| Winter 2008-2009
Reader’s Forum (A special thank you to all who shared so generously)
- Fabergé Thimbles
Thimble enthusiasts Magdalena and Professor William Isbister, retired surgeon, have done a very thorough literature search and discuss their findings on Fabergé thimbles in a well-researched, illustrated paper.
An outgrowth of this research is that Karl Gustav Lundell, attributed as a Fabergé 'workmaster' in recent publications and on websites, died on May 29, 1856, and never qualified as a workmaster. Confirmed archival research on this gentleman was first published in Tillander-Goldenhielm, et al. Carl Fabergé and His Contemporaries, 1980, 46-47.
Fabergé Thimble by M. Perchin
- The 1890 Fabergé Danish Palaces Egg - The Miniatures Explained
Christian Steener Eriksen from Copenhagen questioned the identity of the third panel from the left in the Danish Palaces Egg. Traditionally in Fabergé literature it had been identified as Hvidøre, the house in Denmark to which the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna retired after the 1917 Revolution. He observed that the Danish Palaces Egg was made in 1890 and the Empress and her sister only bought the house in 1906!
Using Internet tools Annemiek Wintraecken and Mr. Eriksen found the correct identity, and the very image that was probably used as a model by Konstantin Krijitski to paint the miniature of the Kejserens Villa. On her web page, Ms. Wintraecken has juxta-opposed the 10 miniatures from the Danish Palaces Egg with contemporary and modern photographs of the palaces and yachts depicted. Thank you, Mr. Eriksen for this astute question!
Danish Palaces Egg - The Kejserens Villa
- Blue Serpent Egg Redating
Excerpts of reader’s responses on the redating hypotheses suggested by Annemiek Wintraecken in the Fabergé Newsletter, November 2008, have been compiled with the writer's permissions. Newsletter space limitations do not permit publishing lengthy rebuttals. Individuals interested in contacting the writers of the responses may email Christel McCanless. Additional future rebuttals will be posted on the newly-initiated Fabergé Eggs Forum.
- 1900 Paris Exposition Universelle Discoveries
Stephen Harrison, Cleveland Museum of Art, writes that he discovered two Fabergé objects, a desk clock owned by Hillwood Museum in Washington (DC) which resembles the James Cox clock at the Walters Art Museum, and the Danish Palaces Egg in the Matilda Geddings Gray Foundation Collection, were shown at the Exposition Universelle in Paris in 1900.
The objects are on view in the Artistic Luxury exhibition closing January 18, 2009. Other Fabergé eggs on view are the Pansy Egg (recently restored and last seen publicly in San Diego in 1986), the Rose Trellis, Red Cross Egg, Cartier Tsarevitch Egg, Kelch Rocaille and Bonbonniére Eggs, and Cleveland Lapis Lazuli Egg. Exhibition moves next to San Francisco where it will be hosted at the Palace of the Legion of Honor from February 7 - May 31, 2009.
Fabergé Happenings
- The late Mr. David A. Braver, an avid collector of Fabergé frames, has left his collection to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. (Courtesy Dr. Géza von Habsburg)
- Exhibition catalog, Masterworks of Fabergé: The Matilda Geddings Gray Foundation Collection, by John W. Keefe is now available from Cheekwood Botanical Garden & Museum of Art, Nashville, Tennessee. Contact: Christy Hager.
- Objects of Desire: Fabergé from the Hodges Family Collection on view through January 18, 2009, at the New Orleans Museum of Art will have an exhibition catalog available February 2009. Contact: 504-658-4116. (Courtesy Jim Mulvihill)
- Peter Carl Fabergé and the Other Russian Masters, opened December 8, 2008, as a permanent exhibition at the New Orleans Museum of Art.
- Daniel Bibb, lender of Fabergé silver and other art objects to the New Orleans Museum of Art, is also an icon enthusiast. On his website he has a slide show of the recent Windows of Heaven exhibition at the museum.
