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Pushkin House

 

In 1954 a small group of Soviet emigrés set up a polit­i­cally neutral Russian cultural centre at a house in Kens­ington Park Gardens. Two years later they moved to 46 Ladbroke Grove, which they named Pushkin House in honour of the influ­en­tial author and poet, echoing the familiar name of the Institute of Russian Liter­a­ture in St Petersburg.

In 2006 Pushkin House relocated to a more spacious and refined home, a grade II* listed Georgian townhouse at 5a Blooms­bury Square. Dating from the beginning of the 18th century, the house was substan­tially rebuilt in 1744 by Henry Flitcroft, who added the Palladian façade.

Unlike most of London’s foreign cultural centres, Pushkin House operates as an inde­pen­dent charity rather than a govern­ment-funded arm of an embassy. It lays on a varied programme, focusing on the arts but with a smat­tering of history, philos­ophy and politics. Events include talks, seminars, exhi­bi­tions, films, concerts and readings, mostly in English or with English subtitles in the case of Russian film screenings.

Russian language courses are run here and Pushkin House also has its own reference library of Russian culture, a corner of which is shown in the picture above.