Art museum An art museum or art gallery is a building or space for the display of art, usually from the museum's own Collection (artwork), collection. It might be in public or private ownership and may be accessible to all or have restrictions in place. A ...

s of

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

possess many Western European paintings. There, one can see canvases by world-famous artists (such as

Titian Tiziano Vecelli or Vecellio (; 27 August 1576), known in English as Titian ( ), was an Italians, Italian (Republic of Venice, Venetian) painter of the Renaissance, considered the most important member of the 16th-century Venetian school (art), ...

Francesco Guardi Francesco Lazzaro Guardi (; 5 October 1712 – 1 January 1793) was an Italian painter, nobleman, and a member of the Venetian School. He is considered to be among the last practitioners, along with his brothers, of the classic Venetian school of ...

Jusepe de Ribera Jusepe de Ribera (1591 – 1652) was a painter and printmaker, who along with Francisco de Zurbarán, Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, and the singular Diego Velázquez, are regarded as the major artists of Spanish Baroque painting. Referring to ...

Diego Velázquez Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez (baptized June 6, 1599August 6, 1660) was a Spanish painter, the leading artist in the court of King Philip IV of Spain and Portugal, and of the Spanish Golden Age. He was an individualistic artist of th ...

Peter Paul Rubens Sir Peter Paul Rubens (; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat from the Duchy of Brabant in the Southern Netherlands (modern-day Belgium). He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque traditio ...

) as well as by the painters whose works throughout the world are unique (such as

Master of the Osservanza The Master of the Osservanza Triptych, also known as the Osservanza Master and as the Master of Osservanza, is the name given to an Italian painter of the Sienese School active about 1430 to 1450. The Italian scholar Roberto Longhi recognized t ...

Jacopo del Sellaio Jacopo del Sellaio (1441/42–1493), was an Italian painter of the early Renaissance, active in his native Florence. His real name was Jacopo di Arcangelo. He worked in an eclectic style based on those of Botticelli, Filippino Lippi, and Domenic ...

Jacob Ferdinand Voet Jacob Ferdinand Voet or Jakob Ferdinand Voet ( 163926 September 1689) was a Flemish portrait painter.Jacob Ferdinand Vo ...

Georges de La Tour Georges de La Tour (13 March 1593 – 30 January 1652) was a French Baroque painter, who spent most of his working life in the Duchy of Lorraine, which was temporarily absorbed into France between 1641 and 1648. He painted mostly religious chia ...

and others).

Before the year 1917

The museum collections of Western European paintings were formed in different ways. Usually they were based on private collections. The collectors often sold or presented pictures they owned to other owners; sometimes (mostly after the

1905 Russian Revolution The Russian Revolution of 1905,. also known as the First Russian Revolution,. occurred on 22 January 1905, and was a wave of mass political and social unrest that spread through vast areas of the Russian Empire. The mass unrest was directed again ...

) large collections were sold abroad. A number of Ukrainian art lovers spoke out against the export of the artistic wealth and strove for its preservation in public museums and galleries. As early as in the middle of the 19th century, in Ukraine there existed private museums and ‘cabinets of fine arts’ in the universities of

Kyiv Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...

Kharkiv Kharkiv ( uk, wikt:Харків, Ха́рків, ), also known as Kharkov (russian: Харькoв, ), is the second-largest List of cities in Ukraine, city and List of hromadas of Ukraine, municipality in Ukraine.Odessa Odesa (also spelled Odessa) is the third most populous city and municipality in Ukraine and a major seaport and transport hub located in the south-west of the country, on the northwestern shore of the Black Sea. The city is also the administrativ ...

. It was due to the public efforts that the first Ukrainian public museum was opened in 1886 in Kharkiv, and the municipal art gallery in

Lviv Lviv ( uk, Львів) is the largest city in western Ukraine, and the seventh-largest in Ukraine, with a population of . It serves as the administrative centre of Lviv Oblast and Lviv Raion, and is one of the main cultural centres of Ukraine ...

in 1907. Both had large sections of Western European paintings. Some educated people paid their own money to acquire artistic objects which they wanted to donate to their native cities. In such a manner, I. Betsky and A. Alfyorov, graduates of

Kharkiv University The Kharkiv University or Karazin University ( uk, Каразінський університет), or officially V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University ( uk, Харківський національний університет імені ...

, started the collection of Western European paintings at the local museum. In Kyiv, it was Bogdan and Varvara Khanenko who in the 1870s began collecting works by Western European artists.

