Monday, October 4, 2021

Arrival of Schoolgirl to Blind Father

Vasily Perov (Russian, 1833 or 4-1882) painted Arrival of Schoolgirl to Blind Father in 1870. The painting is unfinished, and the unfinished parts give us insight into his picture-making process.

Vasily Perov, Arrival of Schoolgirl to Blind Father, 1870

Two figures in a doorway appear in the pencil line stage at the far left. Presumably the woman in the dress facing away from us is the girl's mother.


Is the man the husband, and is he holding a baby? If so, that would add a lot to the story of the schoolgirl returning to her father and it might explain her expression.

The young woman's hand is also in an unfinished state. It appears that Perov changed his mind about the hand after the first attempt to paint it, and he then removed the paint down to the canvas and redrew it, ready for repainting. 

Given that the pencil lines are stated simply without sketchiness, it's probable that he had a full size drawing on thin paper and that he transferred the drawing to the canvas with some sort of graphite coated paper.

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Online: Vasily Perov on Wikipedia

Book: Vasily Perov: Paintings, Graphic Works

2 comments:

  1. It seems like a perfect thumbnail for an animation sequence.

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  2. On another site I just visited the punchline was, "sometimes a retweet is just a retweet."

    Today this image could be misconstrued by all sorts. Why is he groping her, what is she up to, etc. Perhaps that's why it's unfinished, but sometimes an unfinished painting is just an unfinished painting.

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