Photo: museums and exhibitions, Abramtsevo Estate-Museum, Sergiyev Posad

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Abramtsevo Estate-Museum: a Unique Center of Russian Culture

Museums and Exhibitions

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Abramtsevo estate outside Moscow on the shore of the picturesque Vorya River became famous in Russia thanks to its famous owners – a writer, public figure and critic Sergei Aksakov and later, in the 1870s, an entrepreneur and philanthropist Savva Mamontov. The Aksakovs' house was visited by world-renowned writers: Turgenev, Gogol, Tyutchev, Zagoskin, while Mamontov regularly invited all the famous painters of his time: Repin, Vrubel, the brothers Viktor and Apollinary Vasnetsov, Levitan and Polenov for summer stay. Singer Feodor Chaliapin also used to be here. For many years the Abramtsevo estate was an important center of Russian culture. In order to plunge into the creative atmosphere of this ancient Russian estate today, it's just enough to drive 20 kilometers from Sergiyev-Posad.

Until 1917 the Abramtsevo was a private estate where talented artists and critics drew, argued about art, staged home shows, invented and embodied different architectural projects. Then it was nationalized and turned into an estate- museum. The first curator of the museum was Alexandra Savvichna, Mamontov's daughter. A beautiful Church of the Savior Not Made by Hands, designed and painted by M. Vasnetsov and V. Polenov, was built in Abramtsevo in the lifetime of Savva Mamontov. Here, among the trees you can find a fairy-tale Hut on Chicken Legs which appeared in Abramtsevo also during Mamontov’s lifetime. Worth a look are picturesque workshops where you can see the legendary tablecloth with the embroidered autographs of eminent guests of Abramtsevo. Having viewed the farmstead with a rich artistic heritage, don’t fail to take a walk along the picturesque park with the Vorya River dam, lime alleys and stylized stone sculptures.

Abramtsevo Estate-Museum: a Unique Center of Russian Culture

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