Liberal Painter, Conservative Painting? Vasilii Perov's Volga Plunderers

• In Event: Nineteenth-Century Russian Conservative Imaginaries

Abstract

Margaret Samu will examine Vasilii Perov's unfinished painting Volga Plunderers, (c. 1878), a project undoubtedly inspired by the hundredth anniversary of the Pugachev rebellion and the bicentenary of the Sten'ka Razin rebellion. By emphasizing the peasant rebels' violence against women, the otherwise liberal painter heightened the moral ambiguity surrounding these folk heroes, producing an image that would appeal to more conservative viewers.

Author

• Margaret Samu, The New School