Regulating Russian Arts and Crafts

On March 10, 1913, the “Second All-Russian Kustar Exhibition” opened in St. Petersburg under the patronage of the Empress Alexandra Fedorovna. The largest display of folk art and kustar goods in Imperial Russia, it was a huge success with the public and significantly shaped the layman’s view of Russian folk art. Although this exhibition has garnered considerable attention within the scholarly discourse, it has mainly been discussed from the critics’ point of view. This article provides complementary insights by reconstructing the organizational efforts that contributed to the public success of the exhibition and by analyzing the reaction of the organizing committee to criticism in the contemporary press.