The hunters at rest

In the early 70-ies of the XIX century, Vasily Perov is moving away from the subject of the difficulties of national life, which is the subject of most of his works of the period 1860-70-ies To replace the sad paintings, tells about the plight of the peasants and their children, come paintings, painting ordinary everyday scenes: "Fowler", "Nerd", "Fisherman", "Pigeon". To this period also belongs the painting "The hunters at rest"— Perov famous painting created by the master in duplicate. The original is now in the Tretyakov gallery (Moscow), another painting in the Russian Museum (Saint Petersburg). In 1984 he appeared on the third canvas twin for authorship Perov, which was kept in the Museum of Nikolaev as a copy.

Gloomy autumn sky with the floating birds, dry grass and low bushes, whose branches there is not one piece, Yes, a small swamp — these are the "decorations" picture Perov "Hunters at rest". Their background is conveniently located three hunters. Judging by the spread out piece of fabric which is visible from the flask, cups and a loaf of bread, my friends decided to make camp soon. A pair of grouse and hare tell the audience that the hunt was quite successful, and the relaxed poses of the hunters suggest that the continuation is unlikely to follow.

One of the hunters eagerly talking, reinforcing the impression of facial expressions and gestures. Hunter right into the story: his hand with the cigarette stood, he leaned forward, as if wants to know the ending. A third character, situated in the middle, configured explicitly skeptical — as evidenced by his incredulous grin, and the hand reaching to the head. The painter deliberately singled out the hands and faces of the characters with bright colors to accent attention to them. Production, shown in the picture Perov "Hunters at rest", it could claim to exist as a separate still — life- so thoroughly the artist has written all the details.

The prototypes of the hunters were friends Perov: the role of the narrator went to Dmitry Kuvshinnikov, interested listener — Nicholas Nagornova, skeptic — Vasily Bessonov. "Hunters on a halt" was perceived by contemporaries Perov different — so, liked the painting and criticism of Vladimir Stasov, who put it on a par with Turgenev's hunting stories, and the writer Fyodor Dostoevsky, but M. Saltykov-Shchedrin she seemed feigned: he believed that the expressions of the characters lacks immediacy.

The picture Perov "Hunters at rest" combines hunting still life, landscape and domestic painting. Today, reproductions of this famous leaf, decided to give as the traditional gift to avid hunters.