Stieglitz Museum in St. Petersburg

How many unusual museums exist in the world and in St. Petersburg in particular? It can be not only art galleries or artifacts in famous old buildings, but also interesting original monuments of Russian culture in ordinary buildings.

Stieglitz Museum, St. Petersburg

In the center of the city, where the Academy, which produces artists, is located, there is a museum in which a unique collection of things belonging to different times and styles is collected. More than thirty thousand exhibits from antiquity to our days can be seen in the museum: porcelain, ceramics, metal, furniture, Russian tile stoves, as well as the work of students over the past half-century.

The building itself is also a historical heritage and a unique monument. It was created by the architect Maximilian Messmacher, it resembles the Italian buildings of the Renaissance. It was built not only for beauty, but also for students to clearly see the example and be able to join the world art. In the design of the halls, the students took an active part in order to apply their knowledge obtained in the classrooms in practice.

History of the Museum of Applied Art Stieglitz

In 1876, a well-known baron, as well as a financier, industrialist and philanthropist Alexander Stiglitz wanted to create a school of technical drawing. Two years later, in 1878, a museum appeared in one of the buildings of the school. Active participation in the development was taken by the statesman Alexander Polovtsev, the architect Maximilian Mesmakher. It was he who in 1885 began the construction of the building in which the museum was to be located, at the same time antiques and objects of applied art were bought at various Russian and international auctions.

The collection of the Museum of Applied Art of the Stieglitz Academy included high-quality exhibits that relate to the epochs of antiquity, the Renaissance, the Middle Ages and to the Eastern and Russian art of the 17th and 18th centuries.

11 years later, in 1896, an official opening took place, where Nikolay II was present with his family, as well as notable people of St. Petersburg.

In specially made show-windows, samples of gold, copper, porcelain, jewelry, fabrics were placed.

Since then, the collection of the Stieglitz Museum has been constantly replenished, international exhibitions have been held. In 1898 there was an exhibition "World of Art", in 1904 - "Historical Exhibition of Art Objects", in 1915 - "Exhibition of Church Antiquities."

Museum funds

More than thirty-five thousand items in 14 rooms and galleries from antiquity to our days are located in the Museum of Stieglitz. All funds can be divided into art forms, such as the pottery and porcelain fund. The main exhibits presented here were collected after the war and were obtained from the collections of the Hermitage, the Russian Museum and the Academy of Arts of the USSR. Products made at the imperial porcelain factory, items from China and Japan, made during the reign of the Ch'ing dynasty are presented.

In the art glass fund, there are more than 350 exhibits from different eras, and some belong to the VI-V centuries. BC. E.: Glasses, beads, amulets, vessels. Separately, we can mention the items related to the Venetian glassmaking, and a collection of Russian glass, which is represented by single samples.

Another interesting collection, represented in the Stieglitz Museum, are fabrics, which number more than 7 thousand samples, demonstrating various ways of decoration: weaving, printing, embroidery with silk and gold threads. A significant part is made up of apparel, which were transferred from the Museum of the History of Religion: the clothes of priests, ministers of the Buddhist temple, Catholic Ornats and others.

In addition to these funds, the museum also features a collection of fine art, artistic bone carving, furniture and wood carvings.

Ticket price and museum address

The Stieglitz Museum is located at Solyanoy Pereulok, 13-15. Anyone can come here and see the exhibits and temporary exhibitions shown every day, except on Sundays and Mondays.

You can reach the museum by public transport, the nearest metro stations are Nevsky Prospect, Chernyshevskaya and Gostiny Dvor.

The ticket price for adults is 300 rubles, and for schoolchildren, pensioners and students - 150 rubles. The main thing is not to forget to produce documents. Participants of the Second World War, Heroes of the Soviet Union and children under 7 years old free admission. There are also group excursions, which are worth negotiating in advance.