Harvest Time (Mowers)

Harvest Time (Mowers)
ArtistGrigoriy Myasoyedov
Year1887
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions164 cm × 282 cm (65 in × 111 in)
LocationRussian Museum, Saint Petersburg

Harvest Time (Mowers) (Russian: Страдная пора (Косцы)) is a painting by Russian artist Grigoriy Myasoedov (1834–1911), completed in 1887. It is kept in the State Russian Museum in St. Petersburg (Inventory Zh-6899). The size is 164 × 282 cm[1] (according to other data, 179 × 275 cm).[2] The work, combining elements of domestic genre and landscape, is devoted to the theme of peasant labor during the harvest.[3] The painting was originally known under the title Harvest Time;[4] later, the names Harvest[5] and Croppers[6] were also used. Modern literature usually uses the double title, Harvest Time (Mowers)[1] or Harvest Time. Mowers.[7]

The canvas was presented at the 15th exhibition of the Association of Travelling Art Exhibitions (Peredvizhniki), which opened in February 1887 in St. Petersburg. Right from the exposition, the painting was purchased by Emperor Alexander III.[8] For a long time, Harvest Time was in the Gatchina Palace.[8] In the summer of 1941, after the outbreak of the World War II, the collection of paintings from the Gatchina Palace was evacuated to Sarapul. After the war, the paintings were first in Pushkin, and then in Pavlovsk. In 1959, the canvas Harvest Time (Moers) was transferred to the State Russian Museum.[2][1]

In a review article dedicated to the 15th Travelling Exhibition, art critic Vladimir Stasov called Harvest Time one of the most excellent paintings by Myasoedov and noted that it is full of "poetry, light feeling, something healthy and solemn".[4] Art historian Dmitry Sarabianov wrote that in this work Myasoedov managed to achieve "monumental construction of the canvas", which corresponds to the general idea and shows "the beauty of the labor upsurge in the season of labor".[5] According to art historian Irina Shuvalova, in this painting, for the first time in Russian painting, the "greatness and beauty of peasant labor and, most importantly, its powerful creative beginning" is so clearly shown.

  1. ^ a b c Государственный Русский музей — каталог собрания / Г. Н. Голдовский, В. А. Леняшин. СПб.: Palace Editions, 2016. V. 6: Живопись второй половины XIX века (К—М). ISBN 978-5-93332-565-9 p. 158.
  2. ^ a b Государственный Русский музей — Живопись, XVIII — начало XX века (каталог). Л.: Аврора и Искусство, 1980. p. 212.
  3. ^ Мясоедов Г. Г. Страдная пора (Косцы). 1887 (HTML). Виртуальный Русский музей — rusmuseumvrm.ru. Дата обращения: 5 April 2024. Archive: 2 September 2018.
  4. ^ a b Стасов (1950, p. 226)
  5. ^ a b Сарабьянов (1955, p. 240)
  6. ^ Шувалова (1971, p. 85)
  7. ^ Ильина (2000, p. 212)
  8. ^ a b Шувалова (1994, p. 18)