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Monday, 16.07.2007
Museum of Political History
The museum is located in one of the city’s most beautiful art nouveau buildings. The villa beside the Peter and Paul Fortress belonged to Mathilda Kschesinskaya, who was for many years prima ballerina of the Mariinksi Theatre and also mistress of the Tsar. But after the revolution, the Soviets used this as their headquarters.
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What was formerly the ‘Museum of the Great Socialist October Revolution’ now portrays impartially and openly the political history of Russia in the 20th century.
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ul. Kujbysheva 2/4
Nearest metro: Gorkovskaya
Opening hours: 10am – 6pm
Closed: Thurday
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Besides the Kshesinskaya Villa, the museum also owns the neighbouring villa originally built by the timber industrialist Baron Brandt. In the 1950s, both building were joined by an unappealing connecting structure. But the architecture is still worth the visit on its own merits: Where else in Petersburg can you view the interior of such a fine Jugendstil mansion?
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The museum does not have a real permanent exhibition, apart from Lenin’s reconstructed study on the top floor. Instead the individual rooms’ exhibitions are continually being reworked to address new topics. The well-researched exhibitions on the history of the Russian Duma in pre- and post-socialist times, as well as the exhibition on the Russian merchant in Tsarist times are particularly worthwhile.
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Exhibitions have in the past had as varying themes as ‘Political Needlework’, which included a giant detailed railway map of the Soviet Union including Stalin portrait, which only on close inspection was seen to be tapestry, and recent political history, covering Afghanistan, the Putsch and Chechnya.
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