The sculptural group Cupid and Psyche, according to the researchers, was created in the workshop of the Italian sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini by his student Giulio Cartari.

In 1718, Yuri Ivanovich Kologrivov acquired this sculpture in Italy to decorate the Summer Garden. At the same time, Kologrivov suggested not to carry the sculpture through Holland for fear of damaging it on the way. As it happened, there are glues of marble from the 18th century on the sculpture.

In the summer of 1721, the sculpture Cupid and Psyche was installed in the Grotto of the Summer Garden. Peter I and his wife Catherine, niece Anna Ioannovna and daughter Elizabeth admired her. And also the future Empress Catherine II, when she lived in the Summer Garden before her wedding with Peter III. The sculpture remained in the Grotto until the end of the 18th century. During the reign of Paul I, when the Grotto, by order of the emperor, decided to dismantle and build a garden pavilion, the sculpture was transported to the “shops” of the Tauride Palace. Thanks to the efforts of the sculptors and restorers of the Hermitage, Alexander Ivanovich Terebenev and Alexander Nikolaevich Belyaev, the sculptural group Cupid and Psyche was returned to the Summer Garden. This event took place in the 60s of the XIX century. The sculpture was installed on the Swan Canal pier with its front side deep into the garden.

In 1933, when they dismantled a smaller copy of the Tsar Carpenter monument, which was located opposite the sculpture Cupid and Psyche, it was moved to the site of the monument to Peter.

In 2009, the original sculpture “Cupid and Psyche” was transferred to storage in the Mikhailovsky Castle, and in its place was installed a copy made of natural marble chips (80%) by casting on the basis of polyester resin. The publication used materials from the book by Galina Aleksandrovna Khvostova “Behind the Scenes of Peter’s Paradise, or the History of Sculpture in the Summer Garden in the 18th – early 21st centuries”.

Enjoy your walks in the gardens of the Russian Museum.

#gardensoftheRussianMuseum #MikhailovskyGarden #summerGarden #RussianMuseum #rusmuseum_gardens #igardens