On 29 June 2024, an exhibition of furniture from Emperor Alexander III’s yacht Polyarnaya Zvezda [“Pole Star”] begins its run in the Gothic Library of the Winter Palace (Nicholas II’s library). The pieces have been donated to the Hermitage by Mikhail Yuryevich Karisalov, a Russian industrialist, art patron and hereditary collector.
The set is made up of ten items: two tables, an armchair, two low cupboards, a dressing mirror, a cartonniere (filing cabinet), two doors and a mirror from a cupboard. They were all made at Nikolai Feodorovich Svirsky’s factory to designs by the architect Nikolai Vasilyevich Nabokov.
Svirsky’s factory specialized in producing pieces decorated with marquetry using “our own method”. The distinctive feature of the craftsmen’s signature was extremely intricate, literally jeweller-like, detail work in the inlaid designs, making it possible to convey the subtlest nuances of colour.
In 1889 Svirsky put his creations on show at the 1889 Paris Exposition, where he was awarded the Grand Prix and a gold medal. In 1894 the Svirsky Factory was granted the honorary title of Supplier to the Court, and two years later his products were awarded a gold medal at the All-Russian exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod.
The manufacture of the furnishings for all the cabins aboard the yacht that was built for the imperial family’s long-distant voyages would be one of Svirsky’s most significant commissions. The correspondent of the Pravitelstvenny Vestnik [Government Messenger] newspaper wrote: “Regarding the interior finishing of the yacht, it must be said that this is something wholly exceptional and perfect in its elegance; there is not gaudy, eye-catching splendour here, but there is artistic splendour… On the right, from the Imperial Dining-Room, a door leads into Her Majesty the Empress’s boudoir; there the walls and furniture are upholstered with English waxed cretonne; the cupboard, toilet table, writing desk and doors are covered with superb inlay work…”
The exhibition includes two items that the journalist mentioned – the Empress’s “toilet table” and a low cupboard inlaid with Maria Feodorovna’s monogram МФ.
Emperor Alexander III and Empress Maria Feodorovna are known to have sailed all around Europe on the Polyarnaya Zvezda. On arrival in different countries, they would happily show off the exquisite interiors of their floating home.
After the October Revolution, the yacht became the headquarters of the Bolsheviks’ Central Committee of the Baltic Fleet (Tsentrobalt), then in the 1930s it was as refitted to serve as a floating base for submarines. In beleaguered Leningrad the crew of the Polyarnaya Zvezda helped the staff of the Hermitage to hold a conference devoted to the 800th anniversary of the Azerbaijani poet Nizami and a festive gathering marking the 500th anniversary of the Uzbek poet Alisher Navoi. A cable was run from the yacht, which was moored in front of the Hermitage, to provide electricity to the museum halls.
For the Hermitage, the items of furniture from the Polyarnaya Zvezda are of especial value – from artistic, historical and memorial points of view. After the temporary exhibition, the set will find a place within the display devoted to the Art Nouveau era in the General Staff building. A separate room may be allotted to Svirsky’s works there.
The exhibition curator is Natalia Yuryevna Guseva, Candidate of Art Studies, Deputy Head of the State Hermitage’s Department of the History of Russian Culture, keeper of the Russian furniture collection.
