The Mikhailovsky Palace

Ilya Repin (1844–1930) was possibly the most famous of the Realist artists, remaining so to this day. All the stages in his career in art are well represented in the Russian Museum.

Repin painted Barge Haulers on the Volga between 1870 and 1873. It came to be regarded as a pictorial emblem of its day and age. Repin simply yet effectively resolved a theme that occupied many in those years — serf labour — uniting almost ten portraits in one composition. He does not confine himself to portraiture alone, though at the same time Barge Haulers on the Volga cannot be called a genre picture. It goes much deeper than a purely group portrait or genre scene. Barge Haulers on the Volga is a metaphor for strength and debility, love of freedom and the attempt to break free from slavery.

The Raising of Jairus’s Daughter (1871) was given to final-year students of the Imperial Academy of Arts in 1871 and received the most lifelike and emotional incarnation in the work of Ilya Repin. The artist was at first not particularly inspired by the theme, until he associated it with the death of his sister. Tragedy and sorrow combine with lucidity and hope, enriching the painting with an atmosphere of agitation, expressed in the tense ring of the colours and the lighting contrasts. The sorrowful and deferential hope of the girl’s parents is contrasted to Jesus’ austere solemnity. The painterly culture and spirituality of the young artist’s canvas rank it alongside the leading works of Russian art. The Raising of Jairus’s Daughter was awarded a major gold medal and was acquired by the Imperial Academy of Arts. Repin was rewarded with a trip to France to perfect his art. While in France, he painted Sadko (1876), a picture in the fairytale spirit for which he was elected to the Imperial Academy of Arts.