The monument to Minin and Pozharsky is a sculptural monument
dedicated to the leaders of the Second National Militia in 1612, as well
as the end of the Time of Troubles and the expulsion of Polish
interventionists from Russia.
The sculptural monument is the
first major sculptural monument in Moscow. It was designed by architect
Ivan Martos in 1818. The monument is made in the classical style, which
is explained by the monumentality of its forms and the smoothness of its
volumes. The monument consists of a bronze sculptural group and a
granite pedestal with bronze bas-reliefs. The pedestal is decorated with
bas-reliefs on both sides and the inscription: "TO CITIZEN MININ AND
PRINCE POZHARSKY, I AM GRATEFUL TO RUSSIA. OCTOBER 1818". Height of the
monument (without terrace) it is approximately 8.3 m, according to other
data — 8.7 m and 8.9 m.
Initially, the monument was erected on Red Square in front of the Upper Shopping Malls, later renamed GUM. Currently it stands at the Pokrovsky Cathedral, where it was moved in 1931 in connection with the reconstruction of Red Square and the construction of the Lenin Mausoleum.
The idea of erecting a monument to the heroes of the liberation
militia arose in 1802, when the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts offered
students the feat of Nizhny Novgorod elder Kuzma Minin and Prince Dmitry
Pozharsky as a working topic. The following year, at a meeting of the
Free Society of Lovers of Literature, Sciences and Arts in St.
Petersburg, the writer Vasily Parugaev expressed the idea of the need to
erect a monument to the leaders of the militia of 1612 and the
outstanding figure Patriarch Hermogenes. Despite this, Emperor Alexander
I did not support the idea, as he decided that it was impossible to
raise enough funds for its implementation.
In 1804, associate
Rector of the Academy of Arts Ivan Martos, taking the initiative,
executed a model of the monument and presented it to the public, who
positively appreciated his work. Three years later, an engraving of the
first model of the monument was published. Although this was not the
final composition, Ivan Martos reflected its main features in the first
draft: Minin and Pozharsky were represented by the liberators of the
Fatherland from foreign intervention.
After the creation of the
monument project, talks about its installation stopped. However, in
1808, residents of Nizhny Novgorod again raised the issue of erecting
the monument, collecting funds for it by subscription. Emperor Alexander
I supported the appeal, giving permission for the opening of the
competition. Among the participants were sculptors Ivan Martos, Ivan
Prokofiev, Feodosiy Shchedrin, Vasily Demut-Malinovsky, Stepan Pimenov,
architects Jean-Francois Thomas de Thomon and Andrei Mikhailov.
According to the results of the selection, the work of Ivan Martos was
recognized as the best project, it was approved for creation in November
1808.
On January 1, 1809, a nationwide subscription was announced
and engravings of the project were sent throughout Russia. However, due
to financial problems, work on the monument was suspended. By order of
Alexander I, the monument was to be installed in Nizhny Novgorod, but
Martos believed that the monument should stand in Moscow, where the main
events of the second national militia took place, and obtained
permission to install it. Thus, when in 1811 the amount of funds raised
reached 136 thousand rubles, the Committee of Ministers agreed to erect
a monument in Moscow. At the same time, 18 thousand rubles sent by the
Nizhny Novgorod province went to create an obelisk in Nizhny Novgorod,
which was installed in 1828 on the territory of the Kremlin, next to the
Cathedral of Michael the Archangel, where Kuzma Minin's ashes are kept.
Work on a small model of the monument began at the end of 1811. The
sculptor did not stop working on it even during the Patriotic War of
1812. While working on the figures of Minin and Pozharsky, Martos was
posed by his sons. In 1815, a large model was completed, and the
sculptor Ivan Timofeevich Timofeev helped create it. He lifted weights,
moved scaffolding, dragged clay and other working materials, wetted a
large clay sculpture group to maintain humidity daily for two years.
