Grigoriy Grigorievich Myasoyedov (1834 - 1911)

Grigoriy Grigorievich Myasoyedov

Grigori Grigorievich Myasoyedov (Russian: Григо́рий Григо́рьевич Мясое́дов) was a Russian artist of the second half of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He is known as a bright representative of Russian realism and a founder of the Itinerant movement. In different years Myasoyedov turned to historical and everyday life genres, wrote portraits and landscapes. This versatile painter paid attention to religious subjects, his paintings depicted rituals, folk beliefs and customs.

Grigori Myasoyedov devoted the bulk of his career to depicting the life of the peasantry. Traveling and studying the works of Italian, German, Spanish and French artists, sculptors and architects, he was fascinated by critical realism, which flourished in Europe in the second half of the 19th century.

Determined to bring art closer to the average citizen, on his return to his homeland he founded the Association of Traveling Art Exhibitions and headed it. As one of the main participants of this movement, he himself traveled around the country with traveling exhibitions. Leaving the partnership after a conflict with the Impressionists, Myasoyedov concentrated on creativity. He created landscapes, tried his hand at graphics, and worked on theatrical sets.