Between the October Revolution and the Great Patriotic War

After the October Revolution, all artistic works located in Ukraine were nationalised and distributed to museums and art galleries, both to the existing and to the newly formed ones. But the new rulers kept selling works of art abroad. Besides, Ukrainian museum pieces were being exchanged for far less valuable ones from

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

n museums. For example, against Varvara Khanenko’s will, the

Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...

split the collection of the

Khanenko Museum The Khanenko Museum (official name: The Bohdan and Varvara Khanenko National Museum of Arts) is an art museum located in Kyiv, in Ukraine, which holds the biggest and most valuable collections of European, Asian and Ancient art in the country. T ...

. Some pieces were sold to the USA for little money that was to be spent on military equipment and arms. Varvara’s will was violated once again after her death when the mention of the Khanenkos disappeared from the name of the museum. After that, it was for a long time called Kyiv Museum of Western and Oriental Art. In 1925-1926, the museum was enriched with Shchavinsky’s collection of the 17th century pictures by

Flemish Flemish (''Vlaams'') is a Low Franconian dialect cluster of the Dutch language. It is sometimes referred to as Flemish Dutch (), Belgian Dutch ( ), or Southern Dutch (). Flemish is native to Flanders, a historical region in northern Belgium; ...

and

Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...

artists. In 1919, Zhytomyr Local History Museum was created. Its art gallery was based on the Chaudoirs’ collection with a number of first-rate canvases by Western European painters. The works from the stock of Odessa Committee for the Protection of Monuments of Art and Antiquity and the ones from the metropolitan museums formed Odessa Art Museum. It was opened in 1920. Its present name is

Odessa Museum of Western and Eastern Art Odesa Museum of Western and Eastern Art ( uk, Одеський музей західного і східного мистецтва) is a museum of Fine Arts on Pushkin street in Odesa, Ukraine.

. In November 1920, the

Crimea Crimea, crh, Къырым, Qırım, grc, Κιμμερία / Ταυρική, translit=Kimmería / Taurikḗ ( ) is a peninsula in Ukraine, on the northern coast of the Black Sea, that has been occupied by Russia since 2014. It has a pop ...

having become

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

, the regional section for the protection of monuments of art and antiquity started work effecting the order of the Crimean Revolutionary Committee. The section was to expropriate and inventory the art treasures from the palaces and mansions of the Crimean South Coast. In December, the objects expropriated formed the basis of

Yalta Yalta (: Я́лта) is a resort city on the south coast of the Crimean Peninsula surrounded by the Black Sea. It serves as the administrative center of Yalta Municipality, one of the regions within Crimea. Yalta, along with the rest of Crimea ...

Popular Artistic Museum where Western European authors prevailed. In 1927, Yalta Museum's collection was transferred to the newly created Sevastopol Art Museum. The same year, the museum in Sevastopol received

Simferopol Art Museum Simferopol State Art Museum (russian: Симферопольский художественный музей) is an art museum located in the Crimean capital Simferopol. Simferopol Art Museum was founded in 1937. There more than 6,000 artworks i ...

’s entire collection of Western European art that included a lot of valuable Flemish and Dutch paintings. After the annexation of

Western Ukraine Western Ukraine or West Ukraine ( uk, Західна Україна, Zakhidna Ukraina or , ) is the territory of Ukraine linked to the former Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia, which was part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Austria ...

to the

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

in 1939,

Lviv Art Gallery Borys Voznytsky Lviv National Art Gallery ( uk, Львівська Національна Галерея Мистецтв імені Бориса Возницького) is the largest art museum in Ukraine, with over 62,000 artworks in its colle ...

was enriched with nationalised private collections containing plenty of wonderful works by Western Europeans.

During the Great Patriotic War

On June 29, 1941, most pieces from the Kyiv Museum of Western and Oriental Art started being evacuated to

Penza Penza ( rus, Пе́нза, p=ˈpʲɛnzə) is the largest city and administrative center of Penza Oblast, Russia. It is located on the Sura River, southeast of Moscow. As of the 2010 Census, Penza had a population of 517,311, making it the 38th-l ...

and

Saratov Saratov (, ; rus, Сара́тов, a=Ru-Saratov.ogg, p=sɐˈratəf) is the largest city and administrative center of Saratov Oblast, Russia, and a major port on the Volga River upstream (north) of Volgograd. Saratov had a population of 901,36 ...

