The main character of the picture is a young woman clad in a tight buttoned-up mourning dress, squeezing a handkerchief. Beside her sits a girl in a pinafore frock with a floral print. She is probably the wet-nurse of the first woman’s child that she is holding in her arms. They are traveling by train, in a first-class carriage; this detail is seen from the soft seat with a dark upholstery. It can be concluded that the central character of the painting was a well-off person.

Analysis of these details supports the assumption that the woman depicted in the painting is a young widow who goes ‘to the family’ after her husband’s death.

Leonid Pasternak, father of the renowned poet Boris Pasternak, was a popular painter. He often produced pictures with ambiguous, enigmatic subjects, which were built from multiple small but important elements.

One of those works is the displayed canvas Going to the Family. It covers the theme of family and maternity, an essential motif in Pasternak’s creative oeuvre.

Analysis of these details supports the assumption that the woman depicted in the painting is a young widow who goes “to the family” after her husband’s death. 

One of the best-known works by Pasternak was a World War I poster called Help War Victims. The artist wrote: ‘I could never imagine the success that this poster had when it was pasted all over Moscow on the day of the fund-raising campaign. Crowds were standing before it, women were crying…’