Both models were put on display, which earned universal approval, and
from which the forms were subsequently removed. For the casting of the
monument, Martos signed an agreement with the then famous foundry master
of the Academy of Arts Vasily Ekimov.
At that time, many
newspaper articles and magazine articles were published about the
monument, this was due to the high interest in its creation, which
appeared after the liberation of Moscow from the Napoleonic troops.
Thus, the journal "Bulletin of Europe" published an article dedicated to
the casting of the monument and its successful completion. It was also
emphasized there that Vasily Ekimov was one of the first to cast the
figures completely, and not in parts. First, the wax figures were coated
45 times with a liquid mixture of crushed bricks and beer, constantly
being dried with feather fans, and then the inside of the figures was
filled with a composition of alabaster and crushed brick — calidra.
During the month, 16 pre-installed furnaces melted wax, at the same time
1100 pounds of copper with 10 pounds of tin and 60 pounds of zinc were
melted in several furnaces for 10 hours. Finally, on August 6, 1816, the
casting took place, which took only 9 minutes. For the first time in
Russia, a complex composition consisting of two figures was cast at
once, except for the sword, helmet and shield.
Granite blocks for
the pedestal were made by St. Petersburg stonecutter Samson Sukhanov.
Their production took place in the Vyborg province near the village of
Kirkopele. Ivan Martos' son—in-law, Avraham Melnikov, also participated
in the development of the pedestal. He made drawings and templates and
carefully supervised the decoration of the pedestal. In February 1817,
the inscription on the pedestal was approved: "GRATEFUL Russia TO
CITIZEN MININ AND PRINCE POZHARSKY. IT 'S 1817." But since the monument
was opened only in 1818, the end of the phrase was changed to "OCTOBER
1818".
In 1807, the Journal of Fine Arts published an article by
Nikolai Koshansky "Monument to Minin and Pozharsky, appointed in
Moscow," which noted that Martos presented a significant moment:
Minin's appearance is firm and resolute; the expectation of something
great is noticeable in his eyes, and his half-open mouth seems to be
saying to the Hero: Save the Fatherland! Pozharsky's gaze is directed to
the sky, doubt and hope, desire and expectation of help from above, seem
to be animated in the features of the Hero… How artfully artists are
able to speak to the image with all their senses
The Russian
writer and journalist Nikolai Polevoy spoke positively about the
monument: "... who among us was not touched, looking at the majestic
monument that grateful Russia erected to citizen Minin and his employee
Prince Pozharsky!" Polevoy considered it right that Minin's name was
ahead, since "... without him, what could Pozharsky have done ...".
For his work on the monument, sculptor Ivan Martos was elevated to
the rank of a full state councilor with a pension of 4,000 rubles per
year. Foundry master Vasily Ekimov received 20,000 rubles and the Order
of Anna II degree, sculptor Ivan Timofeev — 3,000 rubles, architect
Abraham Melnikov — a gift.
After the completion of the work on May 21, 1817, the monument was
shipped by water from St. Petersburg to Moscow. He was taken along the
Neva and Onega Lake, then through the Mariinsky system, along the
Sheksna to Rybinsk, from there by the Volga to Nizhny Novgorod, where on
June 2 the monument was greeted by huge crowds. Then the path went up
the Oka to Kolomna and ended on September 2, 1817 on the Moskva River
near the walls of the Kremlin.
Until February 1818, work was
underway to erect the monument. Initially, the sculptural monument was
planned to be placed at the Tverskaya Zastava, but Martos chose a
location near the Upper Shopping malls on Red Square facing the Kremlin.
The monument was erected in the middle of Red Square in front of the
Upper Shopping Malls facing the Kremlin. The monument was surrounded by
four lanterns, and on the left side there was a booth with a grenadier
guarding it.
