Titian will leave soon

Pushkin Museum is about to lose the most valuable canvas

A week later, on December 18, from the Pushkin Museum to the mourning fanfares, the canvas of Titian Venus and Adonis will take out the canvas. The public life of a masterpiece in the museum will be over. The agreement between Pushkin’s MiMI and private owners on temporary storage and exhibiting came to an end. And the private owners today intend to pick up the canvas from the museum.

UPDATE

In the history of Venus and Adonis, the lights dawn. The representative of the owners Sergey Kruglikov “got in touch” with the director of the Mlime of Marina Horsk and announced his readiness to negotiate or acquire the Museum of the Masterpiece of Titian. The temporary storage agreement will not be extended - it is assumed that negotiations on the sale will begin in the past year.

The New Gazeta in detail told this detective story in the material "Give Titian Citizenship in Russia." It was about an incredible plot of attribution to an unknown picture, which turned out to be the original genius and squeezed the famous Prado canvas, in turn, turned out to be the second. And about the personality of the scientist who established authorship, a wonderful Italian with the world name of Victoria Markova. About what adventures fell to Titian in Italy and Russia. And, of course, - about the personality of the real owner trying to hide his valuable acquisition for fictitious documents and characters.

And today we have to state: Russia, not having time to give citizenship to Titian Vechellio, can lose it. Only four days left. We asked the Director of the Mlical Science Marina Loshak to comment on the situation.

- What is happening around Venus and Adonis now?

- We are trying to build negotiations about the future fate of the picture in the museum.

“But why are they still not conducted?”

- Because we begin negotiations when we clearly understand the situation when we are sure that we have a sponsor when the real market value of the thing is established. And this is a huge job, and we did it. Just on Monday, we sent a letter to the owners asking for a meeting in order to discuss the possibility of sale. There is no answer yet.

- So, since the New Gazeta published its investigation, a person was found ready to pay the necessary amount and transfer the picture to the gift to the museum?

- Yes, and this is the most important thing - that a person was found, ready to pay the amount adequate expert value. The fact is that the fresh provenance, whatever it may be, affects the price. And no matter how convincing we are, no matter how much their scientific discoveries demonstrate, the thing does not have a historical confirmed Provenance, history for centuries, and therefore, accordingly, it has a more modest price. Everyone understands this. And the owners must also understand this.

- Who made an expert assessment?

- We talked with a variety of experts, world, international, with museum colleagues. We were helped by a variety of categories of people, one way or another related to the assessment, from researchers to loyers, from experts in the era to auctionists. And in the end, the cost, in a general opinion, adequate to this thing, was named. And there is a person who is potentially ready to make this gift to the museum. And now, when everything is ready, we want to urgently negotiate. Today, on Wednesday, I sent another letter with a convincing request for these three days to find some kind of consensus. Bearing how much the museum made to reputs this picture, for its restoration, to introduce a scientific context.

- Can I get a document in which the owners ask to return the picture?

- It cannot be published. According to our agreement, they ask to prepare a picture for sending.

- And the Russian authorities at any level, from the ministerial to the presidential administration, aware of this plot?

- Yes, everyone is very interested in this, the Ministry of Culture wants the same as the museum, we are recommended to work in every way. And we worked, with our participation there was a philanthropist who is ready to provide this masterpiece to the museum with the consent of the owners.

- Can you name the market value of a thing?

- Until this was discussed with them, I can’t.

“Are you afraid of something in this situation?”

- I am very afraid that, in spite of everything, they will not want to sell the thing, and it will be a big loss - for the country, for the museum, for the audience ...

And most importantly, I am afraid that the picture will remain out of our attention. This is very dangerous for a thing, especially for such an important thing and so seriously attribute. It can simply fall out of cultural turnover, to lie in the storage for many years or be offered to some collector, not public ... What is the museum always fearing? That the thing will be lost for a long time. Will disappear.

- And the museum drawed the attention of the higher ones that the recent projection of things and, in fact, the person standing behind all the official agreements and papers, to put it mildly, is muddy? There are a lot of questions on the history of the import of the picture to Russia, and on the history of its legalization, and even - we will be straightforward - through the channels of the occurrence of the funds that paid the canvas. The authorities in this story are enough to stand on a purely legal position ...

- We act exclusively inside the legal field. And I will only negotiate with the organization with which we have a contract. With the company "Gollner Management Sarl". This is fundamentally important, they offered us this thing, they are an official person of this proposal, they still publicly at our first press conference, and publicly stated that they were ready to sell a thing to the museum. These are not our inventions, not undercover intrigues. This was originally the subject of discussion. Of course, every expert opinion, every camera, every publication, especially such as yours, as it seems to them, increases the price, that is, attracts more attention to the thing. But at the same time, we do this to demonstrate how important the picture is for the museum.

- Do you have a plan for operational actions?

- I hope to get an answer today; My assistants will sit on phones and seek this meeting. It must certainly happen, we must tell each other everything that we want to say. Any answer in this case is important. If they say that our conditions do not suit them, we must hear it. But maybe I will be able to convince them. So now is a very sharp moment.

- Why is this happening at the very last moment, why is the museum trying to jump into the already outgoing train?

- Because only now we have confidence that there is everything to carefully and argued to formulate the proposal. This is not a market, this is a process. We are a museum, not merchants, and in this case I am a person who can only conduct these negotiations with an open rack. I can’t bargain, I can only honestly say what this price is made of, and be convincing professionally. They, I hope, will be able to appreciate all the advantages of this story and our interaction, if they agree, and all the disadvantages, if they do not agree, because there are many minuses.

Not a single serious museum of the world, not a single major auction will go to the acquisition of this thing, knowing its background.

- That is, no serious cultural institution will take part in this. But is Arabic Sheikh always possible?

- And not only Arabic ...

- But how can Venus and Adonis be taken out of Russia? The museum consulted on this occasion with the body that gives the go -ahead for such operations - state customs?

- We act in fossilly and the Ministry of Culture too. If official papers are in order, it will be taken out. If not, it will not. Our task is to attract maximum attention to the situation so that nothing happens by accident. If the picture is exported, the corresponding official bodies will carefully watch all the documents; Just like that, bypassing customs or hoping for some random circumstances, it is already impossible to take out this thing.

- And if you suddenly had not given to Venus and Adonis? ..

- We cannot but give it, because we guaranteed the return by the legal document, and in any case we are obliged to return the picture. Otherwise, we are not museum workers who act in civilized and according to agreements, but raiders.

-That is, quite possibly, the 17th picture is packaged and on December 18 it will leave the museum?

- Yes, at 10 in the morning. Therefore, we now want to remind everyone, including international cultural institutions and international sales markets, how important this picture is, in what context it will be in the museum so that this becomes part of universal knowledge. Hit in an alarm bell that will be heard all over the world.