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Stroganoff art show is Portland museum's biggest project ever Photo from Portland Art Museum Priceless Russian art, such as this malachite coupe from the early 19th century, is coming to the Portland Art Museum. By BILL VARBLE What Lucy Buchanan has in mind is turning on an entire state to some of history's greatest art treasures. If she succeeds, Oregonians may even develop associations with the name "Stroganoff" that go beyond beef and sour cream. Buchanan, the Portland Art Museum's development and marketing director, was in Medford Tuesday to drum up support for "Stroganoff: The Palace and Collections of a Russian Noble Family." She said the world premiere exhibition opening Feb. 19 in Portland is by far the biggest and most important show in the museum's 107-year history. She said it's "not a Portland thing but an Oregon thing." "I want to get Medford pumped," she said. "It's costing about $3.5 million to put it on, so we're hoping lots of people come." Buchanan said she was in Southern Oregon for two reasons: to make people aware of the exhibit, and to talk to businesses and foundations about chipping in money to take children to Portland to see the exhibit. The Stroganoff exhibit showcases more than 230 art treasures from The State Hermitage, the Russian State Museum and other museums and palaces in St. Petersburg, Russia, collected over the centuries by one of the great Russian dynasties, the Stroganoffs. Buchanan Many of the pieces are almost priceless: a three-legged bronze coupe of malachite from the Hermitage, Botticelli's painting of St. Jerome, an 1811 portrait of Count Alexander Stroganoff by Alexander Warnek. "It's a big, big project we've worked on for four years," Buchanan said. The pieces have been insured for more than $200 million for the visit, she said. Buchanan and her husband, John E. Buchanan, the museum's executive director, traveled to Russia several times in efforts to close the deal on what she calls "the project of a lifetime." Buchanan said the key to hammering out agreements with the labyrinthine Russian art bureaucracy was the Baroness Helene de Ludinghausen, a Stroganoff descendant, head of the Stroganoff Foundation and a woman well-connected in Russian art and diplomatic circles. The baroness, described by Buchanan as "a friend of a friend of a friend," told John Buchanan, "You have to push the Russians.'' She is expected to attend the exhibit's opening, Buchanan said. Coordinating curator was Penelope Hunter-Stiebvel, formerly of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. The Stroganoff family occupies a legendary position in Russian history. They opened Siberia in an expansion loosely analogous to the opening of the American frontier, working with Ivan the Terrible (1533-1584) and Cossack outlaws alike to create an empire in timber, furs, minerals and salt. But they were also a cultural force, banning serfdom, founding monasteries and developing the "Stroganoff School" of painting. After being ennobled by Peter the Great, the family built the Stroganoff Palace and embarked on years of art patronage. The exhibit is divided into sections that highlight the family's relationship with Russia's imperial family, document the dynasty's early years, examine icons and other religious art and so on. The family's collections were nationalized after the Bolshevik Revolution, and many pieces were sold off in the 1920s and 1930s. Many have never been outside Russia until now. M.B. Piotrovsky, a director at the Hermitage, referred to the treasures' history when he wrote that the exhibit is in part an attempt "to atone for our sin ... by restoring the natural connection between the Stroganoff name and these remarkable masterpieces of art, these astonishing treasures of world culture." Unlike major exhibits that come to the Northwest after originating elsewhere, this one was put together by the Portland Art Museum. "It's Oregon's project," Buchanan said. After its debut it will travel to the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth, Texas, the Louvre in Paris and the Hermitage. The museum is producing a book that museum and Russian officials say should be the definitive word on the family's legacy. The exhibit comes just in time to help the museum celebrate a $40 million capital and endowment project, which in part expands the museum to more than 60,000 square feet. The ambitious expansion, including the museum's first new gallery since 1938, will enable the museum for the first time to mount special exhibits without taking down its permanent exhibits. "Guess where most of the collections have been living," Buchanan said. "In the basement!" A series of events keyed to the exhibit for both adults and children runs from February through May, including lectures, concerts, art exhibits, theater, dance, film and other events. For ticket information and special group prices, call the museum at (503) 226-2811. Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 2000, Medford, Oregon USA