ABOUT MUSEUM
Which country do you prefer to live in? — Of course, in the country of Culture.
Whom will you send your best thoughts? — The Culture.
What do you dedicate your enlightened work to? — Of course, The Culture.
How do you renew your consciousness? — By the victorious light of Culture.
Are you rebels? — In constant work, we do not have time for a revolt. We are building. In positive affirmation and cognition, we strive to improve and decorate earthly life.
Nicholas Roerich
On March 10th, 2000, the Public House-Museum named after Nicholas Roerich was opened in Odessa, one of the twelve museums in the world dedicated to the outstanding artist — Nicholas Roerich, and the only Nicholas Roerich museum in Ukraine. The first Nicholas Roerich Museum was opened in New York in 1923. Subsequently, the Roerich Museums and Art Galleries were established in many countries around the world.
The Museum was founded by the Odessa Roerich Pact Committee, which, on February 14th, 2004, celebrated its 14th anniversary, and the South Ukrainian Charitable Fund named after Nicholas Roerich.
The concept of the exposition and activities of the Odessa Roerich House-Museum is in line with Nicholas Roerich’s view of the Museum: “People pronounce the word ‘Museum’ but don’t realize the idea, that the Museum is a ‘Mouseion,’ in Greek, the House of Muses. The abode of all the Muses is, above all, the symbol of the Unification.”
“First of all, Mouseion is the abode of all the genera of the Beautiful. Not only in the sense of preserving one or another artefact. But in the sense of the creative application of them to life.” The younger son of Nicholas Roerich, Svetoslav Roerich (1904-1993), added to the concept his vision of the Museum as a Cultural Center: “First of all, it should be a live center. Not just a museum exposition, but constantly changing exhibitions... Of course, along with this, the works of Nikolai Konstantinovich should be constantly presented. There may be a lecture-concert hall at the center... Undoubtedly, a large library should work at the center... But I also see the center as a scientific institution. I suppose its task is not only the systematization and study of the multifaceted heritage of Nikolai Konstantinovich and Elena Ivanovna. But also in the further development of the ideas inherent in this heritage”.
The building of Odessa Roerich House Museum
Our main task is the scientific comprehensive study and dissemination of the creative heritage of the entire Roerich family — the world-famous painter Nicholas (Nikolai Konstantinovich) Roerich (1874 — 1947), philosopher Helena (Elena Ivanovna) Roerich (1879 — 1955), the wife of Nicholas Roerich, their sons — an orientalist George (Yuri Nikolaevich) Roerich (1902 — 1960) and painter Svyatoslav (Svyatoslav Nikolaevich) Roerich (1904 — 1993). Following the principles laid down by Nicholas Roerich, during the creation of the first Roerich Museum in New York, we are open to the broadest cooperation with all organizations of culture, art, and science around the world.
At the roots of the creation of the Roerich Museum in Odessa were artist Boris Alekseevich Smirnov - Rusetskiy (1905—1993) — a disciple of Nicholas Roerich and Natalia Mikhailovna Sazanova (1932—2006), an Indologist Professor at Moscow State University. The founder of the Odessa Roerich House Museum, Helena Petrenko, a doctor and Roerichologist, developed a project for the museum space exposition. The premises for the Museum were purchased by philanthropists and renovated by Museum’s co-workers. The initial collection of the Museum consisted of paintings, sketches,
Exposition of contemporary artists of Ukraine, Israel and Odessa in the Odessa Roerich House Museum
The Odessa Roerich House Museum was organized following the example of the Nicholas Roerich Museum in New York, opened in 1923. The true Temple of Arts, Culture and Science, in 1929 the Museum in New York was moved to a new 29-storied building, also known as the Master Building.The constantly enriched collection of N. K. Roerich’s paintings of the Museum consisted of about 1000 masterpieces and was presented as a gift to the American people. Several organizations,
founded by Nicholas Roerich in the USA, resided in the museum’s building — the “Master Institute of the United Arts” (1921), the art center “Corona Mundi” (1922), the society “Roerich Peace Pact and Banner of Peace” (1935). Art departments of more then ten countries, the Tibetan library, which comprised 330 sacred Buddhist books Kangyur and Tangyur, and the gospel-rooms, dedicated to St. Sergius and St. Francis, were set in the Museum.
Nicholas Roerich
June–October, 1929. Entrance to the Roerich Museum, New York
In background: “Treasure of the Angels” (1905, top) and “Solovetsky Monastery” (1923, below)
Nicholas Roerich Museum archive, New York
The creative heritage of the Roerichs is multifarious and enormous — it is a powerful contribution to the development of the international culture, science and arts, prosperity of Peace and Beauty on Earth through the beauty of the inner world of each man and mankind in its entirety. It can be said that through the Roerichs the evolutionary message of Beauty of Cosmic Knowledge was declared from the Great Teachers of mankind as described in the crown of their heritage — the scientific and philosophic Teaching of the Living Ethics. But it was preceded by a life-long way of education and self-education of every member of the Roerichs and the contacts with those Great Minds, who guide human evolution and whom Svetoslav Roerich used to call “the more perfect people”. Svetoslav Roerich dedicated several essays to his parents:
“Artist and Seer”, “A word about my father”, “Uplifting yourself, to uplift the others”. He saw their joined way during all his life, and wrote, “Nicholas Roerich considered that whatever interests and thoughts we have, the most important thing is to study and understand a man. This deep analysis was of real interest to my father (Nicholai Konstantinovich) and mother (Helena Ivanovna). In their life they managed and were lucky to meet outstanding and exceptional people who had already passed a part of the intended Great Path. And they were themselves an example of what a man can be if he really transforms his life and follows these paths. They had a true Contact with the more perfect life, with the more perfect people who always existed on Earth. The only person can find them whom they want to meet themselves”.
