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by Paul Bass | May 25, 2006 4:16 pm

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Posted to: Arts

Russian and American government leaders may not be getting along well these days, but their museum counterparts are making history. At least the women who direct a Kremlin museum and New Haven’s Yale Center for British Art did.

YCBA‘s Amy Meyers and the Kremlin Museum’s Elena Gagarina and a retinue of assistants came together at the Chapel Street museum to launch a first-ever collaboration, an exhibit of 16th and 17th century gilded British silver objects from the collection housed at the Armory Museum of the Kremlin. The exhibit opens Thursday; it’s called “Britannia & Muscovy: English Silver at the Court of the Tsars,” and according to the press release, contains “the greatest surviving group of English sixteenth- and seventeenth-century silver in the world.” It’s the first time this particular collection has left the Kremlin; this is its only North American stop. Meyers and Gagarina participated in a press preview. They got along swell.

p(clear). Many of the items originally came to the Kremlin by way of the Muscovy Company, founded in London in 1551 to find a sea route to China and India. The company’s pilot, Richard Chancellor, reached Russia in 1553. He and Tsar Ivan IV launched a relationship between their two empires; Ivan the Terrible was interested in a military alliance, Great Britain in a trading partner. The gifts of gilded British silver, like this glittering leopard, served as diplomatic currency.

p(clear). This golden jewel-laden ladle was known as “kovsh.” It was used to serve mead at ceremonial banquets. Ivan reserved it for his personal use.

p(clear). The British also sent over ornate muskets and pistols, which Russian gunsmiths studied for tips on upgrading their own weaponry.

p(clear). YCBA This four-sided salt cellar would be placed beside the most important person at a dinner; salt was a precious commodity back then. The decorations on this silver example, circa 1594-5, include goddesses and gods, as well as hunting scenes.

p(clear). “This is the first common venture” between the Kremlin Museum and a U.S. Partner, observed Moscow State University historian Olga Dmitrieva, a member of the Russian delegation. “I hope it will not be the last. I think it is important. It’s interesting how easily the nations could establish mutually advantageous relationships.” The YCBA exhibit runs through Sept. 10. Next stop: London.

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