Russian oligarch pays for Turner exhibit in Moscow

By James Kilner

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia is to exhibit paintings by the English oil painter, William Turner, for the first time since 1975 despite a sharp downturn in relations between London and Moscow.

The deal between Moscow's Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts and London's Tate Britain is bankrolled by metals billionaire Alisher Usmanov, who has close links with the Kremlin and owns nearly a quarter of the London soccer club Arsenal.

"The generations have changed since Turner was last in Moscow and it's important that the young see him," Zinaida Bonami, Pushkin museum deputy director, said.

She ruled out diplomatic rows stopping the loan of about 100 Turner paintings from Tate Britain for the November exhibition in Moscow.

"We have a strong relationship with the Tate and have organized many exhibitions together," she told Reuters on Wednesday. "The Turner paintings will be here."

A row over the 2006 murder of former KGB agent and Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko in London triggered the worst fallout between London and Moscow since the Cold War.

Both sides expelled diplomats and the British government's cultural arm was forced to close two regional offices. Some observers have linked a police crackdown on BP's Russian joint venture TNK-BP to the row, though the Kremlin has denied this.

In December last year, only a last minute deal secured 120 Russian paintings for an exhibition at London's Royal Academy after Moscow had said it was worried the artworks would be confiscated.