On February 20 (March 4), 1818, the grand opening of
the monument took place. At the beginning of the event, the composer
Stepan Degtyarev's oratorio "Minin and Pozharsky, or the Liberation of
Moscow", written by him in 1811, was performed. The opening was attended
by four consolidated Guards regiments that arrived from St. Petersburg,
later all members of the imperial family, headed by Emperor Alexander I
(on the eve of his departure to Warsaw), as well as the ranks of the
court. The Kremlin walls and towers, along with the roofs of the
adjacent buildings, were filled with people.
In 1829, the young
Vissarion Belinsky, a future literary critic, in a letter to friends in
Chembar tells what a "sacred awe" he feels every time he passes by the
monument and examines it. Belinsky calls the figures of Minin and
Pozharsky standing on the pedestal "two eternally sleepy giants of the
ages who immortalized their names with fervent love for their dear
homeland." In the sequel, he adds: "Maybe time will crush this bronze,
but their sacred names will not disappear into the ocean of eternity."
However, among the laudatory statements, there were also critical
remarks. So, the poet Alexander Pushkin was dissatisfied with the
inscription and gave it the following assessment: "The inscription to
Citizen Minin, of course, is not satisfactory: for us he is either a
philistine Kosma Minin, nicknamed Sukhorukoy, or a duma nobleman Kosma
Minich Sukhorukoy, or, finally, Kuzma Minin, an elected person from the
entire Moscow state, as he is named in the letter of election of Mikhail
Romanov. It would not be bad to know all this, as well as the name and
patronymic of Prince Pozharsky." This note was never printed, as it
referred to the lines of Mikhail Pogodin's article "A Walk through
Moscow", which the censorship did not miss.
In the middle of the
XIX century, the monument was fenced with an openwork cast-iron lattice
and new lanterns were installed. In the mid-1890s, they were replaced by
electric lanterns.
In Soviet times, the monument and both
historical figures to whom the monument was dedicated were severely
criticized by literary figures. On August 27, 1930, the metropolitan
newspaper Vechernyaya Moskva published an article "It's time to remove
historical garbage from squares" by publicist Vladimir Blum. In it, he
calls Minin and Pozharsky "representatives of the boyar trade union,
concluded 318 years ago for the purpose of strangling the peasant war,"
who "do not even think of going home." The poet Jack Altausen expressed
a similar opinion in verse form, suggesting that the monument to "two
shopkeepers" be melted down. Writer Demyan Bedny also contributed by
supporting the idea of demolishing the monument. He wrote a poetic
feuilleton "Without Mercy" in the newspaper Pravda on December 6, 1930,
where he concluded that the Crimean Jew Khozya Kokos, who helped Ivan
III in overthrowing the Horde yoke, could have stood in place of the
"two embezzlers". Such statements were typical of the Soviet era.
Despite this, the secretariat of the Central Committee of the CPSU(b) in
a special resolution severely condemned Demyan Bedny for "false notes
expressed in the indiscriminate ogling of "Russia" and "Russian"."
In 1931, in connection with the reconstruction of Red Square and the
construction of the renovated Lenin Mausoleum, the monument to the
heroes was moved to the Pokrovsky Cathedral. According to the memoirs of
Lazar Kaganovich, who was at that time the first secretary of the Moscow
Committee of the CPSU (b), the decision to move the monument to Minin
and Pozharsky was made by Joseph Stalin himself. After this
rearrangement, the monument no longer changed its location and is
currently located in the same place.
Every year on National Unity
Day, people bring flowers to the monument. So, on November 4, 2017, in
honor of the holiday and in memory of the liberation movement of 1612,
President Vladimir Putin laid a bouquet of red roses at the monument,
the ceremony was attended by Patriarch Kirill along with representatives
of various faiths, members of the Council on Interethnic Relations and
representatives of youth organizations.
The first restoration dates back to the 1890s. The weekly supplement
"Builder's Week" to the magazine "Architect" published information about
the planned restoration of the monument, for which the Moscow City
Administration allocated 2,000 rubles. It was supposed to clean the
monument, wipe the bronze bas-reliefs and figures with drying oil,
polish the granite pedestal, repair the broken corner and potholes, gild
the inscription and fix the lattice with bronze coloring.
