NIDOS DE RUSIA

Christa Zaat

Alexei Kondratyevich Savrasov (Russian landscape painter) 1830 - 1897
Грачи прилетели (The Rooks have Returned), 1871
oil on canvas
62 x 48.5 cm.
Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia

The painting was done on the basis of etudes made in the settlement of Molvitino (now Susanino) in Kostroma Province. The work, which was presented at the first Itinerant (Peredvizhniki) art fair in 1871, marked the beginning of the development of the Russian landscape school and birth of the lyrical landscape. Savrasov used this work to affirm the idea that the simplest and most modest manifestation in nature, when inspired by the personal attention of the artist, can carry a full aesthetic content. The landscape appears as an open, unrestricted space, a small part of the universe where ordinary, clear and simple life goes on. The world of the painting is harmonious in its commonplace way, warmed by the heat of humanity – smoke from the chimney creates a touching atmosphere of comfort. N.N. Kramskoi described his impressions of the exhibition, saying that all the landscapes there consisted of “water, trees, even air, whereas a soul could be found only in Rooks.”