Lot 32: Petr Petrovich Vereshchagin (1836-1886)

View of the Chusovaia, Russia
signed in Cyrillic and inscribed in Russian 'P. Vereshchagin r[iver Chusovaia' (lower left and right respectively)
oil on canvas
14 1/8 x 20 1/4 in. (35.9 x 51.5 cm.)
Painted circa 1877

Born in Perm, Petr Vereshchagin (1836-1886), the brother of Vasilii Petrovich, was already an established fresco painter before he enrolled at the Academy of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg. He eventually became an Academician in 1873. Vereshchagin was particularly known for his skill at rendering perspective and, owing to his peregrination through Russia, his topographical views. From 1868 onwards, the work stemming from his visits to Moscow, St. Petersburg, Finland, Crimea, the Caucasus, Kiev, Sebastopol and the Urals was frequently on show at Academicians' Exhibitions.

The Chusovaia river, a tributary of the Kama River, rises in the central Urals and flows northwest towards Perm. The river is particularly well-known for the impressive rock formations which line its banks and have proved so trecherous to boats that they are known colloquially as boitsy, or fighters. In 1877 Vereshchagin travelled to the region and appears to have painted a number of studies of the Chusovaia including 'Mouth of the river Arkhipovka at the Chusovaia' and 'View of the Chusovaia by the village of Podvolochnaia' (F. I. Bulgakov, Nashi khudozhniki, St. Petersburg, 1890, I, p. 87).

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