In
1926, during the inspection of the monument to Minin and Pozharsky, it
was revealed that its cast-iron grille was in poor condition, the
missing parts of which were replaced with wooden ones. In connection
with the reconstruction of Red Square and the construction of the Lenin
Mausoleum in 1931, the monument was moved to the Pokrovsky Cathedral.
30,000 rubles were allocated for the reshuffle.
In May 1940, the
restoration commission, which included Dmitry Sukhov, examined the
monument and determined that it was necessary to wash the dirt from the
bronze figures, bas-reliefs, inscriptions and pedestals with soap, smear
with mortar and widen the seams of granite forged slabs, make a filling
at the site of the butte outcrop. By 1953, the staff of the State
Historical Museum had drawn up a "Defective act for the restoration of
the monument to Minin and Pozharsky." It followed from it that the
bronze figures, bas-reliefs, the blind area and the curb were in poor
condition. The commission proposed to process the bronze parts by hand,
then wipe them with alcohol and cover them with special wax or light
varnish, as well as tint the stripped and knocked-out places. It was
also planned to lift the slabs, pour soil into the base, smear the seams
with lime all over the base, level and strengthen the granite curb.
Under the leadership of chemist Alexei Dmitrievich Chivarzin and
architect Ivan Vasilyevich Makovetsky, work was carried out to restore
the monument, including cleaning from dirt and oxide, fixing seams and
cracks, leveling white stone slabs and a pedestal.
The next
restoration was carried out in 1964, its cost was 2,422 rubles.
Specialists washed and cleaned the sculptures and bas-reliefs from
layers of dust and soot, patinated and treated with protective varnish,
sealed the seams in the pedestal with lead, plastered chips, potholes.
In 1967, the inscription on the pedestal was gilded with gold leaf.
In February 1980, before the Summer Olympic Games in Moscow, the
All-Union Industrial Scientific and Restoration Plant examined the
technical condition of the monument. As a result, work was carried out
on cleaning and washing bronze sculptures and bas-reliefs from dust,
soot, dirt, and bird droppings. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the
restoration of the monument to Minin and Pozharsky in Moscow did not
take place for several reasons: there was no restoration production base
in the city and there was not enough experience in the practical
restoration of urban monumental sculpture made of copper-based alloys
and various types of stone. At the same time, difficulties arose with
financing research and restoration work.
In 2002, the VIOLe-M
company and the Restoration Research and Production Center (RNPC) REKOS,
with the participation of the Ostafevo Estate Museum, prepared the
workshop's production base for research and practical restoration work
on the rear bas-relief. The rear bas-relief was restored and put back in
its original place.
At the beginning of the XXI century, the
monument turned out to be in a depressing condition: the metal of the
body thinned over the years, holes formed in it, and the metal bars of
the frame were heavily corroded. The restoration work carried out in
2010-2011 made it possible to strengthen the monument.
In 2016, the monument to Minin and Pozharsky was transferred to the
State Historical Museum of Moscow and needs restoration. According to
museum director Alexei Levykin, a thorough examination will be carried
out together with the Ministry of Culture, restoration was scheduled for
2018 — by the 200th anniversary of the monument. In addition, the museum
undertook to maintain the monument in proper condition.
For the
period from January to March 2018, the GIM has planned an exhibition
"Monument to Minin and Pozharsky in Moscow. To the 200th anniversary of
the main sculptural monument of Russia". Visitors should be presented
with watercolor views of Red Square, rare engravings and lithographs,
little-known photographs, posters, as well as miniatures of the monument
made of bronze, porcelain, bone and other materials.
