Editing Pushkin Museum (section)

==Collection==
The holdings of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts currently include around 700,000 paintings, [[sculpture]]s, [[drawing]]s, applied works, photographs, and archaeological and animalistic objects.

===Painting===
[[File:André Derain, 1905, Le séchage des voiles (The Drying Sails), oil on canvas, 82 x 101 cm, Pushkin Museum, Moscow. Exhibited at the 1905 Salon d'Automne.jpg|thumb|[[André Derain]], 1905, ''Le séchage des voiles (The Drying Sails)'', oil on canvas, 82 x 101 cm. Exhibited at the 1905 {{lang|fr|[[Salon d'Automne]]|italic=no}}.]] The earliest monuments from the museum collection are pieces of [[Byzantine art]]: [[mosaic]]s and [[icon]]s. The early stage of development of Western European painting is represented by a relatively small collection of Italian Primitives. The hall of early [[Italian art]] was opened on October 10, 1924.

===Graphic art===

The Department of Prints and Drawings was founded in 1924, when the museum received the holdings of the Printing Cabinet of the Moscow Public and [[Rumyantsev Museum]]. In 1861, Alexander II made a valuable gift to the Printing Cabinet: the Moscow Public and Rumyantsev Museum received more than 20,000 prints from the Hermitage. 

===Sculpture===

The collection of Western European sculptures includes more than 600 pieces. The museum has expanded its holdings over the years and currently owns artworks from the 6th-21st centuries. The first artifacts presented to the Museum of Fine Arts were sculptures from Mikhail Schekin's collections. After the revolution, the museum received sculptures from nationalized collections. 

===Collection of decorative art pieces (Department of the Old Masters)===
The collection of decorative art pieces from Europe includes around 2,000 items. The earliest are from the [[Middle Ages]], and the set as a whole is very diverse. 

===Archaeological collection===
[[File:Grave stele 03 pushkin.jpg|thumb|Stele with two [[Hellenistic armies|Hellenistic soldiers]] of the [[Bosporan Kingdom]]; from [[Taman peninsula]] (Yubileynoe), [[southern Russia]], 3rd quarter of the 4th century BC; marble, Pushkin Museum]]

The Museum of Fine Arts was intended primarily as a museum of classical arts. Ancient artifacts were the core and the main components of its collection, and the Department of Antiquity was one of the three major scientific departments. Its founder and director, Ivan Tsvetaev (1847-1913), was an expert in ancient art, as were his closest associates, Vladimir Malmberg (1860-1921) and Nikolay Scherbakov (1884-1933).

====Egypt====
Most of the objects presented in Hall No. 1 have been on display since the museum opening in 1912 and come from the collection of Vladimir Golenishchev (1856-1947).

====Ancient civilizations====
The museum holdings of genuine artifacts of Southwest Asia are based on the collection of Russian Orientalist and Egyptologist Vladimir Golenishchev.

====Antiquity====
The antique collection of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts includes many genuine artifacts: more than 1,000 vessels, small plastic pieces, and sculptures.

====Tsvetaev's collection of casts====
The collection of casts and copies, typical for European museums of the nineteenth century, is unique today in its preservation and consistency. With a similar cohesiveness, Tsvetaev wanted to present plastic art of the modern era and complete the collection with casts made from contemporary sculptures, where [[Auguste Rodin]]'s works would take the central place.

===Numismatic collection===
Today, the holdings of the Numismatics Department of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts form a collection in excess of 200,000 items and 3,000 volumes of the special library. It was started at Imperial Moscow University. In 1888, the collection was divided and formed the basis for the major numismatic collections of Moscow that belonged to the Historical Museum and the Alexander III Fine Arts Museum.

Since 1912, objects of ancient and Western European numismatics from the university collection were transferred to the Sculpture Department of the Fine Arts Museum and mostly kept packaged. By June 1925, museum custodians had grouped together a number of cases with coins, medals, and casts and created the Numismatic Cabinet located on the balcony of the White Hall. In 1945, the museum's Numismatic Cabinet became an independent department. It includes archaeological material from Central Asia, such as a hoard of Kushano-Sasanian coins acquired in 2002.<ref>{{cite news |title=Vasudeva Imitations and Kushano Sasanian Coppers from Turkmenistan |journal=Moneti I Medali |last=Smirnova |first=N |year=1996 |pages=130–133}}</ref>