The Russian Aviation in the Great War exhibition on the origins of aviation in the Russian Empire and on Russian pilots in World War One is on show at the Martial Chamber of Tsarskoe Selo from 1 August till 12 November 2024. Visiting information
Commemorating the 110th anniversary of World War One and the 10th anniversary of the restored Martial Chamber, the exhibition offers about 300 artefacts from the collection of six museums: Tsarskoe Selo, the Artillery Museum, the Central Naval Museum, the Civil Aviation Museum and the Russian Museum of Military Medicine in St Petersburg, and the Vadim Zadorozhny Museum of Technology in Moscow Region. Some exhibits are provided by private collectors.
Our visitors have a chance to learn how Russian aviation was structured, managed and financed in the early 20th century and how aviators were trained and equipped back then.
The exhibits include: aircraft scale models and design drawings, aircraft ammunition and machine guns, uniforms and personal weapons of aviators, as well as paintings, graphics, and some rare photographs.
Also noteworthy: an officer's naval dirk and field bag of Mikhail Babushkin (1893–1938), a famous Soviet polar aviator and World War One participant who was the first to land an airplane on the North Pole (from Paul Klimov's collection), and rare early 20th-century models of planes flown by Russian pilots (from the Central Naval Museum).
A richly illustrated exhibition catalogue will soon be available at the Museum shop, thanks to support from the investment company VELES Capital.