In autumn 1905, YefIm Chestnyakov returned home, to the village of Shablovo in KologrIvsky Uyezd, from Saint Petersburg. He had spent five years in the capital studying the arts and mastering the fine points of its various disciplines. He came back home with a firm intention to work hard for the benefit of the locals. Among YefIm Chestnyakov’s travel items, there was an English box-like magazine camera (measuring 9×12 cm) capable of making 12 exposures. If needed, the camera could be used for observation purposes and not only to take pictures. With it, one was able to see an image at the necessary angle and in 3D, which was extremely useful for YefIm Chestnyakov as an artist. The exposed plates could be processed, for a small fee, at any shop in the capital that sold photography equipment and accessories.

Having acquired some knowledge about photography in Saint Petersburg, in his native Shablovo, YefIm Chestnyakov continued to capture “3D images” of girls and boys, elderly women and men as well as adult males and females. He used the two-aperture “box” to photograph the interior of log houses, thus capturing snippets of daily village life indoors. With his camera, YefIm Chestnyakov took some of the best pictures in his collection, which, just as his art work, includes predominantly group portrait shots, such as “Peasant procession in the village of Shablovo”, “A Peasant family” and others. In photographs taken by YefIm Chestnyakov his fellow countrymen are often not smiling. It appears that they took the picture taking process very seriously. During World War I, the artist was unable to continue with this art form because there was a lack of accessories and equipment for photographers.

Among Yefim Chestnyakov’s belongings, museum staff found a box in its original packaging full of unused plates. The artist stopped taking photographs altogether during Soviet times due to lack of necessary materials, as evidenced in a draft of a letter written to Ivan Kasatkin in the 1920s. According to it, Ivan Mikhailovich asked Yefim Chestnyakov to send photographs of his works. The artist, who was unable to take the pictures himself, considered inviting photographer Vasva to his home in his reply, and then immediately expressed his reservations about the idea ‘He probably will not travel on foot, the only alternative here is a horse-drawn cart. And I doubt he will enjoy eating radishes and drinking kvass here, I am embarrassed to admit that there is nothing else that I could offer him.’