Ludmilla N. Shapiro, 91, Collector of Soviet Kitsch, Dies
NY Times
Ludmilla Nikitina Shapiro, a Russian-born journalist and photographer who with her husband amassed a collection of Soviet-era political porcelain considered the most comprehensive in North America, died on May 8 in Madison, Wis., where she lived. She was 91.
Mrs. Shapiro’s death was announced by her granddaughter, Alexandra Corten.
Over six decades, Mrs. Shapiro and her husband, Henry, built their collection through donations, by scouring consignment shops and by occasional gentle larceny. (Mrs. Shapiro once lifted a cigarette holder from the Kremlin.) The collection was acquired in 1989 by the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York…
The Shapiros started their collection in 1933, purely by chance.
“Henry and I were eating lunch at a skating rink, and the coffee spoons were chained to the water heaters on the table so they could not be stolen,” Mrs. Shapiro said in 1992. “The plates had inscriptions on them: ‘Stolen From the Moscow State Eating Enterprise.’
“I said, ‘Well, then let’s do what they invite us to do.’ So we stole it.”
