Fryne at the Russian Museum in St Petersburg
24 October 2018 marks the 175th anniversary of the birth of Henryk Siemiradzki, author of the monumental composition The Torches of Nero, which in 1879 provided the impetus for the founding of the National Museum in Krakow.

Few people know, however, that another work by Siemiradzki - Fryne at the Feast of Poseidon in Eleusis - inaugurated the existence of the Russian Museum in St Petersburg. The painting, depicting the Greek hetero Fryne playing the role of Aphrodite emerging from her bath in front of a crowd, was intended to perfectly depict timeless beauty. It was exhibited in St Petersburg in 1889, arousing real admiration from the public, which translated into the purchase of the canvas by Tsar Alexander III for the dizzying sum of 50,000 roubles in gold.

The Fryne became a pillar of the Tsar's collection, which included contemporary Russian art and was the beginning of the Museum of Art established by Tsar Nicholas II in 1895. In this way, H. Siemiradzki's Fryne, alongside Ilia Riepin's work Zaporozhian Cossacks Writing a Letter to the Sultan, acquired in 1891, became a quintessential example of the national Russian school not only in painting but also in art. The work can still be seen today in the State Russian Museum in St Petersburg, in the Mikhailovsky Palace.

1889

Henryk Siemiradzki (malarz)(aperçu)