| Mika Morozov | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Artist | Valentin Serov |
| Year | 1901 |
| Medium | Oil on canvas |
| Dimensions | 62,3 cm × 70,6 cm (245 in × 278 in) |
| Location | State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow |
Mika Morozov (in Russian: Мика Морозов; alternatively known as Portrait of Mika Morozov)[1] is a painting by the Russian artist Valentin Serov. It was painted in 1901. For the artist at the age of four posed future Soviet literary scholar (specialist in the works of William Shakespeare), theater scholar, teacher, translator Mikhail Morozov, son of a major Russian businessman and philanthropist Mikhail Abramovich Morozov.
The painting forms part of the State Tretyakov Gallery collection's in Moscow, where it arrived in 1917. It has been repeatedly presented at national and international exhibitions. Among them are the exhibition In Russian Art Traditions held in 2004-2005 at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.[2] and an exhibition of works from the collection of the Morozov brothers at the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris in 2021-2022.
The artist Paola Volkova in her book Bridge over the Abyss (2015) noted that the canvas reflects the view of the child characteristic of the second half of the 19th century — "sometimes the emotional or mental or inner world of a child is more significant than the world of an adult". The adult lives "in a socially defined world" — in a "false and closed" world. From the point of view of the artists of the time, complete openness is characteristic of children. However, she noted that from the second half of the 19th century artists "begin to deal only with the salvation of the world" and they are little interested in children. Therefore, Serov's treatment of the child in the portrait of Mika Morozov is "the least numerous and very quickly cut off", but at the same time "the deepest and most fruitful".