. The museum's Director General is Roman Zhukarin.[1]

Buildings and structure

The NGSAM has five venues. The permanent collection is housed in three buildings, each of which is a federally listed architectural and urban heritage monument:[2]

In addition to its permanent exhibitions, the NGSAM stages exhibition projects at the Manège (Nizhny Novgorod Kremlin, building 1A) and at the Pakgauzy (Pakgauzy) warehouses (Strelka (nnov.ec), 21, lit. I).[2]

Permanent collection

The "Russian Art" wing's permanent display spans the collection from Old Russian icon painting to masterpieces of the Silver Age and includes works by K. Bryullov, A. Savrasov, I. Shishkin, I. Repin, I. Levitan, V. Serov, B. Kustodiev, and other classical masters. Among the highlights are Alexei Savrasov's "The Rooks Have Returned," Karl Bryullov's "Svetlana Telling Fortunes," Boris Kustodiev's double-sided canvas "Russian Venus," and Nikolai Koshelev's monumental "Burial of Christ," measuring 4 × 5.4 m. Among the decorative-arts items are a floral study, "A Sprig of Forget-Me-Nots in a Little Vase," by craftsmen of the Fabergé firm from around the turn of the 19th–20th centuries, and a 25-kilogram altar Gospel in a cover that is an example of Russian Baroque goldsmithing.[3][4]

The "Foreign Art" wing on the Verkhne-Volzhskaya Embankment maintains a permanent display that includes the K. E. Makovskiy Hall. The "Art of the 20th Century" wing on Minin and Pozharsky Square houses the permanent exhibition "Russian Avant-Garde. Painting and Sculpture," and from December 2025 through August 2026 hosted the exhibition "Russian Symbolism: from Vrubel to Larionov."

Opening hours

All museum buildings are closed on Mondays; on Thursdays opening hours are extended to 20:00, and on all other working days the museum is open from 10:00 or 11:00 until 18:00 or 19:00. On the third Wednesday of each month, admission is free for all visitor categories.[5]

Exhibition activity

The museum regularly mounts major exhibition projects in partnership with leading federal institutions. In 2026, three large-scale exhibitions ran simultaneously in the "Russian Art" wing: "The Arzamas Academy" (first floor), "Aivazovsky and the Romantic Landscape" (second floor), and "Northern Sun" (third floor).

At the Pakgauzy venue (Strelka), the multi-format exhibition "The Great All-Russian" ran from May through November 2026.

Exhibition "The Arzamas Academy. On the 250th Anniversary of the Birth of A. V. Stupin"

The exhibition was dedicated to Alexander Vasilyevich Stupin (1776–1861) — the founder of the first private art school in the Russian provinces; over the school's years of operation Stupin trained some 150 pupils, many of whom went on to work in smaller towns where the demand for professional artists remained high. The display brought together around 100 works of painting and drawing from the collections of the NGSAM and the Arzamas Museum of History and Art; partners included the State Tretyakov Gallery, the State Russian Museum, and the Research Museum of the Russian Academy of Arts.[6] Tickets were available to holders of the Pushkin Card, and the project was implemented as part of the national project "Family."

The centerpiece was Vasily Grigoryevich Perov's painting "Hunters at Rest" of 1871, shown to a Nizhny Novgorod audience for the first time. Perov was a pupil of the Stupin's Arzamas School of Painting. The State Tretyakov Gallery lent 20 works for the exhibition, including this canvas, which had undergone restoration shortly before the showing. Previously the painting had almost never left the walls of the Tretyakov Gallery.[7]

Among the earliest exhibits was Alexander Vasilyevich Stupin, painted during his studies at the Imperial Academy of Arts. The exhibition introduced visitors to works by Stupin's teachers and contemporaries — Ivan Akimov, Vasily Shebuyev, Alexei Yegorov, Alexander Varnek, Karl Bryullov, Jean-Laurent Mosnier, and Johann Lampi — as well as to the lives of his pupils: Rafail Stupin, Nikolai Alekseyev, Ivan Gorbunov, Vasily Rayev, Pavel Vedenetsky, Nikolai Rachkov, and Yevgraf Krendovsky. Visitors could see academic drawings, portraits, landscapes, and genre compositions created by Stupin and his students at various stages of their careers.

