Tretyakov Gallery to return to Chechnya a painting lost during war

An Alexander Golovin's painting is removed from an exhibition and will be returned to the museum in Grozny, the Tretyakov Gallery reports.

After the Tretyakov Gallery returned the Alexander Golovin's painting "Portrait of E. Tatevosyan in a Bedouin Band", lost during the hostilities in Chechnya, the National Museum of Chechnya would exhibit it in the Russian painting hall, reported on October 23 Vakha Astalov, the director of the Chechen museum.

"This is a significant event in the cultural life of our republic, especially in the life of our museum. [...] For 25 years, we have been searching for museum values lost during military campaigns, and any returned item from the earlier, pre-war collection is important to us, especially the painting of the famous artist Alexander Golovin," said Vakha Astalov.

The painting was lost presumably in 1995, the director of the Chechen museum explained. "It appeared to be possible to find out that the painting from our museum's collection due to the examination of the entire surviving archival base of federal museums concerning the painting," the director of the National Museum of Chechnya said.

According to Vakha Astalov, "up to 90%" of the republic's museum collections, i.e. more than 230,000 exhibits, were lost during the hostilities in Chechnya.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on October 24, 2019 at 11:53 am MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.