The
restoration of this monument began in November 2020, they did not remove
the monument from its current location for this purpose, a special
pavilion was built above it. The restoration was carried out by the
Inter-Regional Scientific and Restoration Art Department (MNRHU) and the
Heritage Restoration Workshop. On January 13, 2022, the monument was
first dismantled from its pedestal for restoration under the roof of a
temporary pavilion. The total budget of the work carried out amounted to
47.5 million rubles. Of these, the Ministry of Culture allocated more
than 30 million, the rest was received as a result of an all-Russian
fundraising campaign announced by the State Historical Museum. The
action was supported by Vladimir Mashkov, Grigory Leps, Igor Ugolnikov,
Oksana Fedorova, Fekla Tolstaya, among others. The largest private
contribution was made by Vladimir Gruzdev.
Pavel Kotelnikov,
scientific director of the monument restoration in 2022, head of the
department of scientific restoration of metal works of the State
Scientific Research Institute of Restoration (GOSNIIR), told The
ArtNewspaper Russia in an interview, the condition of the monument was
extremely deplorable: the iron linings under the plinth were stratified,
moreover, since the black metal, corroding, increases in volume five
times These deformations began to destroy the monument. As a result, it
was decided to cast a new frame and install it inside the baseboard to
strengthen it. Also, to strengthen the plinth, about 500 kg of copper
mass was added to it. The figures were also in a deplorable state.
Technological defects were aggravated by being outdoors — the entire
surface turned out to be in cavities. One of the figures had to be
"trepanned", the bronze on top of her head was so dilapidated. As a
result, a large fragment of the head was removed and replaced with a new
casting. The helmet shell of Prince Dmitry Pozharsky, which was lost in
the early 2000s, was also cast anew. The monument corroded both outside
and inside, and inside it was extremely active, since since the time of
casting inside hollow figures, auxiliary components used in this
procedure have been preserved: a metal injection molding frame and a
molding mass (a mixture of clay and brick chips). Minin's figure, for
example, was completely filled with this mass below the navel. The iron
began to rust, the hygroscopic molding mass began to swell, and the
bronze in contact with the black metal was destroyed. Restorers removed
the entire mass through technological holes (about 500 kg came out), and
also removed the remains of the corroded frame. It was also necessary to
strengthen the granite pedestal. It was sorted out, the granite was
preserved. The bronze bas-reliefs installed on the pedestal were
restored, which received new fasteners. At the end, the sculpture
underwent a complex patination.
On July 13, 2022, the monument
was returned to its pedestal.
The monument was successfully
restored and opened on October 31, 2022, the Ministry of Culture of the
Russian Federation announced.
In the first draft, Minin stood in a belted chiton, in a raincoat and
pointed at Moscow with his outstretched left hand. Prince Pozharsky,
also dressed in a chiton, in a heavily fluttering cloak and a Roman
helmet, rushed forward. With one hand he raised his shield high, with
the other he held his sword together with Minin. In this composition,
Minin's sculpture looked more static than Pozharsky's, which was given
movement. Both figures were compositionally linked, as in the final
work.
The engravings of the new project, sent out by subscription
in early 1809, differed significantly from the first version and almost
coincided with the final one. Minin's figure occupied a commanding
position with a pointing gesture of his right hand. The clothes of the
Nizhny Novgorod headman were simplified: he was without a cloak, the
chiton looked like a Russian shirt. Pozharsky's image has not yet been
found, so instead of the initial impetuosity of movement, they became
more passive. The prince rose from his seat to follow Minin. Pozharsky's
clothes were still antique, but the shield with the image of the
miraculous Savior became more like a Russian one. The sword remained the
center of the composition. Subsequently, new changes took place in the
project, but the main features of the sculptural monument were laid down
in this work.
In the final version, the monument acquired a more
strict appearance, and changes in the details of the figures gave
precision to the ideological plan. Minin was still given the first role.
