Since 17 March 2020, the Hermitage has been making daily live broadcasts over the social networks. As of today, 19 live shows have already gone out and they have received over 4,500,000 views, which is indicative of a high demand and their great social significance. These programmes are allowing people to take their minds off the difficult situation and to think about the beautiful.
On 26 March, the Hermitage broadcast its first online guided tour in Italian. The museum decided this was a way to show support for the Friends of the Hermitage in Italy, the staff of our own centre in Venice, but, first and foremost, all the inhabitants of Italy, who are currently going through a hard time and, like us, fighting against the epidemic. On the day before the broadcast, 25 March, a video address to the people of Italy by Mikhail Piotrovsky, General Director of the State Hermitage, and Signor Pasquale Terracciano, Ambassador of the Italian Republic to the Russian Federation, was published.
The live broadcast aroused a tremendous response. The announcement of the event flew around Italian communities – not just those directly associated with museums. The broadcast was watched by up to 11,000 people at any one time. The total number of views at present has exceeded 165,000 and is constantly growing. The people of Italy are looking forward eagerly to a continuation of broadcasts in Italian, and in the comments section viewers are requesting similar events in other languages. Russian-speaking subscribers also expressed support for this initiative from the Hermitage. Similar broadcasts are planned here in the near future.
During and after the broadcast, the Hermitage received hundreds of comments and thank-you letters, mainly in Italian. The most popular response to the video was grazie. “Thank you for a wonderful tour in Italian. In this very difficult moment, we feel that the Russian people are alongside us. We thank you and wish you all the very best. I have told my pupils about this tour,” Patrizia from Italy wrote.
Thanks to culture, one more bridge has been constructed between Russia and Italy.
Mikhail Piotrovsky’s video address –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25W4VAY0Pfo
Pasquale Terracciano’s video address
The Hermitage Online broadcast in Italian
Video (in Russian) “How the Hermitage Is Working. Cultured Isolation”
The Hermitage is continuing to work in a state of cultured isolation. While visitors’ access has been suspended, the museum staff are taking this opportunity to prepare it for the return of the public and to take even better care of the condition of the Hermitage’s exhibits and halls. An important element of the Hermitage team’s daily work is producing the “Hermitage Online” live broadcasts. Since the start of the restrictions due to efforts to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, the museum has already conducted 19 online guided tours through the museum’s accounts in VKontakte and Odnoklassniki as well as on YouTube, and dozens in Instagram. The broadcasts have already received more than 4.5 million views. One of the most important in the series of live broadcasts was a guided tour in Italian around the state rooms of the Winter Palace, by means of which the museum wanted to express support for the people of Italy, who are going through difficult times now. We want to show solidarity with our friends in Italy and all Italians who, like us, are presently fighting against the pandemic.
