In 2013, the Engels Museum of Local Lore in cooperation with the International Union of German Culture under the auspices of the German Embassy in the Russian Federation organized an exhibition project “The Art of Yakov Yakovlevich Weber”. The exhibition was held in the Central House of Artists in Moscow from August 27 to September 8, 2013. This is the first encounter of the capital’s residents and guests with the work of Yakov Weber, Honored Art Worker of the Autonomous Republic of Volga Germans.

Thirty paintings by the artist from the museum’s art collection were displayed at the vernissage, representing different periods of the artist’s work from 1893 to 1937. Four canvasses were presented after the restoration work was carried out in the Central Museum of the Great Patriotic War: “Flood” of 1926, “Ice Drift on the Volga” of 1928, “Spring Flood” of 1927, and “Belyana on the Volga” of 1929. These paintings were created by Weber before the war and were presented at the First and Second Republican exhibitions held in the city of Pokrovsk (now Engels) in November 1927 and January 1929. Two of them — “Flood” and “Belyana on the Volga” — apparently took part in the First Regional Art Exhibition in November 1934 at the Radishchev State Art Museum in Saratov. The works shown in the booklet have undergone restoration, along with other works by the artist, and currently make up the permanent exhibition “Yakov Weber. Singer of the Volga” of the Engels Museum of Local Lore.

The main theme in the art of Yakov Weber is the great Russian river Volga. Having chosen the path of a landscape painter while still studying at the Imperial Academy of Arts, Yakov Weber remained loyal to his vocation throughout his life, preserving and developing the traditions of classical Russian landscape painting, despite all the challenges of the times.