[MUSEUMS / CONSERVATION / RUSSIAN TRANSLATIONS] Хранение гравюр, рисунков и рукописей / Hraneniye gravyur, risunkovirukopisey [i.e., Storage of engravings, drawings and manuscripts]. Prefaced, translated from the English and redacted by V. M. Nevezhinoj

PLENDERLEITH, JOHN [sic. HAROLD JAMES] (1898-1997).

Muzeya Izobrazitel’nykh Iskusstv Im. A. S. Pushkina, Moscow, 1947.

 Original wrappers. Cr. 8vo. (20 x 14 cm). In Russian. [2], 60, [4] p., one b/w ill. In text, 6 numbered b/w plates of reproduced photographs and frontispiece of “Exhibition Centre of the Prints and Drawings Department of the British Museum”. Browning on the paper near the staple, light age toning, and dusting on the front cover, with a price label and price stamp on the back cover. Otherwise, a very good copy.

First Russian translation of The Conservation of Prints, Drawings, and Manuscripts by 20th-century Scottish art conservator and archaeologist Plenderleith. The original English edition, first published in 1937, is a concise and practical guide to the conservation of prints, drawings, and manuscripts.

Plenderleith joined University College in St Andrews in 1916, but after two terms, he attended officer training school due to World War I, becoming a Lieutenant in the Lancashire Fusiliers in 1917. In 1919, he returned to study Chemistry at University College, Dundee, where he graduated with a BSc in 1921 and earned his doctorate in 1923. In 1924, he began working at the British Museum with Alexander Scott in the newly created Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. This department had been established to address the rapid deterioration of objects in the museum’s collection, caused by their storage in the London underground railway tunnels during World War I. Scott and Plenderleith applied their knowledge of Chemistry to the preservation of museum objects, effectively pioneering scientific conservation in the United Kingdom. As an archaeologist, Plenderleith was involved in the excavation of the tomb of Tutankhamun in Egypt, Sir Leonard Woolley’s site at Ur, and the Sutton Hoo ship burial. In 1934, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

The short book he wrote as a result of his studies at the British Museum was translated into Russian exactly ten years later by the Russian art historian and museum curator Vera MikhailivnaNevezhina (1878-1959) and published by the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts. Nevezhina began her career in the department by studying English engraving, later expanding her focus to German, Dutch, and Flemish graphics. She organized exhibitions, wrote articles, compiled catalogues, and delivered reports. Nevezhina was also the first to translate Wölfflin’s Classic Art into Russian.

As of December 2024, OCLC shows two copies (691379786).