The Russian Museum has launched the Russia program in 2003. A representative delegation comprising 102 people, museum officials and intelligentsia, arrived in Petrozavodsk from St. Petersburg to attend the opening ceremony.
The museum brings a new exposition to every town. Petrozavodsk hosts an exhibition consisting of 66 pictures, a brief review of Russian art from classicism to avant-garde, said Russian Museum's deputy director Yevgenia Petrova. One of the masterpieces, "The Portrait of the Shishmarev Sisters" by Karl Bryullov is included in the permanent exhibition of the museum.
The exhibition will be running until December 1 in the newly restored Fine Arts Museum of the Republic of Karelia.
On its part, the Russian Museum is interested in rich collections of provincial museums. Works by Mikhail Tsibasov, representative of the Filonov school of analytical art, exhibited in Petrozavodsk attracted the attention of the Russian Museum's officials.
Russian Museum's director Vladimir Gusev said that the Russia program aimed to prove that culture is born not only in Moscow and St. Petersburg but also in the province.
Since 2005 the Russian Museum will host exhibitions from other Russia's museums.
