Welcoming the Icon (Russian: Встреча иконы) is a painting by Russian artist Konstantin Savitsky (1844–1905), which was completed in 1878. It is stored in the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow (Inventory No. 591). The size of the painting is 141 × 228 cm.Государственная Третьяковская галерея — каталог собрания / Я. В. Брук, Л. И. Иовлева [State Tretyakov Gallery - catalog of the collection] (in Russian). Vol. 4: Живопись второй половины XIX века, book 2, Н—Я. М.: Красная площадь. 2006. pp. 266-267. This painting is a multi-figure genre canvas that represents an episode of peasant life and was painted during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878. Savitsky worked on it in Daugavpils.
It was presented at the 6th exhibition of the Society for Travelling Art Exhibitions (Peredvizhniki),Государственная Третьяковская галерея — каталог собрания / Я. В. Брук, Л. И. Иовлева [State Tretyakov Gallery - catalog of the collection] (in Russian). Vol. 4: Живопись второй половины XIX века, book 2, Н—Я. М.: Красная площадь. 2006. pp. 266. opened in St. Petersburg in March 1878, and in May of the same year it was moved to Moscow,Товарищество передвижных художественных выставок. Письма, документы. 1869—1899 / В. В. Андреева, М. В. Астафьева, С. Н. Гольдштейн, Н. Л. Приймак [The Society of Travelling Art Exhibitions. Letters, documents. 1869-1899] (in Russian). М.: Искусство. 1987. p. 628. Savitsky's work made a good impression and was purchased by Pavel Tretyakov.
According to the art critic Vladimir Stasov, the painting Welcoming the Icon is full of "such content, such types, and such truth that make it one of the most significant and important creations of the New Russian School". The artist and critic Alexander Benois wrote that Welcoming the Icon is "the most 'ace' thing by Savitsky," and one of the most characteristic anti-clerical works of Russian artists. Art historian noted that in the painting Welcoming the Icon, Savitsky's talent as an "artist of the folk theme," who was able to "come close to understanding the complex psychology of the people," was fully revealed; in her opinion, this picture "unequivocally placed Savitsky in the ranks of the leading artists of the period".
History
Previous events and the work on painting From 1862 to 1873 (with interruptions), Konstantin Savitsky studied at the Imperial Academy of Arts in the class of history painting, where his mentors were Fyodor Bruni, Alexei Markov, and Pavel Chistyakov. In 1871, Savitsky was awarded the Small Gold Medal of the Academy of Arts for his program Cain and Abel. That same year, he became a scholarship holder of Emperor Alexander II.Государственная Третьяковская галерея — каталог собрания / Я. В. Брук, Л. И. Иовлева [State Tretyakov Gallery - catalog of the collection] (in Russian). Vol. 4: Живопись второй половины XIX века, book 2, Н—Я. М.: Красная площадь. 2006. pp. 264.
In the early 1870s, Savitsky began to establish closer ties with members of the Peredvizhniki movement, whose first exhibition opened in January 1871. Two of Savitsky's paintings were exhibited at the second exhibition of the movement, which opened in December 1872. The leadership of the Academy of Arts perceived the success of the traveling exhibitions with irritation and apprehension. Using a formal excuse (a violation of the academic statute, which prohibited students from participating in exhibitions of other organizations) at a meeting held on January 26, 1873,The Julian calendar (“old style”) is used to date events that took place in the Russian Empire. the Academy's Council expelled Savitsky from the Academy's pupils. He was thus deprived of the right to compete for a large gold meda, and also lost his chance for a retirement trip abroad.
From the summer of 1873, Savitsky worked on the painting Repair Work on the Railway, completing it in early 1874. The painting was presented at the 3rd exhibition of the Association of Traveling Art Exhibitions, which opened in St. Petersburg in January 1874. Savitsky's work was highly praised by viewers and critics, and it was purchased by Pavel Tretyakov.
On the proceeds from the sale of the painting, Savitsky managed to make a foreign trip in 1874–1876 (with interruptions), during which he lived and worked in Poland, Germany, and France. In February 1875, Savitsky's family suffered a misfortune: his wife, Ekaterina Vasilyevna, committed suicide (it is believed that the cause of the tragedy was unfounded jealousy). To distract himself from his heavy thoughts, Savitsky returned to Russia, spent some time with relatives in Daugavpils, and visited St. Petersburg. In May 1875, he returned to Paris, but in July of that year, he left again for Russia, where he remained until the fall. Upon his return to Paris, Savitsky spent most of his time working on the canvas Travelers in the Auvergne, which he completed in 1876. In letters to relatives, the artist wrote that he was "torn with all my soul from the beautiful places here" and that only in his homeland would he be able to realize many of his plans.
