Kursk State Art Gallery

Kursk State art gallery named after A. Deineka was founded in 1935. Originally the collection of the gallery comprised some 200 works by Russian and European artists transferred from the Kursk Regional Museum and museums of Rylsk and Lgov (small towns in the Kursk region). Almost all these works came from the nationalized private collections or were received from the State Museum Reserve. Especially should be mentioned collections of Russian and European art in family estates of the princes Baryatinsky, Schwarts and Rhoebinder (Kursk Region). During the years that have passed after the gallery has increased the collection by many times, attaining diversity and a high artistic level of the exhibits. The gallery has paintings, sculptures, drawings, and etchings by Russian and European masters, as well as works of decorative and applied arts.

In the 1930-1950s the gallery received paintings through the Art Committee of the Soviet of Ministers and the Ministry of Culture and the Purchasing Committee of Moscow and Leningrad. Many of the works were transferred from the Hermitage, Moscow Museum of Fine Arts, Tretyakov Gallery and Russian Museum. In 1969 the gallery was named after Alexander Deineka (1899-1969) an outstanding soviet artist who was born in Kursk.

The bulk of the collection of European art was formed soon after the establishment of the gallery. The collection is small and not homogeneous since accumulating works of European masters was not the aim of the gallery in 1930s. It includes paintings by Italian, French, Dutch, Flemish and German artists from the 16th to the 19th century. It also features graphic works (engravings predominantly) of all mentioned above European schools, including the famous “Galleria Giustiniani”.