Introduction : Hermitage, a cultural laboratory -- Moving objects -- Interlude 1 : art history and Hermitage before World War II -- Documenting the museum -- Art history from the collections up -- Interlude 2: mobility at Hermitage -- The nostalgic modesty of Hermitage restorers -- Guides : taking science down the galleries -- Spaces and surprises: technologies of vision for a long winter -- Conclusion : secreting documents
Summary
In Art of Memories, Vincent Antonin Lépinay documents the Hermitage's curatorial practices in an innovative consideration of the museum as a cultural laboratory. Lépinay analyzes the tensions between the museum as a space of exploration of the collections and as a culture heavily invested in self-protection from the outside world