Art in Utero

maria zvereva, 24, gazed at the portrait of Russian princess Yelena Pavlovna and her young daughter, painted by Karl Bryullov, and patted her own swelling tummy. “I like the image of this angelic girl because we are also expecting a daughter. And I thought that my girl would look like this cute child,” she said.

Zvereva was one of about 30 young mothers who toddled through the hushed galleries of St. Petersburg’s Russian Museum, hoping that art inspired by serenity and bliss would soothe their jangled nerves and guarantee blissful babies.

Twice each week, the museum offers tours of calmly inspiring masterpieces for expectant mothers, guided by a scientific worker and a gynecologist, in what museum officials say is the only  program of its kind.

“I got carried away with these excursions after my very first visit,” said Yekaterina Nikulina, 25, a  math teacher, who is almost eight months pregnant. “I feel so peaceful afterwards, and I’m sure it’s good for my future son,” she said, sitting in a chair in one of the museum’s marvelous halls, surrounded by marine pictures by Ivan Aivazovsky and portraits by Bryullov.

The museum began its specialized excursions for pregnant women as an experiment three years ago. So far, hundreds of women have enjoyed it. The program, said Natalya Kuznetsova, the museum’s scientific worker and one of the program’s organizers, was aimed at improving future mothers’ psychological condition and positively influencing their future babies through art. “We truly believe that our excursions have an effect on the harmonious development of future children,” Kuznetsova said.

Marina Komova, the gynecologist who initiated the program, also gives medical lectures at the museum for pregnant women. She said she came up with the idea of art tours when she was looking for ways to positively influence prenatal development.

“The fact is that a baby comes to this world not as a blank slate but carrying something from what its mother saw and felt during her pregnancy. If the mother’s life during pregnancy was limited to staying at home and going to work, then a child would have the same subconscious experience,” she said. “Meanwhile, a harmonic child has an inner need for more impressions, to learn more about the world.”

The group of future mothers gathers around Kuznetsova near the fifteenth century Orthodox icon of the Virgin Mary holding the Christ child, ready to present him to the elder Simeon. The women are quite focused and serious.

Shortly thereafter, somewhat amused museum regulars see the group gather in front of the eighteenth century portrait of a 10-year-old girl dressed in crinoline skirt, a girdle and a wig. Kuznetsova tells them about the difficulties women had in the eighteenth century, due to the fashions of the era. She says that eighteenth century wigs and crinolines were sometimes so big and heavily decorated that ladies could barely get into a coach or enter a room. The women smile. The atmosphere is relaxed.

“Pregnant women are the most gratifying audience,” Kuznetsova said. “They listen to the excursions very attentively and concentrate, their eyes shining. In fact, pregnant women are sometimes a bit aloof from our everyday fuss; they can delve much deeper into the harmony of art.”

Excursion themes include Orthodox icons, paintings of mothers and babies, images of water and air, Russian landscapes, the influence of color, and several others. Kuznetsova said the most popular among mothers are “portraits of women and children” and landscape paintings of famous Russian artists like Konstantin Korovin, Ivan Shishkin or Isaac Levitan. “They also enjoy the unforgettable marine paintings of Ivan Aivazovsky, and pictures with historical and mythological plots,” she said.

Nikulina, who was on her sixth excursion, said that before her pregnancy she had never been to the Russian Museum. “Therefore, Russian art is something new and very interesting to me. I really like the museum’s portraits of women, especially those by Valentin Serov,” she said.

Zvereva once snuck out of her maternity hospital, where she was staying because of difficulties with her pregnancy, in order not to miss an excursion. She said the museum helps her relieve stress and think positively. “There is a lot of stress for pregnant women,” she said. “In my case it’s a long-expected child, and my pregnancy hasn’t gone that well, therefore I often have to stay in the hospital. Then there is lots of work in my office, where I need to concentrate very well. In addition, there is tons of negative information pouring from the TV. Therefore, the visits to the museum are my way of countering negative realities.”

Dr. Komova said that, from a psychological point of view, the positive tone of the excursions definitely decreases the women’s anxiety levels, which are inevitably increased due to the fast pace of modern life and the incessant flow of news and information.

In fact, to protect future mothers from negative images, the excursions only include “positive” images. Thus, future mothers are not taken to see Bryullov’s The Last Day of Pompeii – a scene of horror and destruction. Nor to they visit Vrubel’s often gloomy paintings.

Zvereva’s husband Denis, who accompanied his wife, gently supporting her, said he too felt “very peaceful and comfortable” at the museum. “It’s no doubt that, when our daughter is born and gets a bit older, we’ll bring her to the museum.

Meanwhile, Kuznetsova finds it hard to stop. She said future mothers are so positively reinforcing that she just wants to keep telling them more and more. “When a woman is expecting a baby, she is like a palace for a new life,” she said, “and she is full of inspiration. That makes other people inspired too.”

As if that is not enough, Dr. Komova said that their experience has shown that the excursions had another positive effect on babies born to mothers who attended excursions. When the mothers later bring their newborns on other museum excursions lasting up to 40 minutes, they do not get upset or fussy.

“They didn’t cry but just listened,” she said.  RL