Fifty-Eight Years in the Tretyakov Gallery

Nikolai Andreevich Mudrogel was one of the few employees of the Tretyakov Gallery— the first sixteen years of whose work were spent in close contact with, and under the direct supervision of, the gallery’s very founder, Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov. Having joined the gallery at the age of fifteen, Mudrogel by the time of P. M. Tretyakov’s death had already become an experienced technical worker with excellent museum training, fully grasping all the complexity of museum affairs. Living in the Tretyakovs’ home from early childhood and working from a young age among the people and events around which the gallery collection was growing and taking shape, he had the opportunity, as a close witness, to observe the life and work of P. M. Tretyakov, as well as the entire surrounding environment. That is precisely why Nikolai Andreevich’s memoirs are so valuable and interesting—like a living document, like a page in the history of the gallery.