With an upraised hand, he calls on the people to fight against the
Polish invaders, with the other hand he passes the sword to Pozharsky so
that he leads the militia. Minin is dressed in a chiton with the
addition of a Russian pattern, which resembles a peasant's shirt, with
ports on his feet. A wide step and a protruding torso give Minin's
figure confidence and strength. Pozharsky, leaning on a shield with the
image of the Savior, rises from his bed and takes the sword from Minin's
hand, his leg is stretched out. This pose shows that the prince has not
yet recovered from his wounds, but is ready to follow the call of the
Nizhny Novgorod headman. As in the engraving, the sword is the central
link in the composition, embodying the unity of the people. Behind him
is a helmet, which is visible only from the back of the monument. The
height of the sculptural group is about 4.6 m, according to other
sources — 4.5 m. In August 1941, just in case, the monument was measured
by architect M. Mugalinsky under the supervision of corresponding member
of the Academy of Architecture A.V. Bunin, the drawing was preserved.
In the first project, sculptor Martos placed a bas-relief depicting
Nizhny Novgorod residents making donations on the front side of the
pedestal. On the right, men bowed under the weight of offerings, on the
left — women, kneeling, bestowing jewelry. On the back of the pedestal,
a bas-relief shows the scene of Prince Pozharsky's victory over the
enemies. The plots of the bas-reliefs in the next project remained the
same, but with a different arrangement of characters: the composition
was cluttered with unnecessary figures and was not united by a common
action. The sculptor attached great importance to the arrangement of the
bas-reliefs, so he brought the donations of Nizhny Novgorod residents to
the fore. In the engraving of 1809, the pedestal remained unchanged, and
the composition of the bas-relief was significantly transformed. She
became more concise, some characters disappeared, but new ones appeared
— a father with two sons.
In the final version, the pedestal,
made of red Finnish granite and decorated with bronze bas-reliefs, has
undergone some changes. The frontal bas-relief has become more concise,
the number of figures has decreased. The women on the left and the men
on the right are offering donations. Compared to the first version, the
figures have become more significant. The poses of the women express the
solemnity of what is happening. Kneeling, they smoothly place
decorations on the altar of the Fatherland with a smooth movement of
their hands. Women's clothing resembles antique, but Russian kokoshniks
are on their heads. Behind the figures of the women is a father who
gives two sons to the militia. Here the sculptor depicted himself with
the children. Martos' student Samuel Galberg completed a profile
portrait of his teacher with his sons. Both sons of the sculptor got to
the bas-relief not by chance. One— Alexey Ivanovich, fought in Kutuzov's
army in 1812, the other, Nikita Ivanovich, was detained and killed by
Napoleonic soldiers in France when he was there as a pensioner of the
Academy of Arts.
A battle scene is depicted on the back of the
pedestal. The bas-relief is dedicated to the victory of the people's
militia led by Prince Pozharsky. The plot is also divided into two
parts. On the left, Poles fleeing from Moscow, looking back with horror
at the victors, on the right Pozharsky, leading brave soldiers, tramples
on horseback and drives away the enemy with a sword. In general, the
bas-reliefs located in shallow niches of the pedestal complement the
plot of the main sculptural composition.
The height of the
pedestal is about 3.7 m, the length is about 4 m, the width is 2.3 m.
Under the pedestal there is a terrace, also made of granite, about 1.1
meters high.
The first appearance of the monument to Minin and Pozharsky on a
Russian postage stamp dates back to December 18, 1904 in the postal
charity issue "In favor of orphans of soldiers of the active army". The
drawing on the stamp with a face value of 5 kopecks (the selling price
of which was 8 kopecks) was depicted by the artist Richard Zarrins. The
first Soviet postage stamp with a monument with a nominal value of 1
ruble was issued on September 6, 1946 in the series "Views of Moscow"
performed by the artist Vasily Zavyalov. In 1947, a red overprint
appeared on it in honor of the anniversary of the capital: "800 years of
Moscow 1147-1947". In 1961, a stamp was issued with a different image of
the monument to Minin and Pozharsky by Zavyalov. It was produced at a
cost of 12 kopecks and belonged to the series "Standard Issue of the
USSR", it was re-released in 1966. In 1989, a 15-kopeck stamp with a
monument called "Moscow" was printed in the series "Monuments of
National History". The illustration was done by Leonid Zaitsev.
