When
From 5 SEP 2026 Till 7 FEB 2027, 10:00–22:00
ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
The exhibition presents more than 100 works by international and Russian artists, brought together from the collection donated to the State Russian Museum by renowned German collectors Peter and Irene Ludwig. The exhibition is located on the museum’s second floor and marks the first time this selection has been shown in Moscow in its fullness.
The show explores key artistic movements of the second half of the 20th century, including American Pop Art and Hyperrealism, German Neo-Expressionism and East German painting, Cuban and Latin American art, Moscow Conceptualism, and figurative painting. Artists represented in the exhibition include Pablo Picasso, Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Roy Lichtenstein, Robert Rauschenberg, Claes Oldenburg, Jasper Johns, Joseph Beuys, Georg Baselitz, Anselm Kiefer, Jörg Immendorff, Markus Lüpertz, Ralph Goings, Robert Bechtle, Werner Tübke, Belkis Ayón, Claudio Bravo, Ilya Kabakov, Erik Bulatov, Vladimir Yankilevsky, Viktor Pivovarov, Igor Makarevich, Dmitry Zhilinsky, and Natalia Nesterova.
ZILART museum was founded by collectors, and this shapes the institution’s perspective: our attention is directed not only towards works of art, but also towards the person who chooses them. A private collection reflects the personal perspective, taste, intuition and interests of its creator. This makes the exhibition particularly significant for ZILART. It presents outstanding works of international art while also telling the story of one of the most important private collections of the modern era — a story of personal choice, sustained curiosity and a lifelong commitment to collecting that ultimately became part of the history of art.
«We are delighted to have the opportunity to present in Moscow masterpieces of art from the second half of the 20th century from the collection of the State Russian Museum. It is especially important that the exhibition includes works by outstanding Moscow artists such as Ilya Kabakov, Erik Bulatov, Vladimir Yankilevsky, Dmitry Prigov and Dmitry Zhilinsky.»
Andrey Molchanov
collector and founder of «ZILART»
THE COLLECTION
Peter and Irene Ludwig built their collection systematically from the late 1940s through the mid-1990s. Today it is represented in leading museums and collections around the world. The collection in total comprises more than 800 works, spanning Antiquity, the Middle Ages, Baroque and Rococo art, as well as the art of pre-Columbian America, Africa, India and China.
The couple’s primary passion, however, was the avant-garde and contemporary art. With exceptional taste, insight and an acute sense of historical context, the Ludwigs were among the first collectors to recognize the significance of artists and movements that were still largely unfamiliar to the Western art world.
They did more than assemble works of art: they helped redraw the cultural map of the world, deliberately looking beyond the Western canon to include the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, Cuba and Latin America. The Ludwigs have often been described as cultural diplomats: at a time of profound political division, they built artistic connections across national and ideological borders.
«The Ludwigs worked ‘across barriers’, acquiring works by artists outside the established routes followed by Western curators and gallerists. They did not rely on ideological arguments. Remaining committed to the primacy of artistic quality, their aim was to show audiences the broader context of the development of contemporary art»
Alexander Borovsky
exhibition curator, Head of the Department of Contemporary Trends at the State Russian Museum and artistic consultant to «ZILART»
СIn 1994, Peter and Irene Ludwig donated a group of about 150 works by Russian and Western artists of the second half of the 20th century to the State Russian Museum in St Petersburg. As a result, the Russian Museum became the only museum institution in Russia where international contemporary art of this period could be seen on such a scale and at such a level of quality. The list of works included in The Peter and Irene Ludwig’s Gift was developed jointly by the collectors and representatives of the museum.
The exhibition at ZILART presents this celebrated collection in its original integrity, allowing visitors to appreciate the choices made by two collectors of international stature and the strong sense of cultural mission that defined their approach. Many of the works are being exhibited for the first time.
«The exhibition introduces audiences to the phenomenon of collecting, which extended far beyond private ownership to become an important form of cultural preservation. Experiencing so many works selected by outstanding collectors at close range promises a powerful emotional response. It is a rare opportunity to encounter art in its full diversity and to sense the connections between different eras and individual lives»
Alla Manilova
Director General of the State Russian Museum
EXHIBITION ARCHITECTURE
The exhibition is organized neither chronologically nor by national schools. Curator Alexander Borovsky invites visitors to approach the art of the second half of the 20th century as a space of continuous dialogue, where different artistic movements are not isolated but resonate with one another.
This was also central to the way Peter and Irene Ludwig understood contemporary art. Rather than focusing on individual styles, they were interested in the broader picture of artistic development.
The exhibition route is divided into several thematic sections. Each focuses on one of the key artistic strategies of the second half of the 20th century.
POP ART
Pop Art became one of the defining artistic movements of the second half of the 20th century, turning the attention of art towards mass culture, advertising and everyday objects. Artists transformed familiar products and media images into works of art, examining the nature of modern visual experience. The section features works by Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns, Claes Oldenburg, Tom Wesselmann and other artists who shaped the visual language of Pop Art.
HYPERREALISM
Hyperrealism explores the possibilities of representation, pushing painting towards photographic precision. Yet beneath this apparent objectivity lies a close observation of everyday life and its atmosphere. The section features two acknowledged examples of the movement: Ralph Goings’ Unadilla Diner and Robert Bechtle’s Date Palms.
NEO-EXPRESSIONISM
From the late 1970s onwards, artists returned to emotional intensity, gesture and historical memory. The works of Anselm Kiefer, Georg Baselitz, Jörg Immendorff and Bernhard Heisig demonstrate the renewed power of painting to convey personal experience and address complex questions of national history and collective memory.
ABSTRACTION
Abstraction is presented as an independent field of artistic exploration in which form, colour, gesture and material become carriers of meaning. The section brings German and French approaches to abstract art into dialogue, with works by Bernard Schultze, Max Uhlig, Claude Viallat, Jean-Yves Langlois and other artists.
REALISMS
Realist painting in the second half of the 20th century developed along multiple paths, from social and psychological realism to new forms of figurative art. Works by Dmitry Zhilinsky, Natalia Nesterova, Wolfgang Mattheuer, Ulrich Hachulla and other artists demonstrate the many different ways in which artists of the period addressed the human figure, history and everyday life.
MYTHS. SYMBOLS. SIGNS
In the second half of the 20th century, many artists turned to mythology, archetypes and symbolic imagery as a universal language of culture. The section includes works by Joseph Beuys, Belkis Ayón, Luis Gómez, Jonathan Borofsky, Alexander Sitnikov and Nancy Graves, in which ancient myths, personal symbols and cultural memory become ways of speaking about the contemporary world.
ART ABOUT ART
One of the defining concerns of art in the second half of the 20th century was a reflection on art itself. Artists quoted and reinterpreted canonical works, revisited the history of art and examined the nature of the artistic image. The section features works by Pablo Picasso, Tom Wesselmann, Cy Twombly, Dmitry Zhilinsky, Sergei Mironenko, Claudio Bravo and other artists.
CONCEPTUAL ART
Conceptual art shifts attention from the artistic object towards the idea, language and process of perception. The works of Ilya Kabakov, Erik Bulatov, Viktor Pivovarov, Igor Makarevich and Ivan Chuikov demonstrate how text, space and everyday objects can become fully fledged artistic media.
«The exhibition architecture creates a route of dialogue. The display is designed to emphasise semantic connections between works rather than chronology. The galleries lead visitors from visually rich and recognisable imagery towards more analytical and conceptual practices. The architectural solutions help the viewer focus on the ideas embodied in the works, creating a balance between the individual artwork and the overall logic of the exhibition.»
Eric Belousov
exhibition architect
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