On 29 January 2007, a ceremony was held in the Hermitage Theatre to mark the return to the museum of painting Pool in a Harem by Jean-Léon Gerôme. The painting had been stolen in March, 2001. The ceremony of handing back the canvas to the museum took place during a session of an international conference of UNESCO for countries of Eastern and Central Europe entitled Application of Scientific and Technical Achievements in Managing the Preservation of Historical Cities on the World Heritage List.

In accordance with an order on the place where material evidence has been changed, the painting Pool in a Harem by Jean-Léon Gerôme is being moved to a new storage location by staff of the Administration for Preservation of Cultural Treasures of Rosokhrankultura, the State Hermitage and the Investigative Commission of the RF Ministry of Internal Affairs. The painting was turned over to the museum by the chief of Roskhrankultura, Boris Boyarskov. Since the painting is in poor condition, it was handed over in a closed case.

Jean-Léon Gerôme
1824, Vesoul - 1904, Paris
Pool in a Harem. 1876
Inventory number أف 6221
Canvas, oil paint. 73.5 ُ 62 cm

The painting was exhibited in the Salon of 1876. Provenance: purchased for Grand Duke Alexander Aleksandrovich (the future Emperor Alexander III). Entered the Hermitage in 1918 from the Anichkov Palace, Petrograd.

Jean-Léon Gerôme was an Academic French painter and sculptor who exhibited in the Salons. He was a pupil of Paul Delaroche. He did paintings on topics from the history of France and Ancient Greece. Later, following travels in Turkey and Egypt, he painted "in the Oriental taste with Moorish exotica." He was considered to be the founder of the Neo-Grecian style in painting.

In the course of his entire creative career, Gerôme repeatedly visited Oriental countries (Egypt, Turkey, Syria, Palestine, Sinai). His untiring interest in depicting scenes from the life of the Islamic world won him a reputation as an "ethnographic artist" that he was proud of. Gerôme's compositions on the Orient have documentary value: the artist precisely captured the exotic costumes, architecture and surroundings, as well as diverse ethnic types. In the Hermitage painting we see depicted two white women and a dark-skinned servant at the center of a room illuminated by a window in the ceiling. Their figures and the details of the place are drawn with pedantic exactitude: the mirror-like smooth surface of the marble floor, the floral ornamentation of the tiles, numerous niches, furniture, clothing, a toilet-set. The style of Gerôme's Oriental works is realistic in content and classical in technical execution. It is customary to call this style "Academic Realism."

Mikhail Piotrovsky, Director of the State Hermitage

Boris Boyarskov, Director of Rosokhrankultura

At the handing over ceremony

Speech by Valentina Matviyenko, Governor of St Petersburg

Pool in a Harem
Jean-Leon Gerome
January 2007
Larger view