Nurse of Ivan the Terrible
Этюд для картины 1888 года «Смерть Ивана Грозного» (местонахождение неизвестно).. 1888
- Period Late 19th century
- CategoryHistory Painting
Study for the painting The Death of Ivan the Terrible (1888; whereabouts unknown).
It was not just masters of realistic art, with their yearning to depict complex psychological collisions, who were interested in subjects taken from the time of Ivan the Terrible, but also people involved in salon art. In 1888 Konstantin Makovsky, the creator of spectacular pictures of boyar life, painted a large canvas, The Death of Ivan the Terrible, that was full of external drama and stood out in its masterful depiction of the historical surroundings. This study from the Russian Museum’s collection is for the figure of the Tsar’s old, blind nurse, and according to eyewitness accounts by contemporaries her image was probably the most expressive in the finished picture.