Presentation 4

Presenting Japanese Art: A View
from Russia, Between East and West
Dr. Ainura Yusupova
国際シンポジウム

ProfileAinura Yusupova is Senior Curator of Asian Paintings and Prints, Departmentof Prints and Drawings, the State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts. She had beenat the Museum since 2007 and acted as the Head of the Department of Printsand Drawings from 2010 to 2016. After graduating from the Department of Art
History at Moscow State University (MA: 1976–1981; PhD course: 1990–1993)
she worked at several museums in Moscow, including the Moscow KremlinMuseums (2003–2007) and the State Museum of Oriental Art (1981–2003).
She has curated several exhibitions of Japanese art at several Russian museums,
with recent ones including:Japanese Prints of the 18th–19th Centuries from the Collection of the State Pushkin
Museum of Fine Arts (The State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow; 2008)
Samurai: Treasures of the Japanese Daimyo from the Collection of Tokyo National
Museum (Organized by Moscow Kremlin Museums and Tokyo National
Museum, Moscow; 2008)
Raku Ware: The Cosmos in a Tea Bowl (Organized by the Pushkin State Museumof Fine Arts, the Raku Museum, and the Japan Foundation in cooperation withthe Embassy of Japan in Russia and the assistance of the National Museum ofModern Art, Kyoto; 2015)
Masterpieces of Edo Paintings and Prints (Organized by the Pushkin State
Museum of Fine Arts, Tokyo National Museum, and the Agency for CulturalAffairs, Japan, with the special participation of the Chiba City Museum of Art
and the Itabashi Museum of Art; 2018)

In Moscow the most significant collection of Japanese art is in the Pushkin State Museumof Fine Arts. The bulk of the Museum’s Japanese collection once belonged to the Russian
naval officer Sergei Nicholaevich Kitaev (1864–1927). Kitaev entered the Naval Collegein St. Petersburg in 1878 and went into active duty upon graduating in 1881. He wasnominated for navigation abroad in 1885, and for more than ten years served on shipsthat sailed near Japanese shores, including the clipper “Vestnik”, the frigate “VladimirMonomach”, and the cruiser “Admiral Kornilov”. Kitaev was promoted to the rank ofcolonel in 1909 for his brilliant service and was granted the highest military honors. He
remained affiliated with the navy after returning to St. Petersburg until his resignation
around 1912 due to failing health.
Kitaev was captivated by Japanese art and at that time collected a considerable number of artworks. He wrote that the works were bought “... in Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka,
Yokohama, Kobe and many other cities and villages; in the space of several years myagents probably traveled all over Japan ...” Kitaev also visited some Japanese artists andtheir families, such as Ogata Gekkō. Particularly interesting are his contacts with thedescendants of Kishi Ganku.
According notes of made by Sergey Kitaev, his collection consisted around 7000
items, including 276 paintings on hanging and handscrolls and foldng screens; 4000
woodblock prints; around 100 printred books, 1900 drawings and scetches by ink, 830
Presenting Japanese Art: A View from Russia, Between East and West

39

International Symposium

Senior Curator of Asian Paintings and Prints, Department of Prints and Drawings, The Pushkin State
Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow, Russia

litography copies of the Japanese painters. It is also included 180 posters and 1300
photographies.
Moreover, some parts of the collection were probably lost or destroyed.
The first exhibition of Kitaev’s collection opened in St. Petersburg in 1896. After being
displayed there in the Academy of Art, the exhibition was shown in Moscow in 1897 at theHistorical Museum, where Kitaev delivered several lectures on Japanese art. In the winterof 1905–1906, after the Portsmouth Peace Treaty was signed, a third exhibition was heldat the Rerich’s Society in St. Petersburg. The first catalogue listing of the collection waspublished in 1896, and reissued in 1905.
Upon retiring from the navy because of illness in 1916, Kitaev decided to go abroadfor treatment. At that time he arranged to store his collection at the Rumyantsev
Museum in Moscow, and from there it was transferred to the Pushkin State Museum ofFine Arts in 1924.
Kitaev moved to Japan in 1916, next year in Russia happened Communist Revolution of 1917. There is no other information about his life in Japan exept article inJapanese newspaper “Yokohama Bōeki Shinpō” published in October 16, 1918 about
him and his collection and short information about his death in Yokohama in 1927. Henever returned back to Russia.
The Museum of Fine Arts named in honour of Emperor Alexander III and attachedto the Imperial Moscow University as a University teaching center open to the public atlarge was opened in May 1912.
A major collection of originals paintings and prints appeared in the museum muchlater, after the Communist Revolution of 1917. Almost all private collections were confiscated by the Soviet Government and transfered to the different State Museums. In
1923 the Museum of Fine Arts was granted independence of Moscow University, in 1932
it was renamed the Museum of Fine Arts, and in 1937 it was dedicated to Alexander
Pushkin.
Most publications and exhibitions of the Japanese art at the State Pushkn Fine Arts
Museum after WWII made by Dr. Beata Voronova (1926–2017), who was curator of
the collection of Orinetal Paintings and Prints from the mid of 1950-s till 2007.
Recent Exhibitions of Japanese Art. 2008. Exhibition “Japanese Woodcut Prints of 18–end of 19 centuries from the Pushkin
Museum of Fine Arts”. Commemorating to the publishing of catalogue raisonné ofcollection. 250 pieces.
. 2015. Raku Ware: Cosmos in a Tea Bowl.
Organizers: The PMFA, the Hermitage Museum, the Raku Museum, the Japan Foundation, National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto. 170 pieces. 2017. Yasumasa Morimura. The history of the self-portrait at the Pushkin Museum ofFine Arts.
. The display presented over 80 pieces from the collection of The National Museum ofArt (Osaka), Hara Museum of Contemporary Art (Tokyo), The National Museum ofModern Art (Kyoto), and from the collection of the artist.
. 2018. Tadashi Kawamata. Para-site Project at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts.
. 2018. Masterpieces of Edo Paintings and Prints.
Organizers: The PMFA, the Tokyo National Museum, the Agency for Cultural Affairs,
Japan, with the special participation of the Chiba City Museum of Art and the Itabashi
Museum of Art. 135 pieces

40International Symposium: The Arts of Japan in a Global Context: Beyond Orientalism and Occidentalism