Tatyana Yudenkova, Deputy Director General for Academic Affairs at the State Tretyakov Gallery, noted Pavel Tretyakov's interest in the work of Alexander Stupin's pupils: the gallery founder's collection includes a portrait of A. V. Stupin by Alexander Varnek and works by students of the Arzamas School.

Exhibition "Aivazovsky and the Romantic Landscape"

On the second floor of the "Russian Art" wing was the project "Aivazovsky and the Romantic Landscape," presenting original works by Ivan Aivazovsky and his contemporaries who worked in the genre of the romantic landscape.[1]

Exhibition "Northern Sun"

On the third floor of the "Russian Art" wing was the exhibition "Northern Sun," devoted to the art of gold embroidery and tracing the craft's evolution from ornamentation of peasant everyday life to items made for the imperial court. The project was prepared jointly with the Tsarskoye Selo museum-reserve and the Kargopol Museum of History, Architecture, and Art.[1][4]

Partnerships and patronage

On City Day, timed to coincide with the 805th anniversary of Nizhny Novgorod, free admission to the permanent collection and all current exhibitions in the "Russian Art" wing (Kremlin, building 3) was offered to all residents and guests of the city, with the support of the energy holding company En+. The event also marked the 95th anniversary of the Avtozavodskaya Combined Heat and Power Plant. En+'s enterprises in Nizhny Novgorod supply heat, hot water, and electricity to more than 400,000 Nizhny Novgorod residents.[1][3]

Links

  • Official website (artmuseumnn.ru)
  • Wikidata (Q207694 — entry in the open knowledge base)
  • GND (4166041-9 — catalogue of the German National Library)

The museum was founded on 25 June 1896 as the "Nizhny Novgorod Municipal Art and Historical Museum": its ceremonial opening took place in the Dmitrievskaya Tower of the Kremlin and was timed to coincide with the All-Russian Art and Industry Exhibition held in Nizhny Novgorod; the official decision to establish the institution was taken by the City Duma as early as 14 July 1894, and in 1934 the combined museum was divided into two independent institutions. The initiative to create the museum belonged to two artists: Professor of the Academy of Arts Nikolai Andreyevich Koshelev (1840–1918) and the history painter Andrei Andreyevich Karelin (1866–1928), who laid the foundation of its collection; the initial collection consisted of canvases donated by A. P. Bogolyubov, I. Ye. Repin, A. A. Karelin, N. A. Koshelev, K. Ye. Makovskiy, A. P. Ryabushkin, and other painters. Maxim Gorky played a significant role in expanding the collection: through his efforts works by B. M. Kustodiev, N. K. Roerich, M. V. Nesterov, and other artists entered the holdings; after 1917, sources of acquisition included nationalized noble collections and the State Museum Fund.[8]

The building of merchant D. V. Sirotkin's house is an architectural monument in the Neoclassical style, built in 1913–1916 to a design by the Vesnin brothers and considered the first major independent work of the subsequently celebrated Constructivist architects.[5]

Sources

  1. Wikipedia (ru) — Nizhny Novgorod State Art Museum (archive)
  2. GTRK "Nizhny Novgorod" (Vesti) — An exhibition marking the 250th anniversary of Alexander Stupin has opened in Nizhny Novgorod (archive)
  3. NIA "Nizhny Novgorod" — En+ and the NGSAM give Nizhny Novgorod residents an encounter with the treasures of world culture (archive)
  4. Vzglyad-NN — En+ and the NGSAM give Nizhny Novgorod residents an encounter with the treasures of world culture
  5. putevka.com — Art Museum in Nizhny Novgorod — exhibitions, address, tickets — NGSAM — The building of merchant D. V. Sirotkin's house on the Verkhne-Volzhskaya Embankment, 3 — an architectural monument in the Neoclassical style… (archive)
  6. NIA "Nizhny Novgorod" — 20 canvases from the Tretyakov Gallery are on display at the NGSAM for the 250th anniversary of Alexander Stupin (archive)
  7. Vremya N — The NGSAM will open free admission to all exhibitions on City Day (archive)
  8. wearts.ru — Nizhny Novgorod State Art Museum — The museum was founded on 25 June 1896 as the "Nizhny Novgorod Municipal Art and Historical Museum" — its ceremonial…