Arts & International Affairs: Volume 2, Issue 1 | Page 125

which would both complement the city’s already thriving art landscape and
benefit from existing Dutch-Russian ties. Timing was propitious with the
main fundraising for the Hermitage Amsterdam taking place just before the
���� financial crisis. The initial Hermitage Amsterdam agreement specified
that there would be no new Hermitage satellites in close European cities for
a period of time. Veen did a press junket to Paris, Berlin, and other European
cities in advance of the Hermitage Amsterdam opening. The message was
that “Europe is getting a new museum.”
Piotrovsky was receptive, partly because a satellite would create a welcome
new revenue stream. “The museum was facing both a surplus of deferred
maintenance projects and a lack of funds. Its new Dutch friends put sufficient
funds at its disposal within an incredibly short time” (Tromp ����:���).
As Piotrovsky put it, “art is more important than money. But money is not
unimportant” (Tromp ����:���). The St. Petersburg Hermitage gets one
euro per visitor to the Amsterdam branch (Tromp ����:���). Operations
ostensibly cost five million euros a year, with half coming from receipts
and the other half through fund-raising (Tromp ����:���). Hermitage
Amsterdam operates more or less independently from St. Petersburg (Tromp
����:���). The Amsterdam branch mostly shows art from the St. Petersburg
storage and some exhibits from local Dutch museums. � When asked about
the Hermitage “expansion” to Amsterdam, Piotrovsky took issue with the
terminology. “Sure, but it’s not about expansion, it’s about access. We have
extensive and marvellous collections. Here we can only show a small part
of them” (Tromp ����:���). The Hermitage ostensibly holds over � million
objects in its collection. Approximately ��,��� of them are on display in the
��� galleries of the St. Petersburg museum (Russia Gallery).
There were some contributions from the city, the province and the state to
get the Dutch museum up and running. But, there is no public money for
Hermitage Amsterdam operations. There are several long-term sponsorships
from corporate donors, like Phillips and Heineken. This sort of activity
contributes to their corporate social responsibility mission and they benefit
from the fact that they can use the museum building a few times a year for
their events.
Guggenheim and Louvre—Saadiyat Island
Saadiyat Island is a development project of the Government of Abu Dhabi
under the auspices of the Tourism Development and Investment Company
�
For example, in the summer of ����, the two exhibits were “Alexander, Napoleon, and Josephine,”
from St. Petersburg, and a portrait exhibit from the Rijksmuseum.
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