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These papers consist of correspondence, manuscripts, documents, art works, printed materials, and a photograph, and relate chiefly to Russian artists and ballet personalities active in France in the 1920s and 1930s. Records of the Parisian World of Art (Mir Iskusstva) group, of which Shervashidze was the president, includes correspondence, documents, an exhibit program, clippings and a photograph of the artists involved. There is correspondence from Lev Bakst, Ivan Bilibin, Sergei Diagilev, Mikhail Larionov, Georgii Lukomskii, and Joan Mirʹo, and one letter each from Nikolai Roerich, and Nataliia Goncharova. There are also many letters from Shervashidze's family in the Soviet Union from the 1920s and 1930s. Illustrative materials by Shervashidze include programs, prints and water colors.

The collection consists of correspondence, manuscripts, and an enormous number of notecards (that were collected over a twenty-year period for a proposed "Slovar' russkikh khudozhnikov") and several dozen notebooks containing entries to which the cards refer. Among the correspondents is Eugène Fabergé, whose letters contain information about the Fabergé dynasty of jewelers. Sakharov's manuscripts include essays on Ivan Bilibin, M. V. Rudaltsov, Mariia Bashkirtseva, Nikolai Globa and V. E. Borisov-Musatov. The cards containing information on artists are arranged alphabetically by artist and contain references to specific notebook entries. There are also bibliographic cards containing citations of articles on art in Russian and other languages. These are arranged by author. The notebooks are largely devoted to a particular artist or genre; others are designated by color and number, letter, number or not titled at all. There are also two sets of large notebooks which seem to belong to another series. There are a few photographs of artists (notably a 1939 photograph of Globa) and photographic reproductions of works by Bakst and Lukin among others. The collection contains approximately 11 exhibition catalogues dating from 1915 to 1940 and primarily relating to the exhibitions of Russian emigre artists in Paris. There are also 4 issues of "Illiustrirovannaia Rossiia" and some clippings dealing with Russian emigre artists.