. But it appeared impossible to move the whole collection. When the

Germans , native_name_lang = de , region1 = , pop1 = 72,650,269 , region2 = , pop2 = 534,000 , region3 = , pop3 = 157,000 3,322,405 , region4 = , pop4 = ...

came, they started plundering the collection, a process that was put the brakes on for some time only by Dietrich Roskamp who was the keeper of the museum at that time. He protested against the misappropriation of the artistic objects and moving the collection to Germany. But it was hardly possible to fully stop it, and in 1943, due to the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, after ...

’s advance, the invaders organised the exportation of the collection to Germany. They did it methodically at first, listing and carefully packing the objects, and later hastily and chaotically. Altogether, the

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

s took 474 pictures, 10 sculptures and about 25,000 prints from the museum. Luckily, a few valuable works had managed to be hidden, among them

Perugino Pietro Perugino (, ; – 1523), born Pietro Vannucci, was an Italian Renaissance painter of the Umbrian school, who developed some of the qualities that found classic expression in the High Renaissance. Raphael was his most famous pupil. Ear ...

’s ''Archangel'' and

Marco Palmezzano Marco Palmezzano (1460–1539) was an Italian painter and architect, belonging to the Forlì painting school, who painted in a style recalling earlier Northern Renaissance models. He was mostly active near Forlì. Biography Palmezzano was b ...

’s ''Madonna with a Saint''. 225 works of art were plundered from Lviv Art Gallery during the German invasion, many of them were destroyed. Among them was the unique collection of Dürer’s paintings. In

Kharkiv Art Museum The Kharkiv Art Museum ( uk, Харківський художній музей) is one of the largest collections of fine and applied arts in Ukraine, a state museum. The Kharkiv Art Museum is located at 11, Zhon Mironositz Street, Kharkiv (Ukra ...

, only five thousand pieces survived. Before the war, the collection of

Poltava Art Museum Poltava Art Museum is a public art gallery in Poltava, Ukraine which contains many works of native and foreign art and a rich ethnographic collection. History Today’s collection of the museum was started in 1917, when Nikolai Yaroshenko, a pai ...

numbered about 30,000 pieces. The exposition failed to be evacuated and was almost all destroyed. Among the losses was the priceless Western European collection with unique works by

Giambattista Tiepolo Giovanni Battista Tiepolo ( , ; March 5, 1696 – March 27, 1770), also known as Giambattista (or Gianbattista) Tiepolo, was an Italian painter and printmaker from the Republic of Venice who painted in the Rococo style, considered an import ...

, Peter Paul Rubens,

Melchior d'Hondecoeter Melchior d'Hondecoeter (; 1636 – 3 April 1695), Dutch animalier painter, was born in Utrecht and died in Amsterdam. After the start of his career, he painted virtually exclusively bird subjects, usually exotic or game, in park-like landscap ...

Adriaen van Ostade Adriaen van Ostade (baptized as Adriaen Jansz Hendricx 10 December 1610 – buried 2 May 1685) was a Dutch Golden Age painter of genre works, showing everyday life of ordinary men and women. Life According to Arnold Houbraken, he and his brot ...

Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun Elizabeth or Elisabeth may refer to: People * Elizabeth (given name), a female given name (including people with that name) * Elizabeth (biblical figure), mother of John the Baptist Ships * HMS ''Elizabeth'', several ships * ''Elisabeth'' (sch ...

and others. The major part of the objects from Sevastopol Art Museum was evacuated and preserved by its director Mikhail Kroshitsky. After the war, the works of art from Sevastopol Gallery were on display in Simferopol Art Museum for some time, because

Sevastopol Sevastopol (; uk, Севасто́поль, Sevastópolʹ, ; gkm, Σεβαστούπολις, Sevastoúpolis, ; crh, Акъя́р, Aqyár, ), sometimes written Sebastopol, is the largest city in Crimea, and a major port on the Black Sea ...

lay in ruins and the house of the museum had been burnt down. Only eleven objects of all the pre-war treasures survived in the Art Museum in

Donetsk Donetsk ( , ; uk, Донецьк, translit=Donets'k ; russian: Донецк ), formerly known as Aleksandrovka, Yuzivka (or Hughesovka), Stalin and Stalino (see also: Names of European cities in different languages (C–D), cities' alternat ...

(at that period the name of the city was Stalino).

