Joseph Backstein Collection

Joseph Backstein (1945–2024) was a curator, art historian, and critic and a key figure of the Russian contemporary art scene over the past four decades. 

The display is a selection from his collection of around 200 works. In the context of the Museum’s work on shaping a collection of Russian contemporary art, the Backstein collection is unique, as it comprises gifts from artists such as Vadim Zakharov, Konstantin Zvezdochotov, Elena Kovylina, Oleg Kulik, Igor Makarevich and Elena Elagina, Andrei Monastyrsky, Irina Nakhova, and Pavel Pepperstein.

The deeply personal nature of this collection expands the notion of what constitutes a work of art: within the museum context, even a greeting card made by Makarevich and Elagina for Backstein’s birthday becomes one. Some works were identified through dedications on the reverse. Another, more «

“professional”, line of acquisitions consists of works given by artists as a gesture of gratitude — for example, for cu-rating an exhibition — such as one of Andrei Monastyrsky’s twelve collages from the project Particular Histories (1990, with Conrad Atkinson), originally shown at the exhibition space on Peresvetov Lane in Moscow’s Proletarsky District. We can be sure that each of the works on display here has a similarly particular history.