V. V. Vereshchagin: literary-artistic
cartographyof life and work

If the 19th century ever had a prophet, that was the Russian artist Vereshchagin.

From the English newspaper «Christian», dated December, the 2nd, 1887.

Vasily Vasilievich Vereshchagin

The name of Vasily Vasilievich Vereshchagin, a great artist and our countryman is often met in Cherepovets. In the city there is the Memorial house-museum of the Vereshchagin, Vereshchagin street, the monument to the famous artist, Vereshchagin square. Cherepovets regional college of arts and art crafts named after V.V. Vereshchagin and The city’s Central library are called after him.

Vasily Vasilievich Vereshchagin (October 14 (26), 1842 – March 31 (April 13), 1904) is the greatest Russian artist of the second part of the 19th century who stands out of all the art movements and schools; according to Aleksandr Benois, he is «the most popular personality in the Russian art not only in Russia, but all over the world at one point».

Besides art, V.V. Vereshchagin went in for literary activity. He wrote narratives, essays, memoirs, travel notes, publicist articles. It was a person of a curious fate. He was born in a district town of Cherepovets, Novgorodskaya province (now Cherepovets is a part of Vologda region). The parents of the promising artist seemed to foredoom his further life in the early childhood: they sent him to study the Naval cadet corps in St. Petersburg. However, V.V. Vereshchagin did his own way. He decided by himself where he should study, what to do, where and how to live, how to communicate with the powers.

He had his independent opinion, based on his own observation and experience and received during the far and hard expeditions too: «I remember pondering and thinking a lot at sea, then while travelling along the deserts and gorges of the mountains». The life of V.V. Vereshchagin was a great travel. He visited all the continents, except for Australia and Antarctica, he studied far-away countries and the Russian North, he lived in European capitals and in hardly accessible places. The artist draw what he had seen in these travels. The genre range of V.V. Vereshchagin was sketches and etudes, plot compositions, nature and architecture landscapes, portraits. In his works he reflected the world in a very realistic, precise way and reached omnitemporal generalization. The artist’s realism is not impartial photographic accurateness, the artist, for sure, expressed his attitude to what he drew. According to V.V. Vereshchagin, «the most strict dealing with all the details of creativity does not exclude the ideas, but contains them».

Time passes, historic events go away with it into the past. The artist’s works let the next generations – you and us - see this past. His works make us start thinking about the good and the evil, truth and patriotism, about the fact that the world is very various, but the man’s life is valuable and fragile. While observing the pictures of the artist, reading his literary works, every person may make his own discovery of V.V. Vereshchagin.

Cartography of the life
and work of V. V. Vereshchagin

Амстердам

The Balkans. The Balkan series of paintings

Берлин

Бреславль (Вроцлав)

Брюссель

Будапешт

Варшава

Вена

Вильно (Вильнюс)

Гамбург

Гельсингфорс (Хельсинки)

Дрезден

Дюссельдорф

India. Indian series of paintings.

The Caucasus

Кенигсберг

Киев

Копенгаген

The Crimea

Лейпциг

Лондон

Москва

Moscow. A series of paintings “Napoleon I in Russia”

Нью-Йорк

Одесса

Париж

Петербург

Traveling around Russia

Прага

Ревель (Таллинн)

Рига

Russian North

Syria and Palestine. Paintings on Evangelical Subjects

Стокгольм

Turkestan. Turkestan series of paintings

The Study at the Workshop of the Artist J. L. Jérôme.

Филадельфия, Сент-Луис, Вашингтон, Бостон

Philippines, USA, Cuba

Франкфурт-на-Майне

Харьков

Христиания (Осло)

Tsarskoye Selo, St. Petersburg, Siverskaia

Cherepovets

Чикаго

Юрьев (Тарту)

Japan. Japanese series of paintings

Солон.

1869 – 1870 гг., холст, масло, 37,5 х 27
Саратовский государственный художественный музей имени А. Н. Радищева

Лезгинец Хаджи Муртус из Дагестана

Из книги: Булгаков Ф. И. В. В. Верещагин и его произведения : иллюстрированное издание. Санкт-Петербург : Типография А. С. Суворина, 1905

Представляют трофеи.

1872 г., холст, масло, 242 x 173
Государственная Третьяковская галерея

Конец Бородинского сражения.

1899–1900 гг., холст, масло,165 х 229
Из «Юбилейного альбома Отечественной войны 1812 г.». Москва, 1912

Письмо на родину (Письмо к матери).

1901 г., холст, масло, 61 х 40,5
Ярославский художественный музей

Женщины-молокане

Тамерлановы ворота.

1869 –1871 гг., холст, масло, 39 х 26
Государственный музей изобразительных искусств Республики Татарстан

Дом солона в Ак-Кенте.

1869 – 1870 гг., холст, масло, 36 х 27; в раме: 60,5 x 49,5; в свету: 36 х 24,8; 25,9 х 35,3 (авторский холст)
Государственная Третьяковская галерея

Раджнагар. Мраморная, украшенная барельефами набережная на озере в Удайпуре.

1874 г., холст, масло, 28,8 x 40,8; в раме: 66 x 78,5 x 11; (основа); 27 х 38,5 (авторский холст)
Государственная Третьяковская галерея

Двери Тимура (Тамерлана).

1872 г., холст, масло, 216 x 172,5; в раме: 269,3 x 225; в свету: 213 х 168,3
Государственная Третьяковская галерея

Икона Николы с верховьев реки Пинеги.

1894 г., холст, масло, 27,9 x 21,1
Государственная Третьяковская галерея

Проход Барскаун.

1869 – 1870 гг., холст, масло, 26,8 х 36,1
Астраханская картинная галерея имени П. М. Догадина

Ночной привал великой армии.

1896–1897 гг., холст, масло,100 х 120
Из «Юбилейного альбома Отечественной войны 1812 г.». Москва, 1912

Повозка богатых людей в Дели.

1875 г., холст, масло, 28,5 x 41,1; в раме: 64,5 x 77 x 14,5 (дублировочный холст); 26,6 х 39,7 (авторский холст)
Государственная Третьяковская галерея