Treasures a la Russe

In the late 1930s, US Ambassador to the Soviet Union Joseph E. Davies and his extremely wealthy wife, General Foods owner Marjorie Merriweather Post, purchased hundreds of Russian antiquities at rock-bottom prices. Many of these are now on view at her former mansion, Hillwood Museum, in Washington, DC, making it world-famous for its collection of icons, Fabergé eggs, and other imperial art.

Interestingly, just a few blocks away from Hillwood there is another treasure-trove of pre-revolutionary Russian delights. It is the residence of Peter MacDonald, a retired diplomat and self-professed Russophile.

MacDonald and his wife Allen live in a wooden, dacha-like 1911 Sears Catalog house. Paintings and hundreds of books on Russia line the walls or are stacked on the floor. Ordinarily, in an old-fashioned Russian home, a single samovar would be sufficient to make things cozy, but MacDonald has dozens. Five of them line the top of the den bookshelf – short ones that can squeeze under the ceiling. Others inhabit window seats and side tables. They dwell en masse in the kitchen, as well.

“My wife, Allen, won’t let me keep too many downstairs at any one time,” MacDonald says.

“That’s because,” Allen interjects, “there used to be 55 of them.”

“Look at this one,” Peter continues. “This is the very first samovar I ever bought. I spotted it in Iran, in the 1950s. Inscribed in Russian and Persian. Actually, it was a group of five, so I took them all.”

With the samovars, of course, came stacks of samovar catch-drip trays in various shapes and metals, plus hundreds of other items. The eye rests fleetingly upon a reproduction of a Frederick Remington painting – his only depiction of a Cossack; and then on an Anatoli Zverev watercolor of a church, crackling with energy. In short, there is no room for Fabergé eggs.

In the 1940s, MacDonald graduated from one of the nation’s first Russian-language immersion programs, at Middlebury College, and received a Master’s degree in Soviet Area Studies from Harvard. Joining the Foreign Service, MacDonald worked as an economics officer at the US Embassy in Moscow from 1960-1962. By then it was no longer possible for Americans to export antiquities from the USSR, so he did the next best thing: he scoured flea markets on this side of the Atlantic.

MacDonald kneels down in an upstairs bedroom corner and moves aside an antique, four-pronged farmer’s rake (the kind Tolstoy might have used) in order to reveal a bookshelf laden with candlesticks.

“Come here, into the light,” he urges. “This one is very unusual. Most Russian candlesticks are cast solid. But to save weight, this one has two hollow halves, soldered together. You can just see the joint if you squint. Now, over here...”

There are all kinds of treasures, such as a collared 1875 measuring cup from Minsk. According to its inscription, it was used for doling out servings of 1/90th of a vedro of wine or vodka. (A vedro, or “pail,” contained 21 pints.)

Vessels parade themselves exuberantly in every size and shape: over here a double-spouted brass jug, possibly for milk, and over there another, with a proliferation of four handles joined at the top. A third boasts a pair of excessively long cylindrical spouts. What could it be for?

“No idea,” says MacDonald. “I think the Russian coppersmiths were just trying to show off and see what they could do.”

We descend to the dining room, where the table is covered, chockablock, with more candlesticks, plus scores of old Russian ceramic, lacquer, metal, and tin-lined wooden tea caddies.

“Let me show you this beauty. I’ve never seen anything like it,” he says, cradling an Art Nouveau tea caddy, reminiscent of a castle tower, crafted in brass during an elegant era, long ago and far away, before teabags and paper cups.

For centuries, Russians have loved elegant serving items and exotic tea blends. And even today a favorite Moscow destination is the famous 1890s Chinois-style Perlov Tea Shop on Myasnitskaya Street – which even sells a special tisane named for Rasputin.

MacDonald’s collection dates from the Imperium. One of his tea caddies was specially authorized by the tsar’s government and bears the double-headed eagle. Near it stands a hand-painted container made by the famous Novy Brothers Porcelain Manufactory (active in Kuzayevo, a village near Moscow, 1790-1920) – along with a pair of opalescent, milky blue-and-green glass caddies dating from the 1760s.

But pride of place goes to a pair of sparkling, flat-handled silver kovshi: the traditional decorated cups that look something like a cross between a Viking ship, a ladle, and a duck.

“This one is from the 1600s,” MacDonald says. It has a hand-hammered handle stamped with the Imperial Eagle and Crown, surrounded by eight lobes.