In the summer of 1876, Savitsky finally returned to Russia and settled in Dinaburg, where his sister's family lived. There, he completed the painting Courtyard in Normandy, begun in France, and also began work on genre paintings of peasant life, among which were I Liked Her (I Would Ask, but I'm Afraid), Goats, and Fireburnt (Fire in the Village). To earn a living, Savitsky also collaborated with illustrated magazines such as Vsemirnaya Illyustratsiya, Pchela, Khudozhestvenniy Zhurnal, and others. In April 1877, the Russo-Turkish War broke out, during which Savitsky's sister's husband, Officer Sazanovich, was killed. In response to these events, Savitsky created his next major works: Welcoming the Icon (1878) and To War (the first version finished in 1880, the second in 1888).Савицкий К. А. На войну. 1888 (HTML). Виртуальный Русский музей — rusmuseumvrm.ru. Дата обращения: 2 September 2022. Archive: 9 February 2018. It is probable, that in 1877 and early 1878, the artist devoted most of his creative efforts to working on the canvas Welcoming the Icon, but no reliable information about this activity has survived. The author of the 1959 monograph on Savitsky’s life and work, Elena Levenfish, wrote: "By a strange, inexplicable coincidence of circumstances, no information about the artist’s work on this idea has survived. It is difficult to imagine that, in this case, he changed his creative method and worked without preparatory studies with models and sketches. However, up to the present time, it has not been possible to find either artistic or written evidence of Savitsky’s work on this canvas".
6th Travelling exhibition and next events The painting Welcoming the Icon was completed in early 1878. Together with two other works by Savitsky, Courtyard in Normandy and Travellers in Auvergne,Товарищество передвижных художественных выставок. Письма, документы. 1869—1899 / В. В. Андреева, М. В. Астафьева, С. Н. Гольдштейн, Н. Л. Приймак [The Society of Travelling Art Exhibitions. Letters, documents. 1869-1899] (in Russian). М.: Искусство. 1987. pp. 150—157. Welcoming the Icon was exhibited at the 6th exhibition of the Association of Itinerant Art Exhibitions, which opened on March 9, 1878, in St. Petersburg and moved to Moscow in May of the same year. The St. Petersburg portion of the exhibition was held in the building of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, while the Moscow department took place in the premises of the Imperial Society for the Encouragement of the Arts. Directly from the exhibition, the painting was purchased from the artist by Pavel Tretyakov for two thousand rubles.Письма художников Павлу Михайловичу Третьякову: 1870—1879 / Н. Г. Галкина, М. Н. Григорьева, Н. Л. Приймак [Letters from artists to Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov: 1870-1879] (in Russian). М.: Искусство. 1968. p. 515. In November 1878, the 6th Traveling Exhibition continued its journey to other cities of the Russian Empire, which ended in April 1879. During this time, the exhibition visited Riga (November–December), Vilna (December–January), Kyiv (January–February), Odessa (February–March), and Kharkiv (March–April).
In general, the painting received good reviews from viewers and critics. The artist Pavel Chistyakov, in a letter to Pavel Tretyakov, noted that at the traveling exhibition “there were good paintings,” of which he particularly liked Drought by Grigory Myasoedov, Welcoming the Icon by Konstantin Savitsky, Prisoner by Nikolai Yaroshenko, and Rye by Ivan Shishkin. In the article The Traveling Exhibition of 1878, published at the end of March 1878 in the newspaper Novoe Vremya, art critic Vladimir Stasov gave a detailed description of Welcoming the Icon, noting that this canvas seemed to him "the most significant painting at the exhibition". After reading this article, Leo Tolstoy became interested in the paintings Drought and Welcoming the Icon; in a letter to Stasov on April 6, 1878, he wrote: “Your feuilleton at least a little corrected the matter that I did not have time to be at the exhibition—gave me a concept of it, but the more regrettable that I did not see the paintings by Myasoedov and Savitsky. The content of these paintings is interesting to me...”
At the same time, there were critical reviews of Welcoming the Icon in the press. Particularly, in the newspaper Moscovskiye Vedomosti (No. 145 for June 10, 1878), the image of the priest was interpreted negatively and referred to as a "pathological type". Discussing Savitsky's work, one of the critics wrote: "Under the influence of the real direction in art in recent times, we have come into fashion to portray clerics perhaps prosaically... We dare to think that this is a big mistake". In a letter to the artist Ivan Kramskoi dated May 9, 1878, Pavel Tretyakov described the situation as follows: "There are different opinions about Savitsky, but people mostly like the Icon, except for the priest, who is unanimously attacked".Переписка И. Н. Крамского: И. Н. Крамской и П. М. Третьяков, 1869—1887 / С. Н. Гольдштейн [Correspondence of I. N. Kramskoi: I. N. Kramskoi and P. M. Tretyakov, 1869-1887] (in Russian). М.: Искусство. 1953. p. 233.