After World War II

Kyiv and Odesa have the largest collections that exist as independent museums of western and eastern (oriental) art. The Western European collection in Lviv, though as rich and valuable as those in Odesa and Kyiv, is but a department of the local art gallery. Sections containing a lot of valuable works by Western Europeans exist in art museums of Kharkiv, Sevastopol, and in Zhytomyr Local History Museum. A number of important canvases by foreign artists are possessed by the museums of

Poltava Poltava (, ; uk, Полтава ) is a city located on the Vorskla River in central Ukraine. It is the capital city of the Poltava Oblast (province) and of the surrounding Poltava Raion (district) of the oblast. Poltava is administratively ...

Sumy Sumy ( uk, Суми ) is a city of regional significance in Ukraine, and the capital of Sumy Oblast. The city is situated on the banks of the Psel River in northeastern Ukraine with a population of according to the 2021 census, making it the 2 ...

Lutsk Lutsk ( uk, Луцьк, translit=Lutsk}, ; pl, Łuck ; yi, לוצק, Lutzk) is a city on the Styr River in northwestern Ukraine. It is the administrative center of the Volyn Oblast (province) and the administrative center of the surrounding Luts ...

and

Uzhhorod Uzhhorod ( uk, У́жгород, , ; ) is a city and municipality on the river Uzh in western Ukraine, at the border with Slovakia and near the border with Hungary. The city is approximately equidistant from the Baltic, the Adriatic and the B ...

Works by famous Western European painters in Ukraine

Dnipro Art Museum * Batoni, Pompeo Girolamo, ''Time destroying Beauty''

* Bellini, Gentile, ''Portrait of a patrician'' * Bellini, Giovanni, ''Madonna and Child'' * Boucher, François, ''Cupids'' * David, Jacques-Louis, ''Portrait of Lazare Hoche'' * Hals, Frans, ''Portrait of Descartes'' *

Luca Giordano Luca Giordano (18 October 1634 – 3 January 1705) was an Italian late-Baroque painter and printmaker in etching. Fluent and decorative, he worked successfully in Naples and Rome, Florence, and Venice, before spending a decade in Spain. Ear ...

, ''Death of Orpheus'' * Magnasco, Alessandro, ''Funeral of a monk'' *

Master of Osservanza The Master of the Osservanza Triptych, also known as the Osservanza Master and as the Master of Osservanza, is the name given to an Italian painter of the Sienese School active about 1430 to 1450. The Italian scholar Roberto Longhi recognized t ...

, ''The Crucifixion'' * Modena, Barnaba da, ''Scenes from the life of Christ (predella)'' * Orley, Bernard van, ''The Execution of St. Catherine'' * Perugino, Pietro, ''Madonna and Child'' * Rubens, Peter Paul, ''God of the Scheldt River, Cybele and the Goddess of Antwerp (sketch)'' * Ruysdael, Jacob van, ''A woodland river'' * Tiepolo, Giovanni Battista, ''Summoning of Cincinnatus to the dictatorship (sketch version of the canvas in the

Hermitage Museum The State Hermitage Museum ( rus, Государственный Эрмитаж, r=Gosudarstvennyj Ermitaž, p=ɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪn(ː)ɨj ɪrmʲɪˈtaʂ, links=no) is a museum of art and culture in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is the list of ...

)'' * Velázquez, Diego, ''Portrait of the Infanta Margarita'' * Vigée-Le Brun, Élisabeth Louise, ''Portrait of Stanisław August Poniatowski'' * Weenix the Younger, Jan, ''Still life with dead hare'' * Zurbarán, Juan de. ''Still life with a chocolate mill''

* Goyen, Jan van, ''Landscape with fishermen'' Lutsk Local History Museum * Ribera, Jusepe de, ''St. Jerome''

Borys Voznytsky Lviv National Art Gallery Borys Voznytsky Lviv National Art Gallery ( uk, Львівська Національна Галерея Мистецтв імені Бориса Возницького) is the largest art museum in Ukraine, with over 62,000 artworks in its colle ...

* Anguissola, Sofonisba, ''Portrait of a young patrician woman'' * David, Jacques-Louis, ''Portrait of the sister of the painter’s wife'' * Goya, Francisco, ''Majas on the balcony'' * Greuze, Jean-Baptiste, ''A lying girl'' * Guardi, Francesco, ''San Giorge Magiore'' * Guardi, Francesco, ''Loggia in Venice'' * Kauffmann, Angelica, ''Portrait of Henrick Lubomirski as Cupid'' * La Tour, Georges de, ''The payment (At the usurer's)'' * Liotard, Jean-Étienne, ''Portrait of Maria Theresa'' *

, ''Head of an old man'' * Magnasco, Alessandro' ''Landscape'' * Matejko, Jan, ''Charles Gustav (Carolus Gustavus) and Szymon Starowolski before the grave of Władysław Łokietek in Warsaw during

The Deluge The Genesis flood narrative (chapters 6–9 of the Book of Genesis) is the Hebrew version of the universal flood myth. It tells of God's decision to return the universe to its pre- creation state of watery chaos and remake it through the microc ...

