On the Russian Land

Nikolay Baskakov represents the post-war generation of the Leningrad school of painting. He is renowned for his numerous portraits of Lenin and large-scale paintings glorifying the achievements of his contemporaries.
"On the Russian Land" is devoted to the events of the Great Patriotic War. The subject is allegorical: a field dusted with fresh snow is dotted with the destroyed tanks and abandoned weapons of a recent battle, with slain German soldiers in the foreground. They are bundled up with homespun rugs, obviously borrowed from the village huts. A crow, the eternal symbol of death, sits on one of the bodies. A low gray sky, piercing cold, endless expanses of snow and ignominious death – this is how Russia welcomes invaders. This is a classic metaphor for the words pronounced by Alexandr Nevsky "Whoever comes to us with a sword, at a sword will perish".

In the world culture the image of a raven is treated differently. Some see it as patience and long-birthday, while others - the exorbitant wisdom, and others -proximity to power, and a fourth - a symbol death and the collapse of all life. Black gloomy bird with a sharp cry and habit of eating carrion unambiguously negative sung in culture and a mythological nology of Western Europe as a messenger of the world of the dead, who hatch their eyes.

Paintings featured in this exhibition:

"Victory! 1945-2015" - The National Art Museum of China - Beijing, China (26.08.2015 - 23.01.2016).