“And this…” He peers at the Cyrillic inscription on its side, “was presented in the seventeenth century by Prince Sergei Nikolayevich Khovansky to the Church of the Nativity of Christ, in Mosashino. I’m giving these kovshi to Middlebury College, where I studied long ago. It has a small museum.” The kovshi alone are assessed at more than $60,000.

Though in no hurry, eventually the MacDonalds will pass along their treasures, perhaps to a museum or to a fellow Russophile. The ideal purchaser would acquire the entire collection. It’s a challenge to find such a person, but nowadays many Russians are eager to repatriate older works of art and handcraft, so – who knows? – these items may cross the Atlantic once again.

“Meanwhile,” says MacDonald, heating water, “it’s time for a cup of tea.”

We sit under a 1962 oil painting by one V. Yushkevich, titled Сиреневый сумерки (Lilac Dusk). It depicts snow-covered roofs and church cupolas at the close of day, and, as does every item in the MacDonald household, it carries a story.

While Peter worked at the US Embassy in Moscow, his wife Allen gave English lessons to the children of a Russian-speaking Greek who was employed at the Canadian Embassy. His name was George Costakis, and he happened to be the foremost collector in the world of avant-garde Russian art.* Allen – herself an art lover – asked Costakis to find her an example of a Russian nonconformist, or “unofficial” oil painting.

Costakis knew hundreds of artists, so he brought Lilac Dusk to the Canadian embassy, where the MacDonalds picked it up.

“It’s not a canvas. You can see a bit of the beaverboard surface peeking through the paint here.” Apparently in the 1960s it was hard for unsanctioned artists such as Yushkevich to procure basic materials. “But he managed somehow to scrounge a piece of American beaverboard from the Embassy garbage – maybe from a diplomatic shipment – which he then used as a panel. In fact, on the back it’s stenciled: ‘To the US Embassy’!”

The saga continues:

In 1943-1944, Peter MacDonald attended Deep Springs College, in California, where he met a fellow student named Norton Dodge. They became close friends and Dodge, an economist, wrote books about tractors and Soviet workforce demographics. During a 1962 visit to Moscow, Norton Dodge was introduced by the MacDonalds to George Costakis. The spark was passed, and over time Dodge himself would amass the world’s largest collection of nonconformist Soviet art (now housed at Rutgers University).

“Thirty years after seeing us in Moscow,” Peter continues, “Dodge was on Amtrak and happened to meet one of the most eclectic writers alive – John McPhee – who was looking for a new book topic. Norton suggested dissident Soviet art and gave McPhee our names.” From this chance encounter emerged John McPhee’s acclaimed 1994 book: The Ransom of Russian Art (in which the MacDonalds appear).

Peter pours glasses of sparkling wine into a pair of antique flutes that belonged to the tsar’s family – and reminisces about Moscow in the 1960s.

“Frankly, it was grim,” Peter says. “But I was so delighted to be there, because it brought to life all my years of language study. It was the period of the U-2 spy plane incident, and there were demonstrations in front of the Embassy. People threw bottles of ink. We knew it was coming and that it was all staged, because the demonstrators prepared themselves at a nearby area. Still, it was scary.

“We were always followed. One time I accompanied the US cultural attaché to Tbilisi, Georgia. As soon as I got to my hotel room, the phone rang and a sultry female voice said: ‘Mr. MacDonald, do you remember me? We met when you were in Kiev. I would like to see you again…’

“I told her that tonight would not be good. Because there was no woman in Kiev, you see – I hadn’t even gone there!

“Sometimes young people came up to talk with me. This happened once in Leningrad, and immediately a plainclothes cop started taking pictures of the encounter. They were more interested in the Russian kid than in me. And once in the underpass near the US embassy a young guy started to chat. As soon as I continued on my way, someone approached him.

“Travel was interesting. On a trip from the USSR to Istanbul we had to change trains because they ran on different gauges. I’ll never forget how the border guards went up and down with long metal prods to make sure no one was hiding under the wagons, behind the wheels.”

Did he make many friends in Moscow?

“A few. But most meetings were official, and if a Russian wanted to meet again, informally, I was advised not to do that, because they might get into trouble.”

“Later, after I left the Foreign Service, I worked at the National Endowment for the Humanities, in the Council for the International Exchange of Scholars, specializing in Russian/American Fulbright Fellowships.”

Would the MacDonalds like to go to Russia again?

“Yes and no,” Peter replies wistfully, motioning towards his house filled with antiques and history. “Of course, one always wants to return. But now the relationship is so….” He drains his glass of wine and leaves the thought unfinished. RL