119017, Moscow, Lavrushinsky pereulok, 10
Closed: Monday
General director: Valentin Alexeevich Rodionov
Tel.: (495) 230-77-88, 951-13-62, 238-13-78
Tel/fax: (495) 953-10-51
E-mail: tretyakov@tretyakov.ru
In 1856 the Gallery founder Moscow merchant Pavel Tretyakov acquired first works by Russian artists: Vasily Khudyakov's «Skirmish with Finnish Smugglers» and Nikolai Shilder's «Temptation» — with the aim of creating а collection, which might later grow into а museum of national art, mainly of the second part of the 19th century. Some paintings were presented to Tretyakov by artists themselves, who realize the high aim of the creation of the national treasury of Russian fine art. Since early 1870s the Gallery was open to the public. In 1892 the Moscow city council gratefully accepted the collection of Pavel Tretyakov and his younger brother Sergei. It comprised 1287 paintings, 518 drawings and 9 sculptures by Russian masters as well as 75 paintings and 8 drawings by European artists.
Pavel Tretyakov was appointed the lifelong curator of the Gallery and kept the collection growing buying pictures. The catalogue of the collection published in 1899 contained 1635 paintings and about 1600 drawings of the 18-19th centuries.
The State Tretyakov Gallery is one of the greatest museums of Russian art. Nowadays, the Gallery’s collection contains more than 150 000 works of painting, sculpture and graphics, created throughout the centuries by successive generations of Russian artists.
