The exhibition tells about those who began collecting Russian painting before the emergence of the famous gallery of Pavel Tretyakov. The focus is on two private collections of the 19th century, their owners, and the museum fate of the works. The history of domestic museums was shaped by the efforts of people who saw art not as decoration for an office but as a cultural value for the future. The project addresses two figures - Fyodor Pryanishnikov and Kozma Soldatenkov, whose collections appeared before the public gallery of the Tretyakov brothers and prepared the ground for a conversation about the Russian school of painting. Pryanishnikov was a statesman, philanthropist, and a person of broad interests. Soldatenkov was a Moscow entrepreneur, publisher, and benefactor who supported educational initiatives. Their biographies differ, but both were concerned with the cultural context of art: alongside the paintings, the exhibition features archival materials, rare books, and documents that reveal the history of the formation of the collections. A separate line is dedicated to the further fate of the collections. After being included in the Rumyantsev Museum, they became an important part of its Picture Gallery, and in the 20th century were distributed between the Tretyakov Gallery and dozens of museums across the country. Interesting exhibitions in Moscow are presented on KUDAGO.