Box Inscribed by Prince Yusupov, Bibb Collection
(Courtesy NOMA)
- Anne Odom & Wendy Salmond are guest editors of a new book, Treasures into Tractors: The Selling of Russia’s Cultural Heritage, 1918-1938, in which scholars cover in detail four topics:
- Soviet Culture after the Revolution
- Soviet Museums and the First Five-Year Plan
- Sales in Europe and the United States
- Imperial Libraries and Archives.
Published in Canadian American Slavic Studies, vol. 43, no. 1-4, 2009. Contact: Charles Schlacks, Jr., or available in February 2009 as a book from the Washington University Press and Hillwood Museum.
- Yoo, Hee-Gwone and Kristen Regina, Visual Resources from Russia and Eastern Europe in the New York Public Library: A Checklist describes nearly 900 heavily illustrated books, journals, posters, engravings and prints as well as original works of art on paper, principally from the 18th to the early 20th centuries. Contact: Ross Publishing.
- The Fabergé Arts Foundation (FAF) of Washington (DC) and St. Petersburg (Russia), and Christian Bolin of the Swedish Court Jeweller W.A. Bolin, are co-sponsoring the Sixth International Jewelers Competition in Stockholm from August 11-16, 2009. Young Russian, Scandinavian and jewelers from the Baltic countries will compete for the Russian-Nordic jewelry awards during the Swedish Cultural Festival.
A travel experience for Friends of FAF including three days at the Festival, a three-day historical tour of St. Petersburg, and a one-day boat excursion to Tallinn, Estonia, is planned. Contact: FAF or 301-986-1576.
- Hermitage Museum has a virtual tour and viewers may search the museum's Fabergé holdings using the workmaster rather than the generic Fabergé term in the "search-function".
- "Rare £15,000 Faberge umbrella saved from car boot sale" is to be auctioned by Bearnes, Hampton and Littlewood in the UK on January 28, 2009. (Courtesy Daryl Chi-Wen Dao)
- Art & Auction, December 2008, in an article entitled Across the Universe details the growth of fairs, auction houses and museums to new regions and new audiences in the world. Mentioned is Alexander Ivanov’s Fabergé Museum in Moscow, and Baden-Baden. No further details are given.
- Valentin Skurlov has updated his research on hardstone figures in the October 2008 issue of the Russian journal, Антикварное Oбозрение (Antique Review).
- Ulla Tillander-Godenhielm, author of a lavishly illustrated book Fabergé ja hänen suomalaiset mestarinsa on Fabergé workmasters from Finland (contact), writes, "we unveiled two text and picture panels with extensive media coverage and a large audience, for Knut Oskar Pihl, (1860-1897) and his daughter Alma Pihl (1888-1976), and one for Erik Kollin (1836-1901) at the birthplaces of Mr. Pihl and Mr. Kollin. A few years ago we did the same for Henrik Wigström (1862-1923), and we have plans of continuing now with Hjalmar Armfelt (1873-1959) and perhaps with other Finnish masters."
 
Ulla Tillander-Godenhielm, Mr. Ernst Knape, owner of the estate Brödtorp in Pojo, Finland, where Erik Kollin was born, and on the right, Mr. N.H. Simberg, Fabergé enthusiast and collector at the Pihl unveiling
Exhibitions and Fairs
- December 6, 2008 - January 18, 2009 The National Museum, New Delhi, India Faberge - The Priceless Jewellery of the Russian Empire
196 pieces are on loan from leading Russian museums: the Moscow Kremlin Museums, the State Historical Museum, the Fersman Mineralogical Museum, the Pavlovsk Museum and Palace, and the Link of Times Foundation.
(Courtesy Tatiana Muntian)
- March 13 - 22, 2009 Maastricht, the Netherlands
European Fine Art Fair (TEFAF) - A La Vieille Russie and Wartski exhibiting.
Alma Pihl Snowflake Brooch. Provenance: Nobel Family
(Courtesy Ulla Tillander-Godenhielm)
Christel Ludewig McCanless
Annemiek Wintraecken
Disclaimer: Every effort is made to ensure the accuracy of the information at the time it is posted, but due to the changing nature of the Internet the accuracy cannot be guaranteed.
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