[MSN] Russian Culture Minister Requests $500 Million to Fit Out Museums after Hermitage Theft

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Russian Culture Minister Requests $500 Million to Fit Out Museums after Hermitage Theft

Russia’s culture minister asked the Cabinet Thursday for hundreds of millions to improve security and staff salaries at the nation’s cash-starved museums in the wake of major thefts including at the famed Hermitage museum, AP reports.

“The situation at the Hermitage is a powerful argument for acquiring modern surveillance and security equipment,” Alexander Sokolov was quoted as saying by the RIA-Novosti news agency.
He told a Cabinet meeting that an additional 13 billion rubles ($487 million) was required for a host of measures.
Officials last month announced the theft over a period of years of more than 220 artworks valued at $5 million at the famous St. Petersburg museum.
Just over a week later, officials revealed the disappearance of drawings worth millions of dollars by late architect Yakov Chernikhov, widely admired for his Soviet-era avant-garde and constructivist designs, from the Russian State Archive of Literature and Art.
The thefts, in both cases blamed on staff, underscored the funding crisis that has plagued cultural institutions since the 1991 Soviet collapse. Museum salaries remain paltry and state collections suffer from appallingly lax security and antiquated bookkeeping.
Police have recovered 24 of the stolen Hermitage items and have charged three people over the thefts, which took place over several years, including the husband and son of a late curator.
Sokolov said that he wanted 4.3 billion rubles ($161 million) to boost the pay of museum employees, whose monthly salary averages 4,700 rubles ($175).
He also asked for 1 billion rubles ($37.4 million) on improved security installations, 4.7 billion ($175 million) rubles for temperature-control equipment to maintain collections in good condition and 3 billion rubles ($112.15 million) on capital repairs, ITAR-Tass and RIA-Novosti reported.
Boris Boyarskov, head of the heritage watchdog Rosokhrankultura, also said Thursday that an electronic catalog was essential to enable museums to easily trace stolen valuables, according to RIA-Novosti.
“Every year, we register 50 to 100 incidents of thefts, but we recover the valuables in no more than 20 cases,” Boyarskov was quoted as saying.
President Vladimir Putin has ordered his Cabinet to conduct an inventory of all Russian museums.
Anna Kolupayeva, a Federal Culture Agency official, said Tuesday that it would take about a decade to complete a full inventory of the 79 million items stored in Russian museums and at least two years to conduct even a partial inventory check.
The Hermitage alone has an estimated 3 million items in his possession, however, and officials say only 153,000 have been recorded in an electronic catalog since inventorying began seven years ago.

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