Calendar - the Guardian of time

On the eve of the turn of the century and the millennium the State Hermitage Museum mounts the exhibition showing different kinds of calendars - printed and painted, representing works of applied art, archeological relics and numismatic items. The displayed objects chronologically cover the period from the 6th century BC to the 20th century AD and are arranged in four groups: Antique, Oriental, Western and Russian. The exhibition starts with the Greek red-figure vases dated from the 6th to 4th centuries BC showing scenes connected with the changes of seasons. The kinds of calendars differing in the type of calculation the time, in covering the period of time, in function, in the type of given information and in structure are represented at the exhibition. They are made of different materials.
Some objects are not the calendars in the modern meaning of this word. They rather allegorically represent how the seasons change, the time flies and the New Year comes. Finally the exhibition offers modern Western and Russian calendars from the collection of the Scientific Library of the State Hermitage Museum dedicated to major museums and their collections, private collections, prominent artists and significant exhibitions.
The exhibition is accompanied by the richly illustrated catalogue printed by the Slavia Publishing House.

Deputy director Georgi Vilinbakhov at the opening ceremony of the exhibition

First visitors