Private collectors key to boosting Russia's art market
MOSCOW (AP) — For Russian art collector Roman Babichev, a visit to an artist's family living in a cramped St. Petersburg apartment yielded an unexpected sight. In a cardboard folder under one of the beds was a stash of paintings taken off their frames because they would have filled one of the two rooms the family of four lived in. "They were just lying there, awaiting their destiny," Babichev said. He bought them, adding these works by landscape painter Alexander Vedernikov to his collection of Russian modernist art. It's just one example of how, at a time when sanctions and economic woes push the topic of culture down the Kremlin's agenda, wealthy individuals are filling a gap by bringing much-needed cash to a struggling art market and supporting young Russian artists. The tradition of private art collectors in Russia precedes even the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution when magnates like Sergei Shchukin and Pavel Tretyakov amassed priceless troves, now in the country's top museums. Today's collectors may not have the same stature, says Pushkin Museum director Marina Loshak, but they are key to developing Russia's art scene. "Collectors are the big impetus. Without collectors there are no galleries and these are the laboratories, the test tube, in which everything happens," Loshak told The Associated Press. DISCOVERING RUSSIA'S HIDDEN MODERNISTS Babichev gave up a successful business career in the 1990s to collect art. His apartment on Moscow's outskirts is both a gallery and a living space, with paintings and sculptures displayed floor to ceiling. Babichev dug back into Soviet history, discovering forgotten artists of the 1920s-50s. With determination and detective work, he tracked down their neglected works and pieced together the artists' stories. Many had studied...
