state they provide a fairly complete picture of Russian cultural history from the sixth to the nineteenth century. The permanent exhibitions illustrate the evolution of Russian representational art, architecture, literature, education, science, and technology. The composite arrangement of materials makes it possible to show more clearly the interrelations between the various phenomena of cultural life in the process of social development, and to give an idea of the great wealth of Russia’s cultural heritage.
The early periods in the history of Russian culture are represented by a rich variety of items. Most interesting of all are archaeological artefacts, which include several widely known complexes of finds, such as those unearthed in Kiev on the sites of the Desiatinnaya Church and the St Michael Golden-Domed Monastery; some material uncovered in Novgorod and on the fortified site of Raiki in the vicinity of Berdichev; and, finally, the Vladimir hoard of gold and silver articles. The superb craftsmanship of ancient Vladimir jewellers is well illustrated by gold kolt pendants, beads, riasnos (elaborate chains for kolt pendants), and agraffes with designs of the finest filigree work. The splendid collection of objects (over fourteen thousand items) found in 1957—64 during Mikhail Karger’s excavation of the ancient Russian town of Iziaslavl was also placed in the Hermitage. It is one of the richest complexes of finds relating to the culture and art of twelfth- and thirteenth-century Rus. The collection of manuscripts and early printed books has grown considerably over the last few years. It includes such magnificent specimens of Russian book decoration as fifteenth-century illuminated manuscripts of the Gospels, with miniatures and head ornaments; The Apostle and Ostrog Bible, printed by Ivan Fiodorov; a Psalter rendered in verse by Simeon Polotsky, printed in Moscow in 1680 and illustrated with an engraving by Afanasy Trukhmensky after a drawing by Simon Ushakov; and seventeenth-century Gospels in embossed bindings.
The collection of thirteenth- to eighteenth-century icons and eleventh- and twelfth-century frescoes is small but worthy of note. The Kiev, Moscow, Novgorod, Pskov, and northern schools of painting are represented. Among the oldest examples of work by northern artists are some thirteenth- to sixteenth-century icons, of which a few bear inscriptions showing the date of execution, the painter’s and the patron’s names, and the place of origin. One of the early works of the Pskov school of icon painters is the Manifestation of Our Lord dating from the beginning of the fourteenth century. This icon is very close to the well-known frescoes in the Snetogorsky monastery near Pskov, which were executed in 1313. Among the earliest works owned by the Department are the fifteenth-century icon of St Theodore the Recruit and St Theodore Stratelates, of the Novgorod school, and the early sixteenth-century icons of St Nicholas, The Transfiguration, and The Nativity.
One must also mention the exceptionally important frescoes discovered by the expendition of Nikolai Voronin in Smolensk among the remains of the so-called Church on the Stream (twelfth and early thirteenth centuries). These frescoes used to decorate the lower section of the walls and acrosoleae of the church. Although badly damaged, they have retained their original lively colouring, parts of the design, and also an ornamentation showing birds, lion figures, etc. These frescoes throw light on the art of mural painting in Smolensk, which until quite recently was completely unknown.
The Department owns a small but carefully chosen collection of specimens of Russian decorative art of the twelfth to seventeenth centuries. This includes a wide range of objects, from gold and silver church plate studded with precious stones, to everyday items, such as ceramic tiles, and tools made from iron, tin, lead, and copper: framed mirrors, processional lanterns, window-frames, inkwells, tableware, kitchen utensils, caskets, small icons, and other things. The wealth of their forms bears witness to the fine taste and high artistic skill of the craftsmen concerned. These masters had an amazing command of a great variety of techniques — chasing, forging, engraving, niello, filigree, and granulation — and effectively combined silver and gold, enamels, gems, and pearls. One thirteenth-century copperplate with a representation of St Mark in gold is particularly interesting, as is the work of the celebrated silversmiths and engravers of the Kremlin Armoury — a unique seventeenth-century door from the Cathedral of the Archangel Michael in Veliky Ustiug, covered with numerous copperplates with gold and silver inlays and engraved biblical motifs.
There are also elegant silver koushes (scoops or ladles) of typically Russian forms, which remind one of a boat or perhaps a splendid bird swimming in the water, and spherical loving-cups decorated with ornamentation and inscriptions.
Finally, there is an extremely interesting collection of seventeenth-century Usolye enamels from the town of Solvychegodsk, including copper or silver bowls, scent bottles, caskets, and cups, all almost entirely covered with painted designs of brightly coloured enamels. These works have no counterparts in any other country. The Hermitage possesses many brilliant examples produced in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries and showing a wealth of rich, saturated colours. Their intricate designs incorporate various flowers, birds and animals.
The collections illustrating the development of Russian culture in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries are the most extensive and varied. Alongside paintings, sculptures, and works of the graphic arts, the Department preserves excellent collections of objects of applied and decorative art: furniture, textiles, and costumes, ceramics, gold and silver work, articles of copper, steel, bronze, stone, and wood.
The collection of paintings comprises almost 3,000 works by Russian artists — Vladimir Borovikovsky, Dmitry Levitsky, Karl Briullov, Alexei Venetsianov, Stepan Shchukin, Vasily Tropinin, and Nikolai Argunov; and foreign artists who lived in Russia, like Pietro Rotari, Carl Christineck, Jean-Louis Voile, and Johann-Baptist Lampi. This section differs from the famous collections of the Tretyakov Gallery or the Russian Museum in its approach to and choice of material, which is intended to illustrate the various stages in the progress of Russian culture. Of great interest to the cultural historian are portraits of Russian statesmen, scholars, inventors, writers, military leaders, and artists: Peter the Great, Boris Sheremetev, Mikhail Serdiukov, Andrei Nartov, Mikhail Lomonosov, Ivan Kulibin, Ivan Shuvalov, Gavrila Derzhavin, Alexander Suvorov, Francesco Bartolommeo Rastrelli, and many others; paintings by serf artists, such as M. Funtusov, Ivan Argunov, and Grigory Soroka; and portraits of people exemplifying various social types — landowners and civil servants, bankers, the military stationed in St Petersburg and in the provinces, retired soldiers, merchants, and minor officials.