Harvest Time (Mowers) () 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 cmГосударственный Русский музей — каталог собрания / Г. Н. Голдовский, В. А. Леняшин. СПб.: Palace Editions, 2016. V. 6: Живопись второй половины XIX века (К—М). p. 158. (according to other data, 179 × 275 cm).Государственный Русский музей — Живопись, XVIII — начало XX века (каталог). Л.: Аврора и Искусство, 1980. p. 212. The work, combining elements of domestic genre and landscape, is devoted to the theme of peasant labor during the harvest.Мясоедов Г. Г. Страдная пора (Косцы). 1887 (HTML). Виртуальный Русский музей — rusmuseumvrm.ru. Дата обращения: 5 April 2024. Archive: 2 September 2018. The painting was originally known under the title Harvest Time; later, the names Harvest and Croppers were also used. Modern literature usually uses the double title, Harvest Time (Mowers) or Harvest Time. Mowers.
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 Tsar Alexander III. For a long time, Harvest Time was in the Gatchina Palace. In the summer of 1941, in the wake of the German invasion of the USSR, 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.
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". 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". 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.
History
Previous events and work on the painting
In 1853-1862, Grigoriy Myasoedov studied at the Academy of Arts in the class of history painting. In 1862, for his painting The Escape of Grigoriy Otrepiev from the Tavern on the Lithuanian Border (now in the National Pushkin Museum), Myasoedov was awarded a large gold medal of the Academy of Arts. Along with this award, he received the title of class artist of the 1st category, as well as the right to a pensioner's trip abroad.Государственная Третьяковская галерея — каталог собрания / Я. В. Брук, Л. И. Иовлева. М.: Красная площадь, 2001. V. 4: Живопись второй половины XIX века, книга 1, А—М. ISBN 5-900743-56-X. p. 438. In 1863-1866 and 1867-1869, the artist worked in Italy, France, and Spain, and also visited Germany, Belgium, and Switzerland. In March 1869, Myasoedov returned to Russia. In the following years, he lived and worked in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Tula, Kharkov, and Poltava provinces, as well as in the Crimea. In 1870, for the painting Spells, he received the title of academician of historical painting. Myasoedov was one of the founders of the Society of Travelling Art Exhibitions (Peredvizhniki), established in 1870, whose first exhibition opened in November 1871 in St. Petersburg. After that, all of Myasoedov's major works were exhibited at traveling exhibitions — Zemstvo Dines (1872), Reading the Regulations of February 19, 1861 (1873), Plowing (1876), Drought (1878), Self-Exhaustors (1882–1884), and others. In the first half of the 1880s, along with work on thematic paintings, Grigoriy Myasoedov turned to landscape motifs. In 1881, at the 9th traveling exhibition, he exhibited his canvas The Road in the Rye (canvas, oil, 65 × 145 cm, now in the State Tretyakov Gallery).Государственная Третьяковская галерея — каталог собрания / Я. В. Брук, Л. И. Иовлева. М.: Красная площадь, 2001. V. 4: Живопись второй половины XIX века, книга 1, А—М. ISBN 5-900743-56-X. p. 441. Apparently, work on landscapes of this type led Myasoedov to the idea of creating a series of paintings "glorifying the power and poetry of peasant labor".
A few years after the creation of The Road in the Rye, the artist again returned to a similar motif. In a letter to landscape painter Alexander Kiselyov from January 25, 1886,The Julian calendar ("old style") is used to date events that took place in the Russian Empire. Grigoriy Myasoedov reported that he had begun work on the landscape Rye Field at Sunset, which "comes out boring and does not give a proper representation". In the same letter, Myasoedov wrote: "For domestic paintings, I consider myself experienced enough in the landscape, and backgrounds can write without embarrassment, that's what I will move to". So the artist came to the idea of creating an epic canvas, not only including a landscape with a golden field of rye against the background of the summer sky but also praising the labor of peasants engaged in harvesting the bread crop. It took about a year to work on the painting Harvest Time.
The 15th Travelling Exhibition and other exhibitions of the late 19th century Harvest Time was exhibited at the 15th Art Travelling Exhibitions, which opened in St. Petersburg on February 25, 1887, and moved to Moscow in April of the same year. The St. Petersburg part of the exhibition was held in Botkina's house (7 Sergievskaya Street), and the Moscow part in the premises of the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture.Государственная Третьяковская галерея — каталог собрания / Я. В. Брук, Л. И. Иовлева. М.: Красная площадь, 2001. V. 4: Живопись второй половины XIX века, книга 1, А—М. p. 441. ISBN 5-900743-56-X. Harvest Time was the only work by Myasoedov presented at the exhibition. Such future famous large-format canvases as Boyarynya Morozova by Vasily Surikov and Christ and the Sinner by Vasily Polenov were also exhibited there. The painting Harvest Time received good reviews. In particular, in a review published in the journal Russkaya Mysl, the writer Pavel Kovalevsky described his impressions: "Lovely picture of Mr. Myasoedov. You would not leave it and stand watching it for a long time, embraced by the Russian summer, Russian field...". The artist Vasily PolenovТоварищество передвижных художественных выставок. Письма, документы. 1869—1899 / В. В. Андреева, М. В. Астафьева, С. Н. Гольдштейн, Н. Л. Приймак. М.: Искусство, 1987. pp. 322—330. wrote to his sister Elena Polenova: "Myasoedov long ago such a good thing has not exhibited — a huge painting, men and women mowing rye. Surprisingly truthful and original...". The art critic Vladimir Stasov, who published a review article about the exhibition of the Peredvizhniki, also spoke well of the painting. Harvest Time was purchased directly from the exhibition by Emperor Alexander III.
