Description of the painting by Fyodor Vasilyev “The Thaw”

Description of the painting by Fyodor Vasilyev The Thaw

In artists, probably, like in nature, bad weather is only a conditional category. The sad and cold landscape that is familiar to all of us can perhaps be a subject of inspiration? It turns out yes, maybe. One need only look at the Vasiliev’s “Thaw” picture. Here, how famous and expressively depicted is the famous Russian muddy that even a person who has never seen her in her life will feel it.

Even the stretched shape of the canvas makes the slush more expressive and enhances the feeling of hopelessness. The picture becomes more dull. The trees in the background are still hibernating and a wretched hut, barely showing signs of life.

The sky, gloomy and cloudy, increases the pressure, and makes the picture in a meaningful sense complete. In the foreground is a blurred and busted country road, and the essential detail of the picture is a traveler with a child. Tired travelers to a certain extent make the overall background of the picture more alarming. But on the other hand, if there is a traveler on the road and a thaw from the thaw, then probably there is hope and spring ahead. The fact is that Vasiliev drew his picture to the young (being the first adult work), and it seems that he was not at all embraced by sad thoughts.

Briefly about the picture, which incidentally had a lot of positive feedback, incl. outside of Russia, then we can state its ingenious simplicity. The whole essence of the picture in the aggregate of well-placed parts of the thaw is sodden snow, slush, brown trees and bushes, the air is not so cold, but damp, etc.

A peculiar recognition of the painting “The Thaw” is the fact that in 1872 in the London “Morning Post” the wish was expressed that Vasiliev came to the British capital with the aim of writing a thaw on its streets.


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Description of the painting by Fyodor Vasilyev “The Thaw”