Touched by Russian Art

Before we moved to Moscow seven years ago, I knew nothing, NOTHING, about Russian art.  I did not know the name of a single artist, was not familiar with any artistic style or period and could only pick out a Russian painting from a line-up of international suspects, if the scene on the canvas featured a church topped by an "onion dome."

Now. . . I have a group of favorite artists. It was as if they were waiting for me the first time I walked into the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow, which houses a vast collection of Russian art dating back to 12th century icons.  I bought my ticket, rented an audio guide, picked up a brochure of the floor plan with captions in English, then wondered where to begin. "Come to the second floor," I seemed to hear, as I opened the brochure and my eyes gravitated to the outline of rooms 16-31, one flight up. Wondering how the chorus of male voices knew I spoke English, I decided to follow.

I spent the next three hours, punching in numbers on the audio guide's keypad as I walked from room to room, listening to the speaker describe the paintings and recount the lives of the men who created them.  I was entranced.  Standing in front of. . . . .

Nikolai Ge's "Portrait of Lev Tolstoy"

Ilya Repin's "Autumn Bouquet"

Ivan Sishkin's "Pine Trees in Sunlight"

Nikolai Yaroshenko's "Life is Everywhere"

Vasily Maximov's "All in the Past"

Isaak Levitan's "Golden Autumn"

. . . . I began to understand why these artists had invited me to wander among them.  They were "Wanderers" themselves or Peredvizhniki, members of the Association of Travelling Art Exhibitions during the second half of the 19th century.   Their work rejected the academic restrictions of the day; they were "progressives."  Whatever they had to express could not be expressed within the confines of a traditional frame.  True life, or realistic life, was what they saw and what they were compelled to paint.

Last week when I was in St. Petersburg, I visited them again, this time in the Russian Museum.  They were waiting in rooms at the top of the grand staircase, wall after wall of them, summoning me to look closely, to learn.  I listened, wrote notes, sat on cushioned seats in the middle of high-ceilinged rooms, and looked deeply into eyes, nature, and history.   From the pale, solitary face of a young woman in Yaroshenko's "Warmer Lands,"

to the eighty-one animated faces in Repin's massive "Ceremonial Meeting of the State Council". . . .  

I felt Russia touching me, like the hand of a wandering painter proudly asking, "Please, come, look at my work."