In 1887-1888, the 15th Travelling exhibition continued its journey to other cities of the Russian Empire, visiting Kharkov (August - September), Elisavetgrad (September - October), Odessa (October - November), and Kiev (December - January).Товарищество передвижных художественных выставок. Письма, документы. 1869—1899 / В. В. Андреева, М. В. Астафьева, С. Н. Гольдштейн, Н. Л. Приймак. М.: Искусство, 1987. pp. 629. It is known that in 1889-1890, the canvas Harvest Time was exhibited at the 2nd parallel Travelling exhibition, which was based on works presented at the 15th and 16th exhibitions of the Peredvizhniki Society. This exhibition visited Kazan, Samara, Penza, Tambov, Kozlov, Voronezh, Novocherkassk, Rostov-on-Don, Taganrog, Ekaterinoslav, and Kursk.Товарищество передвижных художественных выставок. Письма, документы. 1869—1899 / В. В. Андреева, М. В. Астафьева, С. Н. Гольдштейн, Н. Л. Приймак. М.: Искусство, 1987. pp. 630. According to some sources, in 1892, Harvest Time was exhibited at the 3rd parallel traveling exhibition, held in the Picture Selivyorstov Gallery in Penza.Пензенская областная картинная галерея имени К. А. Савицкого / В. П. Сазонов, Н. Д. Валукина. М.: Изобразительное искусство, 1979. (Художественные музеи СССР). p. 5. This exhibition also traveled to Kazan and Samara. In 1893, the author's repetition of the canvas Harvest Time (under the English title Harvest Time) was exhibited in the Russian section of the World's Fair in Chicago, together with another painting by Myasoedov — The Escape of Grigoriy Otrepiev from a Tavern on the Lithuanian BorderWorld's Columbian exposition 1893. Chicago. Catalogue of the Russian section. Saint Petersburg: Imperial Russian Commission, Ministry of Finances, 1893. pp. 371-372. (1862, now in the National Pushkin Museum).
Next events For a long time, the painting Harvest Time was kept in the Gatchina Palace. In a guide to the Gatchina Palace and Park, published in 1940, art historian and historian Andrei Pats-Pomarnatsky reported that at that time Myasoedov's painting Kostsy was in the 4th reception room of Alexander III, along with Vladimir Orlovsky's painting The Road near Kiev (1889), as well as a portrait of Alexander III in a jäger uniform by Alexei Korzukhin. According to Pats-Pomarnatsky, the painting Mowers is "beautiful in painting, but completely impersonal, not giving any idea of the true, miserable life of peasants and therefore quite acceptable for the rooms of the royal palace".Пензенская областная картинная галерея имени К. А. Савицкого / В. П. Сазонов, Н. Д. Валукина. М.: Изобразительное искусство, 1979. (Художественные музеи СССР). p. 5.
In the summer of 1941, after the outbreak of World War II, a significant part of the exhibits from the Gatchina Palace was evacuated by four railroad echelons to the city of Sarapul (Udmurt ASSR). Painting items were taken out by the second echelon, which was led by the artist P. P. Kirillov.World's Columbian exposition 1893. Chicago. Catalogue of the Russian section. Saint Petersburg: Imperial Russian Commission, Ministry of Finances, 1893. pp. 371—372. In Sarapul, the exhibits from the Gatchina Palace were placed in the Republican Scientific Museum of the Kama Region (now the Museum of History and Culture of the Middle Kama Region), which at that time was also called the Museum-storage of the Leningrad Suburban Palaces. After the end of the war, in October 1945, the removal of valuables back to the Leningrad region began. At first, they were placed in the Alexander Palace of Pushkin, where the Central Repository of Museum Funds was established, and then this repository was transferred to Pavlovsk.
In 1959, the painting Harvest Time. Mowers, at that time kept in the Pavlovsky Palace Museum, was transferred from the Central Repository of Museum Funds to the State Russian Museum. The painting is exhibited in Hall 31 of the Mikhailovsky Palace, where there are also paintings To War by Konstantin Savitsky, In a Warm Land by Nikolai Yaroshenko, Feast of the Cross by Illarion Pryanishnikov, and others.Михайловский дворец, зал 31 (HTML). Русский музей — виртуальный филиал — www.virtualrm.spb.ru. 21 August 2018. Archive: 18 March 2018.