Russia’s Hermitage Unveils Its First Fully Virtual Exhibition
The project explores four centuries of European art.
The State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg has launched a new digital project. Visitors can now “attend” its first fully virtual exhibition, The Art of Being a Woman Artist, which focuses on four centuries of European art, the museum’s press service told IT-Russia.
According to the museum, the digital exhibition is meant to challenge a historical injustice. It pays tribute to talented women who helped shape art during eras marked by strict social constraints, when society largely rejected the idea that women could be artists and reserved the creation of masterpieces for men.
Women, however, persisted. Pastel portraits by Rosalba Carriera shaped artistic fashion, while Angelica Kauffman set aesthetic standards of her time.
Women Can Be Creators Too
For many women artists of that era, the path to recognition was difficult. Anna Dorothea Therbusch, for example, was forced to pause her career for 20 years to focus on her family. Elisabetta Sirani died at the age of 27 after a serious illness, though rumors circulated that she had been poisoned by a servant.
The 20th century brought greater freedom, allowing women to create on equal footing with men. That shift is reflected in the bold experiments of Sonia Delaunay and the refined works of Marie Laurencin.
The Hermitage says the exhibition will continue to expand, with curators planning to add new artists and virtual galleries. Even now, anyone can explore these works from home: access is available via the museum’s website in the “Virtual Visit” section.
Earlier, hundreds of thousands of viewers across Russian cities attended the immersive exhibition Dreams of Siberia, which in digital form explores the past and present of Siberia and the Far East.