In the Russian Federation, the standard issue with the monument was
released in 1992 in an artistic design by Vladislav Koval, for two more
years the stamp was printed with the same pattern, but in a different
color and denomination: the 60-kopeck gray-green was replaced by a
300-ruble red-purple one. In 2012, his own series "Monument to K. Minin
and D. Pozharsky in Moscow" was printed at a cost of 9 rubles and 20
kopecks. The monument was depicted by the artist Alexander Povarikhin.
For the 150th anniversary of the Russian Historical Society in 2016, a
stamp worth 19 rubles was issued, also decorated by Povarikhin, with a
monument to the leaders of the second national militia in 1612.
In 1919, the Don banknote with the image of the monument to Minin and
Pozharsky with a face value of 100 rubles was issued from the issue
"March on Moscow". In the same year, General Peter Wrangel issued
banknotes of the Main Command of the Armed Forces of the South of
Russia) with a monument with a nominal value of 10 rubles. In January
1920, the monument also appeared on a hundred-ruble banknote in the
issue of "Feodosiysky (evacuation)". In 1997, a commemorative coin
"Monument to Minin and Pozharsky" was issued in Russia from 900 silver
of the series "850th anniversary of the founding of Moscow" with a face
value of 100 rubles and an actual value of 12,000 rubles. In 2016, for
the 150th anniversary of the Russian Historical Society, the Central
Bank of Russia minted five-ruble coins with the image of the monument of
Minin and Pozharsky on the reverse. The circulation was up to 5 million
pieces.
The monument to Minin and Pozharsky against the background of the
Upper Shopping Malls is depicted on a painted lithograph of the edition
by Giuseppe Datiaro, made from a drawing by F. Benoit in the middle of
the XIX century. In Moscow, at the Taganskaya metro station, on the side
of the hall and platforms on pylons in pointed niches, there are panels
decorated with ornaments with interwoven images. On several panels there
is an image of the monument to Minin and Pozharsky.
In Berlin's
Treptow Park, one of the 16 sarcophagi of the Soviet war memorial has a
bas-relief "Everything for the front! Everything is for victory!" It
depicts a monument to Minin and Pozharsky, in front of which there are
people donating their property to support the army in the rear. This
composition repeats the plot of the original bas-relief.
Around the 1830s and 1840s, some time after the monument was erected,
the saying "The beard is Minin, and the conscience is clay" appeared. It
was also found in a special notebook of the writer Alexander Ostrovsky,
where in 1854 he began to write down various things that came out of the
Moscow vernacular. Later, this statement continued to be frequently
encountered by Russian folklorists until the 1920s. The origin of the
saying is connected with the veneration by the merchant class of the
Nizhny Novgorod elder Kuzma Minin, who was also his representative. It
is implied that merchants, standing in front of the monument on Red
Square, could think about saving the Fatherland, but forgot about it,
returning to work and thinking about the benefits.
In the series
of 19th-century splint sheets "Pantyusha and Sidorka inspect Moscow",
one of the sights is the monument to Minin and Pozharsky. The caption to
the painting is a conversation between two countrymen. Russian Russian
epic hero Yeruslan Lazarevich is mistaken by the village boy Sidorka for
the headman Minin, and the more literate Pantyusha corrects him: "This,
you see, is a monument to the Russian heroes who saved Russia from the
Poles. Kuzma Minin is standing there, and Prince Pozharsky is sitting
there." Nikolai Stankevich's quatrain "Inscription to the monument of
Pozharsky and Minin" in 1829 reflects the gratitude of the people for
the liberation of the Fatherland from the Polish invaders: "Sons of the
Fatherland, by whom the predatory enemy was trampled, / You saved the
Russian throne, — glory to you! / The best monument to you is the
gratitude of citizens, / The monument to you is the holy existence of
Russia!". The monument to the leaders of the Second National Militia
appears in Nikolai Nekrasov's poem "The Petersburg Message" of 1859:
"Worthy city! There Minin and Pozharsky / Stand solemnly on the square."
