Hermitage Museum

Saint Petersburg’s Hermitage Museum was founded in 1754 by the Catherine the Great, and opened to the public in 1852. Being one of the largest and oldest museums in the world, it is only natural that the Hermitage houses one of the world’s great collections: more than three million pieces, one third of them accounted for by the museum’s stamp collection alone.

"Objects are nothing on their own. Everyone talks of masterpieces because that is what museums call them. Would they stop being masterpieces if we stopped calling them that?

The State Hermitage Museum’s “Gateway to History” exhibition made its debut at the Byzantine & Christian Museum in Athens on Wednesday, following an official inauguration ceremony co-hosted by Greek foreign minister Nikos Kotzias and his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov.

The Byzantine and Christian Museum in Athens presents "The State Hermitage Museum: Gateway to History," an exhibition of works from the permanent collections of the renowned Saint Petersburg museum. The exhibition opens on Wednesday, November 2, and runs through February 26, 2017.

El Greco's painting of the Apostles Peter and Paul is displayed at the Christian and Byzantine Museum in Athens as part of "The State Hermitage Museum: Gateway to History" exhibition, which opens to the public Tuesday. Running to February next year, the temporary display showcases 80 pieces from the Russian museum's permanent collections, including antiquities, paintings and sculptures.

One of the Athens Acropolis’ finest and best-preserved korai – the archaic statues depicting young women – will be exhibited at the Roman Courtyard of the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg on Friday.

The statue, which leaves Greece for the first time, is travelling to Russia in the framework of a cultural exchange program organised for the Year of Greece and Russia 2016.

The cultural events marking ‘The Year of Russia in Greece’ will commence Friday, March 11. Some exquisite exhibits of the of the Hermitage museum in Moscow will be on display at the Acropolis museum this Friday.

Dozens of cats at Russia's largest museum the Hermitage have one main task: to root out unwanted guests, rodents. The cats are as famous as the collections For more than a century visitors have marveled at the Hermitage Museum's precious collections, and for just as long dozens of cats have prowled the Saint Petersburg palace's sprawling cellars.