ABRAMTSEVO STATE, HISTORICAL, ARTISTIC AND LITERARY MUSEUM-RESERVE

Moscow Oblast
Museynaya Street 1, Abramtsevo Village, Sergiev Posad District, Moscow Region
Phones: +7 (496) 543-24-70
Web site: http://www.abramtsevo.net/

The Abramtsevo Museum-Reserve occupies about 50 hectares. The museum houses many exhibits: paintings, drawings, sculptures, photographs and much more. The oldest building in the estate is considered to be a one-story manor house, built under the Golovins at the end of the XVIII century. In it you can see photos, paintings, furniture and other things of the Aksakov family. Also in the house there are portraits of members of the Mamontov family and members of the Abramtsevo art circle.

Of interest to tourists is the kitchen building. It was built in 1870, when the estate was acquired by the Mamontovs, and the owners lived in it while the main manor house was being rebuilt. Now there are various collections on display here. For example, a large collection of architectural carvings. It was started by artists I. E. Repin and V. D. Polenov.

Another unusual collection is the items of peasant use: buckets, salt pans, buraks, etc.In 1885, Elizaveta Grigoryevna Mamontova, together with Elena Dmitrievna Polenova, went around the nearest villages and collected these samples in the huts. Among them there are interesting exhibits. For example, bells. They had a special purpose: they were hung on the neck of a pet and called "bot". The collection includes a bell podgajny, which is a miniature replica of the big bell. There is a legend about the birth of bells from the veche bells of Novgorod and Pskov.

An interesting collection of spinning wheels decorated with carvings. Among them are spinning wheels for flax, for wool, a spinning wheel-a tool for hand spinning. Some of them were popular in the northern regions of Russia.

The museum's collection contains rare books – more than three thousand of them. The foundation is based on materials related to the Aksakov and Mamontov periods of Abramtsev's history.

The Abramtsevo Museum is located near the town of Sergiev Posad 60 kilometers (37 miles) to the north-east of Moscow.

The estate was laid out on the bank of the River Vorya in the middle of the 18th century and soon became famous due to its owners. The writer Sergey Aksakov purchased Abramtsevo in 1843. He created here his best works: notes on angling, hunting and autobiographical stories. In the days of Aksakov, writers Nikolay Gogol and Ivan Turgenev, historian Mikhail Pogodin, actor Mikhail Schepkin and other celebrated contemporaries were his guests in Abramtsevo.

The railroad magnate and patron of arts Savva Mamontov bought Abramtsevo in 1870. The new owner played host to artists Vasily Polenov, Viktor Vasnetsov, Ilya Repin, Ilya Ostroukhov, Valentin Serov, Konstantin Korovin, Mikhail Nesterov, Mikhail Vrubel and other creative personalities who united to an informal community known as the Abramtsevo Colony. Participants of the Colony created paintings, drawings, sculptures, architectural projects, decorative and applied art articles.

They collected peasant handicrafts and staged amateur performances. The foundation of Abramtsevo joinery and pottery started the revival and development of traditional Russian crafts – woodcarving and majolica. Abramtsevo was nationalized and turned into a museum after the October revolution, 1917. Within the 20th century Abramtsevo gave inspiration to the painters Igor Grabar, Pyotr Konchalovsky, Ilya Mashkov, the sculptors Vera Mukhina, Boris Korolev and many other prominent artists. Nowadays the Museum occupies about 50 hectares (0,2 square miles) along with a park and picturesque outskirts of the Vorya River and comprises architectural monuments created in the 18–19th centuries. The Museum`s collection accounts for more than 25 000 items: pictures, drawings, sculptures, arts and crafts, photographs and archives of previous owners.

In Abramtsevo, Aksakov developed as a writer and created his best literary works. For example, "Notes on the fish supper", "The childhood years of Bagrov-grandson", the fairy tale "Scarlet Flower".

The writer Nikolai Gogol was a close friend of Aksakov and visited him in Abramtsevo. He even had his own room, where he usually stayed. It was in Abramtsevo that Gogol worked for some time on the second volume of the novel "Dead Souls", which he later burned.

In Abramtsevo, many paintings were painted that became famous. Among them are " Zaporozhtsy..", "The Procession in the Kursk province", "Seeing off a recruit"," Did not wait "by Ivan Repin;" Khotkovskaya Doroga "by Vasily Surikov; " The Girl with Peaches" by Valentin Serov.