Located in two adjacent historic buildings in the centre of Kyiv, the Bohdan and Varvara Khanenko National Museum of Arts is named after the two art collectors and patrons. The museum, a former city mansion with a façade reminiscent of a Venetian palazzo, was once the home of the Khanenko family and houses their collection. The former tenement house of Varvara’s sister, Efrosynia Sakhnovska, was given to the museum in 1986 (fig. 1). The museum as an institution, founded by a Soviet decree of 23 June 1919, has existed for over a century, although its art collection has a much longer history. Its core is the private collection of Bohdan and Varvara Khanenko. Bohdan Ivanovych Khanenko (1849–1917), who came from a noble Cossack family, was a lawyer by training and held senior positions in various fields (fig. 2). Varvara Nykolivna (1852–1922) came from the Tereshchenko merchant family, which included, among others, industrialists, art collectors and philanthropists (fig. 3). Bohdan and Varvara married in 1874, a classic union of ‘old aristocracy’ and ‘new money’. This year also marks the beginning of the Khanenko collection; collecting art objects of various kinds became the couple’s shared life’s work. They were interested in both European and Asian art and collected modern and antique books. During their honeymoon in 1874, the couple purchased their first Italian paintings and sculptures in Rome and Florence. The Asian part of the collection began with the purchase of a large painted Persian vase in Warsaw in 1876. This was followed by trips to Paris, Vienna, Berlin, Venice, Madrid, Cairo.... Over a period of almost forty-five years, Anastasia Matselo and Hanna Rudyk Stained-Glass Panes in the Collection of The Bohdan and Varvara Khanenko National Museum of Arts Context, History, Secrets Fig. 1 The Bohdan and Varvara Khanenko National Museum of Arts, Kyiv, str. Tereschenkivs’ka, 15–17, photo 2024 13
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