Ben Uri Research Unit

Born: 1884 Kaluga, Russian Empire (now Russia)

Died: 1952 Nice, France

Year of Migration to the UK: 1940

Other name/s: George Kreskentevich Loukomski, Georgii Lukomskii

Biography

Artist, architectural historian and critic George Kreskentevich Loukomski (also known as George Lukomski) was born in Kaluga in the Russian Empire (now Russia), on 14 March 1884 into an old Russian noble family. He trained in the architectural department of the Kazan Art School (1901–3) and subsequently attended the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg. He became known as an art and architectural historian and critic, writing for Russian journals, and also practised as a painter. He was part of the Mir iskusstva [The World of Art] circle of Russian artists (1898–1904) who edited the famous magazine under the same title.

After the Russian Revolution of 1917 Loukomski served as a conservator of the Palace-Museums of Tsarskoe Selo [Tsar's Village], the former residence of the Russian Imperial family near Petrograd, and as Chairman of the Architectural Department of the All-Ukrainian Committee for the Protection of Historical Monuments and Antiquities in Kyiv. Loukomski emigrated from Soviet Russia in 1920, settling first in Berlin and then in Paris, and continued working as an art historian and graphic artist. In France, Loukomski also contributed to a large number of Russian émigré periodicals and was secretary of the revived World of Art society that operated in Paris during the 1920s. Loukomski's cycles of drawings, mostly in pastel or watercolour, have been called 'important documents of the culture and architecture of the places where they were drawn ... Loukomski's works are drawn with an eye to the recording, cataloguing even, of a place' (Bonhams, The Russian Sale, 30 May 2012, Lot 60).

Loukomski came to England in 1940 at the start of the Second World War. His association with the British cultural scene, however, started a few years previously as the Ben Uri Minutes for 1933–1936 show that at a meeting on 4 October 1934 'it was suggested to have a Lukomski exhibition of synagogue drawing [sic]'. The Exhibition of Water Colours, Drawings and Sketches of Old Synagogues in Poland and Eastern Europe XVth to XVIIth Centuries took place at Ben Uri Jewish Art Gallery at Woburn House, Upper Woburn Place, London from 13th to 28th January 1935 and featured 41 works: 21 General Aspects of Ghettoes and the remainder views of stone synagogues. One of the works from the exhibition is currently in the Ben Uri Collection and depicts an interior of a synagogue in Łańcut, Poland. The exhibition was one of a series of displays of Loukomski's drawings documenting the architecture and interiors of Eastern European synagogues, which subsequently took place at other London venues, as well as in galleries in France and Portugal. Loukomski's pioneering research on the subject was praised in the Russian émigré press and by his colleagues back in the Soviet Union. Loukomski published the results of his work in a volume entitled Jewish Art in European Synagogues (from the Middle Ages to the Eighteenth Century) (1947). George Loukomski died on 5 March 1952 after spending the last years of his life in France and died in Nice, France. His works are held in major Russian museums, as well as in the Ben Uri Gallery and Victoria and Albert Museum.

Related books

George Loukomski, Jewish Art in European Synagogues (from the Middle Ages to the Eighteenth Century) (London and New York: Hutchinson, 1947)
George Loukomski, Charles Cameron (1740–1812): an illustrated monograph on his life and work in Russia, particularly at Tsarskoe Selo and Pavlovsk in architecture, interior decoration, furniture, design and landscape gardening (London: Nicholson & Watson, 1943)
George Loukomski, The Face of Russia (London: Hutchinson, 1942)
George Loukomski, History of Modern Russian Painting (1840–1940) (London: Hutchinson, 1940)
Catalogue of Exhibition of Coloured Drawings by Prince George Loukomski (London: Fine Art Society, 1939)
Augusto de Esaguy and José de Figueiredo eds., Exposição Georges K. Lukomski. Sinagogas antigas da Europa (séculos XI a XVIII) [Exhibition of George Loukomski. Ancient European Synagogues (XI–XVIII centuries)] (Lisbon: Associação da Juventude de Israelita [Association of Jewish Youth], 1936)
George Loukomski, 'The Wooden Synagogues of Eastern Europe', The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs, Vol. 66, No. 382, January 1935, pp. 14-21
George Loukomski, Les Fresques de Paul Veronèse et Ses Disciples (Paris: Éditions Marcel Seheur, 1928)
George Loukomski, Andrea Palladio (Paris: Auguste Vincent & Cie, 1927)
George Loukomski, L'Art Dans la Russie des Soviets (Paris: Union des Etudiants, 1925)
George Loukomski, Russisches Porzellan, 1744–1923 (Berlin: Verlag Ernst Wasmuth AG, 1924)
George Loukomski, Vicenza: Monumenti Classici e Palladiani. Palazzi e Ville Case e Strade 1550–1750 (Vicenza: G. Rossi & C. Arti Grafiche, 1923)

Public collections

Related organisations

Imperial Academy of Arts, St. Petersburg (student)
Kazan Art School, Kazan (student)

Selected exhibitions

Subjects of Jewish Interest: Paintings, Sculpture & Drawings, Ben Uri Art Gallery (1946–47)
Exhibition of Coloured Drawings by Prince George Loukomski, Fine Art Society, London (1939)
Exposition des oeuvres de Georges Loukomski, Casa de Portugal, Paris (1937)
Exposição Georges K. Lukomski. Sinagogas antigas da Europa (séculos XI a XVIII) [Exhibition of George Loukomski. Ancient European Synagogues (XI–XVIII centuries)], Lisbon (1936)
The Exhibition of Water Colours, Drawings and Sketches of Old Synagogues in Poland and Eastern Europe XVth to XVIIth Centuries, Ben Uri Jewish Art Gallery (1935)
Aquarelles, gouaches, sanguines, dessins rehaussés de G. K. Loukomski: exposition, Galeries Georges Petit, Paris (1929)
Exposition des oeuvres de G.K. Loukomski: Vieux Paris (hôtels anciens, coins et recoins, enseignes), Galeries Georges Petit, Paris (1928)
3e Exposition des oeuvres de Loukomski 'Vieux-Paris', Galerie Varenne, Paris (1927)

Ben Uri archive

Consult items in the Ben Uri archive related to [George Loukomski]