The satirical work in prose "A Guide for those who come to Moscow",
composed in 1909 by the writer Sasha Cherny, tells about the basic rules
of visiting the capital. One of these rules reads: "The monument to
Minin and Pozharsky is against the passage. One of the figures is Minin,
the other is Pozharsky. There is a passage opposite the monument."
The monument to Minin and Pozharsky is also mentioned in the
postmodern prose poem "Moscow — Petushki" by Venedikt Yerofeyev. In the
chapter "Cockerels. Kremlin. Monument to Minin and Pozharsky" the main
character of Venechka, running away from his pursuers, finds himself on
Red Square. He sees the Kremlin for the first time, reaches its wall,
where he is overtaken and beaten. Having managed to escape, Venechka
runs down the square and stops at the monument for "two moments" to
figure out where to run next. After looking at Minin and Pozharsky, the
main character decides to run in the direction in which Prince
Pozharsky's gaze is directed.
In Nizhny Novgorod, on November 4, 2005, on National Unity Day, a
replica of the Moscow monument to Minin and Pozharsky was unveiled. The
work was done by sculptor, President of the Russian Academy of Arts
Zurab Tsereteli. The sculptural monument is installed on the National
Unity Square in front of the Church of the Nativity of John the Baptist,
in the center of Nizhny Novgorod Nizhny Posad, at the foot of the hill
on which the Kremlin rises. According to legend, it was from the porch
of the Ivanovo temple in 1611 that the zemstvo elder Kuzma Minin led a
conscription speech about the gathering of the militia to liberate the
capital from the Polish-Lithuanian invaders. The copy differs from the
Moscow monument in height — five centimeters less than the original —
and lighter weight and an inscription that lacks a year.
The
Yaroslavl government also planned to install a monument to Minin and
Pozharsky. According to the statement of the chief architect of the
Yaroslavl region Mikhail Nikolaevich Kudryashov, two installation sites
were considered: a pedestrian zone at the intersection of Revolutionary
Boulevard with Andropov Street and the territory of the
Kirill-Afanasievsky monastery.
In the collection of the Taganrog
Art Museum there is a small model of the monument to Minin and
Pozharsky, made by Ivan Martos. In the St. George's Hall of the Kremlin
Palace there is a bronze mantel clock in the form of a monument to the
leaders of the militia in 1612.
In 1820, the workshop of
Pierre-Philippe Tomir, commissioned by Nikolai Demidov, made a clock in
the form of a monument to Minin and Pozharsky based on an engraving from
a drawing by Ivan Martos. The model had many variants and was designed
for Russian customers. The most famous one, made of gilded bronze with a
dial mounted in the princely shield, came complete with two candelabra.
This clock is located in the State Hermitage Museum of St. Petersburg. A
similar model is kept in the Peterhof State Museum-Reserve. The watch
was once lost, but returned to the museum's collection thanks to its
chief curator, currently the president, Vadim Valentinovich Znamenov.
Another copy, produced by a French bronzer, adorns the grand staircase
of the Pushkin House (Institute of Russian Literature of the Russian
Academy of Sciences) in St. Petersburg. The collection of the Moscow
All-Russian Museum of Decorative, Applied and Folk Art also has one of
the varieties of the Minin and Pozharsky mantel clock by the workshop of
Pierre-Philippe Tomir. The figures and bas-reliefs are made of gilded
bronze, the pedestal is made of red marble. The clock is on display in
the updated exposition "Decorative Art of Russia of the XVIII — early
XIX centuries".
On September 7, 2017, a scaled-down copy of the
monument to Minin and Pozharsky, presented by representatives of the
International Humanitarian Rally "Greater Russia", appeared on the
territory of the Rosinka kindergarten in the city of Irmino, the
birthplace of the Stakhanov movement.