Peter the Great: A Tsar in France, 1717 is an exhibition celebrating three hundred years since Peter the Great’s visit to Paris, during which he visited various institutions (such as the Gobelin Tapestry Manufacturers, Invalides, and the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture), and famously picked up the child king Louis XV and kissed him several times, in flagrant ignorance of royal protocol. Peter’s first Grand Embassy had not included France, due to a disastrous visit by Russian diplomats in 1687 and France’s continued support of Russia’s adversary Turkey throughout Louis XIV’s reign, and sadly Peter the Great and Louis XIV never stood in the same room. The visit of 1717 as a whole was a successful bid to draw Russia into the fold of European culture and politics, and can be seen as one of the crowning achievements of Peter’s European policy where Russia was no longer a backward, medieval country, but one whose leaders could be received at Versailles and actively learn from the institutions, manners and architecture of their European contemporaries.

Coming into this exhibition, I was very excited – Peter the Great’s reign was one of the first glimpses of non-British history that I was taught at school, and was my first foray into the long eighteenth century. Combined with the majestic setting of Versailles, this exhibition from the outset looked certain to succeed on every level.

In many ways it did. The objects and paintings on display were superb, ranging from state portraits of Peter, Catherine and the doomed Tsarevich Alexis to Caravaque’s full sized The Battle of Poltava (1717/1718) of one of the greatest military victories of Peter’s reign against Sweden; and various scientific instruments of the day. The objects I particularly loved were Peter’s cornflower blue summer suit and worn leather shoes, and his ebony medicine cabinet complete with miniature scales and scalpel. The prize object for me, though, was a small pencil which could be easily overlooked in the horde of Russian treasures. This was the pencil Peter used for sketching whilst on his European excursions; it is sharpened at both ends and clearly shows where, like most schoolboys throughout history, the enlightened despot gnawed in thought or frustration. Despite the odd looks I attracted for taking pictures of this nondescript object, I found the pencil to be absolutely wonderful as it showed more of Peter’s curious personality and thirst for knowledge than any official portrait ever could. In this respect the exhibition really pulled out the stops in acquiring and showcasing the objects loaned from the State Hermitage Museum – and offers an opportunity for many who have never been to St Petersburg or who never will.

The exhibition was structured in thematic, broadly chronological stages: Peter’s role as a tsar; the Grand Embassy of 1697-1698; his later trip to France in 1717; his passions for science and technology that he pursued on his Paris visit; depictions of him by French painters; the influence of French architecture and decorative arts; and his legacy. This is a lot of ground to cover and the exhibition has been restricted to only the Cotelle Gallery in the Grand Trianon’s right wing – considering that the recent exhibition at Versailles (Festivities and Entertainment at Court)’ was housed in the main palace over a large expanse of rooms, it does seem that Peter has been short-changed. Granted the exhibition should not be a regurgitation of Robert Mackey’s biography of Peter the Great, but I was left wanting to hear more this Russo-French relationship, and how it had an impact on both France’s and Russia’s standing within Europe. The disastrous visit of 1687 was never mentioned, and the 1717 visit seemed to just happen without an in-depth look into the relationship with Russia and Europe before, during, and after Peter’s reign and famous visit to Versailles. Catherine the Great was touched upon, but what about the figures of Napoleon, Alexander I and other Romanov tsars – how did they live with the effects of Peter the Great’s legacy and his visit three hundred years ago? 

However, this would not be an issue if the exhibition engaged with the remarkable objects on display. Whilst there is some engagement with the categorisation of objects, with detailed descriptions of the objects themselves, alongside a description of each exhibition section, I didn’t feel like the exhibition was engaging the audience in a way that enhanced the importance of the objects on display. There were no interactive ways to draw people into the objects and the history attached to them- again, in stark contrast with the ‘Festivities’ exhibition, where it showed a video of the evolution of court dance from Louis XIV to the Revolution, allowed visitors to walk into a reconstruction of the Petit Trianon’s opera house, and enhanced the visitors’ experience through sounds of court. This might have been hampered by the space available at the Grand Trianon, as well as a potential desire to let the objects speak for themselves. That may be an understandable reaction for people already aware of the history of the period and of Peter the Great. However, as the exhibition had to be walked through to exit the right wing completely, there were a number of visitors who marched through the exhibition with cursory glances to the objects on display in an attempt to leave the building, with nothing demanding their attention or drawing them in. Watching a video showing the scientific instruments in use, an interactive map of contemporary Paris, walking into the reconstructed studio of Caravaque as he painted the destruction at Poltava – at the very least, interactive ideas like these may have made the marchers desperate for fresh air slow their steps. 

On the whole, I did still enjoy the exhibition as an opportunity to see the treasures of the State Hermitage which I had only read about before. The layout of the exhibition is well thought out and is only victim to the space allowed within the Cotelle Gallery. The objects do speak for themselves if you are already aware of the history – if not, a read of Robert Mackay might be advisable. Whilst this was a bit of a missed opportunity when it came to engaging people unaware of Peter the Great, especially in a new era of museum interaction across Europe (as seen at the new Waterloo visitor centre to name but one), the objects do start to build an understanding of Peter the Great and his time, whether through the scientific instruments that signalled the start of Russia’s involvement in European discourse of science and technology, Peter’s western style summer suit, or the pencil whittled down and chewed by the constantly learning enlightened despot.

Peter the Great: A Tsar in France, 1717 was at Versailles from 30th May to 24th September 2017.