04 november – 10 december
The All-Russian Decorative Art Museum presents a luxurious collection of metal works by Gennady Kubryakov. According to the legend that is fondly told, one day in the early 1980s, a citizen knocked at the museum's records department with a bag through which a newspaper roll was peeping. Introducing himself as Gennady Andreyevich Kubryakov, he said that he wanted to make a gift to the museum and began to carefully unwrap the newspaper, pulling out a beautifully crafted vase in the Russian style. It was a vase by the world-famous firm, on a par with Fabergé, the firm of Ovchinnikov, which today adorns the museum's exposition "Russian Style: from Historicism to Art Nouveau". "I want people to see it. If you exhibit it for two years, I'll give it to you as a gift." Kubryakov gave more than just the vase. In the 1990s, he donated 68 valuable exhibits dating from 1840-1920. These are metal objects of the highest artistic level.
The exhibition presents many of them: samovars, wind bells, carriage clocks, various items of noble household. On the one hand, these are ordinary things, on the other hand, they are precise reference points that allow us to feel the space of the past and feel the type of the current time in it.
The main place in the collection is occupied by a collection of samovars from gigantic to tiny, of different shapes and names: watermelon samovar, samovar-shot glass, samovar-vase, samovar-kitchen.
Special attention should be paid to "podduzhnye bells" - companions of travelling on Russian roads, small copies of church bells, which announced with their ringing the arrival of a courier trio, so that other carriages gave way, and the post station had time to prepare a replacement for tired horses. They were especially valued for their ringing, and each craftsman tried to make the voice of his bell recognisable.
No less interesting are various items of noble life of the XIX century, including such jewellery firms as Faberge, I.P. Khlebnikov, the Grachev brothers. These are items made of bronze and precious metals: folds, icons, figural tray, spoons, ladle, sugar bowl, liqueur device, tray dish, teapot, sugar bowls, fruit vases. Particularly popular with wealthy travellers were the 'Carriage Clocks'. They withstood constant vibration, temperature fluctuations, did not let in dust and moisture, sounded loud and clear, ringing one tone for an hour, another for a quarter, and another for the remaining number of minutes.
The exhibition "From Samovar to Fabergé" - elegant and thoughtful - allows us to see through the objects from Kubryakov's collection, sturdy and unusual, the sensible and charming devices of a bygone era.