ZAGREB, Croatia, February 17. /TASS/. The staff of the Russian embassy in Croatia have found ten paintings of the Russian mystic painter Nicholas Roerich (b. 1874, d. 1947) that were listed as missing previously, Ambassador Anvar Azimov told TASS.
The paintings were discovered at a local museum.
"We've found ten unique canvasses by Nicholas Roerich in a museum depositary," Azimov said. "They were brought here upon Roerich's conset at the end of the 1930's when an exhibition of his paintings was held. After that they remained here and then there was the war [World War II] and then these paintings literally drowned in oblivion."
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In these works, the painter reproduced the themes of his previous paintings, includings 'Paranirvana', 'The Pagan Russ', and 'The Teacher's Order'.
Negotiations on the return of the paintings to Russia are underway at present, Azimov said.
Nicholas Roerich was a painter, philosopher, theosophist, traveller, and public activist. He had the title of a member of the Russian Imperial Academy of Arts.
He is known to have painted about 7,000 paintings, many of them currently owned by leading arts galleries of the world.
In addition to it, Roerich was the author of literary works making up 30 volumes, two of thich consist of his poems. He initiated the so-called Roerich Pact (the Treaty on the Protection of Artistic and Scientific Institutions and Historic Monuments) and founded the Peace through Culture and the Banner of Peace international cultural movements.