Wednesdays Words

We still had one more day in St Petersburg, and that day we went to two more museums The Faberge Museum, and the Impressionist Museum.

The Faberge Museum is housed in the Shuvalov Palace. The palace has been restored to it grandure, and the collection of the Faberge items, including 11 of the eggs (9 were know as the Imperial Eggs) was amazing. There are several more of the eggs located in Moscow now. ( which is a trip for another time). There was Enamel ware, cigarette cases, card cases, beautiful desk sets all in silver, and sewing sets as well as plates and numerous other items from the house of Faberge. I could have spent the day there.

We then went to the Impressionist Museum which is housed in the General staff Building of the Admiralty. The building has been repurposed and is quite grand.This spectacular, crescent-shaped neoclassical building, most famous for its central triumphal arch, which brings pedestrians out on to Palace Square from Nevsky Prospekt, was designed by renowned St. Petersburg architect Carlo Rossi and completed in 1829. Before the Revolution it housed not only the offices of the General Staff, in the East Wing, but also the Tsarist Foreign Ministry and Ministry of Finance in the West Wing. Now, it is home to one of the most celebrated and popular parts of the Hermitage’s collection – the art of the impressionists and post-impressionists.

We went up to the 4th floor and saw works of art by Picasso, Renoir, Klaus, Bruegel and Matisse.Impressionism is a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage of time). our tour guides were Ekatarina and Anastasia.