KHERSON, Ukraine – The principal artist designing the exhibitions at Kherson’s regional historical past museum, Anatoliy Gryaznov, was close to tears. The assortment to which he had devoted a lifetime was principally gone, he mentioned, one other cultural establishment ransacked and looted by Russian forces earlier than they withdrew from town in defeat.

Glass show instances have been smashed. Deep gouges within the flooring marked the paths alongside which Russian troopers had dragged tombstones and different heavy objects.

A chisel left behind by retreating Russian troopers on the regional historical past museum in Kherson, Ukraine, on Sunday Nov. 20, 2022. The museum is one other cultural establishment ransacked and looted by Russian forces earlier than they withdrew from town in defeat. (Lynsey Addario/The New York Times)

“I spent my whole life working in this museum,” Gryaznov mentioned. “And now it is all gone. Twenty years of my life — gone.”

According to the top of the tradition division at its City Council, Svitlana Dumynska, Kherson had “one of the most impressive collections of regional museums in Ukraine.”

They are actually in ruins. At the regional historical past museum, the part on weapons and weapons was decimated, the Russians taking every thing they may carry. Just a few heavier objects remained, alongside the entire of the character exhibit.

At the close by Kherson Art Museum, native officers mentioned, spiritual work from the seventeenth and twentieth centuries have been torn from the partitions. The Kherson police have opened a prison investigation, classifying looting as a war crime.

Ukraine’s minister of tradition, Oleksandr Tkachenko, mentioned about 80% of the museums’ collections have been gone: “Mostly the most valuable things were stolen.”

The deputy governor of the Kherson area, Serhii Khlan, advised journalists on Monday that there have been reviews {that a} second department of the regional historical past museum — in Kakhova, east of the Dnieper River, close to an essential hydroelectric plant — had additionally been robbed.

The Russians additionally cleared out your complete part of Kherson’s historical past museum that was devoted to World War II, together with the identification paperwork and medals of a Nazi soldier bearing Hitler’s signature.

They appear to have performed little to hide what they have been taking.

Days after their troopers fled town, photos circulated on Ukrainian social media that appeared to indicate objects from the Kherson Art Museum being unloaded at a museum in Crimea, the peninsula that Russia unlawfully annexed from Ukraine in 2014.

Museum specialists recognized a number of artistic endeavors within the footage, together with work by Ukrainian modernists Ivan Pokhitonov and Mykhailo Andrienko-Nechitaylo.

In an interview this month with the information outlet The Moscow Times, the Crimean museum’s director, Andrei Malgin, confirmed that the artworks had come to his establishment, the Central Museum of Taurida in Simferopol.

“I have been instructed to take the exhibits of the Kherson Art Museum for temporary storage and ensure their safety until they are returned to their rightful owner,” he mentioned.