'' * Matejko, Jan, ''Portrait of the artist’s children'' * Mengs, Anton Raphael, ''Portrait of the engraver B. Bartolozzi'' * Mengs, Anton Raphael, ''Portrait of Christoph Friedrich of Saxony'' * Reni, Guido, ''Madonna'' * Ribera, Jusepe de, ''St. Jerome'' * Robert, Hubert, ''Inside a temple'' * Rubens, Peter Paul,. ''Portrait of a man'' * Strozzi, Bernardo, ''St. Peter curing a paralytic'' * Titian, Vecellio, ''Portrait of a man'' * Vigée-Le Brun, Élisabeth Louise, ''Portrait of Isabella Lubomirska'' Mikhail Kroshitsky Sevastopol Art Museum * Rosa, Salvatore, ''A castle on the shore of a gulf'' * Snyders, Frans, ''Fish on the shore'' * Wouwerman, Philips, ''At the watering place''

Nikanor Onatsky Regional Art Museum in Sumy Nikanor Onatsky Regional Art Museum in Sumy is a state museum in Sumy, Ukraine. Its collection is one of the best in Ukraine and contains works of native and from all over the world artists. History and exposition The museum was founded on Marc ...

* Bellotto, Bernardo, ''The city square'' * Goyen, Jan van, ''Dutch landscape with a house at the road'' * Robert, Hubert, ''Ruins with an arch'' * Vigée-Le Brun, Élisabeth Louise, ''Portrait of Countess Litta''

* Batoni, Pompeo Girolamo, ''Venus and Cupid'' * Berchem, Nicolaes Pieterszoon, ''Landscape with a herd'' * Caravaggio, Michelangelo Merisi da, ''Taking of Christ (stolen in 2008, recovered in 2010)'' * Daubigny, Charles-François, ''Landscape (study)'' * Goyen, Jan van, ''Winter landscape'' * Hals, Frans, ''Luke the Evangelist'' * Hals, Frans, ''Matthew the Evangelist'' * Leyden, Lucas van, ''David and Abigail'' * Magnasco, Alessandro, ''Monks shaving'' * Magnasco, Alessandro, ''Landscape with figures of people'' * Magnasco, Alessandro, ''Corps de garde'' * Magnasco, Alessandro, ''St. Jerome'' * Magnasco, Alessandro, ''Mary Magdalene'' * Robert, Hubert, ''The

Maison Carrée Maison (French for "house") may refer to: People * Edna Maison (1892–1946), American silent-film actress * Jérémy Maison (born 1993), French cyclist * Leonard Maison, New York state senator 1834–1837 * Nicolas Joseph Maison (1771–1840), Ma ...

in Nîmes'' * Sustermans, Justus, ''Portrait of a lady wearing pearls'' * Teniers the Younger, David, ''Man smoking''

* Lampi, Franz, ''Portrait of a man'' * Peeters, Clara, ''Still life'' Yosyp Bokshay Transcarpathian Regional Museum of Art * Hoogstraten, Samuel van, ''Portrait of a man wearing a beret'' Zhytomyr Local History Museum * Carracci, Agostino, ''Portrait of the artist’s brother Annibale Carracci'' * Liotard, Jean-Étienne ''Portrait of a woman'' *

, ''Christ talks to the Samaritan woman'' * Piombo, Sebastiano del, ''Portrait of Michelangelo'' * Robert, Hubert, ''Laocoön Gallery in

the Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...

References

* West-European Painting of the 14th-18th centuries (the Ukrainian title: Західноєвропейський живопис 14−18 століть). A picture album. − Kyiv, "Mystetstvo" Publishing House, 1981 (in Ukrainian, Russian, and English)

External links

Kharkiv Art Museum. The official website

Transcarpathian Regional Museum of Art. The official website

Sevastopol Art Museum official website

Ukrainian museums and pictures from their expositions

{{DEFAULTSORT:Western European Paintings In Ukrainian Museums *Western European paintings Paintings in Ukrainian museums Collections of museums in Ukraine Lists of paintings Ukraine-related lists