Battle of Borodino Panorama Museum

The Battle of Borodino Panorama Museum on Kutuzovsky Prospekt is a historical museum devoted entirely to the events of 1812 and the war against Napoleon. Its main exhibit is a huge painted panorama of the Battle of Borodino by the battle painter Franz Roubaud. Besides the panorama, the collection includes paintings, graphic art, weapons, coins, and rare books.

Roubaud painted the panorama for the battle’s centenary in 1911–1912 — his third large-scale battle piece after “The Storming of the Akhulgo Aul” and “The Siege of Sevastopol.” The commission for the painting came from the imperial court, and the master worked on it in Munich with a group of assistants. The canvas, measuring 15 by 115 meters, depicted one of the decisive moments of the battle and was completed in the spring of 1912. The grand opening ceremony was held in late August 1912 (Old Style), attended by Nicholas II himself and his family; the painting was housed in a temporary wooden pavilion at Chistye Prudy.

The canvas’s fate was dramatic: after the pavilion closed in 1918, the rolled-up painting was kept for many years in various makeshift buildings, causing nearly half of it to rot. In 1939 a panel of experts led by Igor Grabar deemed restoration impossible, but after the war, restorers led by Pavel Korin nonetheless saved the work over a year and a half, adding to the canvas the figure of the wounded Pyotr Bagration. The current building on Kutuzovsky Prospekt was erected in 1961–1962: the composition is based on a 23-meter glazed cylinder flanked by wings bearing mosaic panels by Boris Talberg. The museum opened on October 18, 1962, for the 150th anniversary of the victory over Napoleon.

The museum's history also endured tragedy: in 1967 the panorama was set on fire by Chinese students who supported the Cultural Revolution — the fire destroyed about 60 percent of the canvas, and the studio of battle painters undertook its restoration. In 1973 a monument to Kutuzov was installed at the entrance. The building was originally intended to house only the one painting, but over time about forty thousand artifacts from the Napoleonic era were gathered; the collection was restored in 2011–2012, and the building was renovated in 2017–2019.

The Panorama Museum is the center of a historical memorial complex dedicated to the War of 1812. It includes the izba (peasant hut) at Fili, recreated in 1887, where the commander decided at a council of war to retreat from Moscow without a new battle, as well as the Museum of Heroes of the Soviet Union and Russia, the Chapel of the Archangel Michael, a mass grave of Borodino soldiers, and a replica of the Triumphal Arch by Osip Bove. Today the museum’s holdings number almost 38,000 items, and its permanent exhibition covers more than 1,400 square meters.

Having evolved from a temporary wooden pavilion into a modern memorial complex, the Panorama Museum remains one of the main sites of memory of the Patriotic War of 1812 in Moscow. Franz Roubaud's unique panorama, which narrowly escaped destruction and survived a fire, still conveys the tension of the decisive hour of the Battle of Borodino.