Fyodor Vasiliev was born in 1850 in Gatchina in the family of an employee of Saint Petersburg post office. He was a student of the Drawing School of the Society for the Encouragement of Artists in Saint Petersburg and simultaneously took private classes of painting from Piotr Sokolov, the restoration artist. Vasiliev was acquainted with Ivan Kramskoy, travelled to Valaam Island together with Ivan Shishkin and spent 5 months there painting local landscapes. After coming back to Saint Petersburg, Vasiliev continued to work in the open air creating lyrical landscapes and paintings with dramatic scenes of nature.
In the winter of 1870, during the period of working on the painting Thawing, Vasiliev caught a cold, and later tuberculosis was diagnosed for him. The artist spent the remaining summer months in real estates of Stroganov family in Voronezh and Kharkov Provinces; however, his health did not improve. The Society for the Encouragement of Artists sponsored his trip to the Crimea, where Vasiliev spent two last years of his life. In the Crimea, he created many drawings, sketches with sepia and watercolours, oil paintings; he worked very hard, often to the detriment of his health. Nikolay Ghe, the artist, used to say about Vasiliev:‘Young and strong, he lived as an artist for only five years … and still was able to achieve great altitude in art … He discovered wet, light moving skies and the beauty of the landscape, which he depicted in hundreds of his pieces’.
In Yalta, a town in the Crimea, in the last year of his life the artist painted On the Sea Shore.
The landscape is remarkable for its intimacy. Despite the small dimensions of the piece, the artist was able to convey the vastness and the infinity of Russian landscape. Vasiliev filled the image of the nature with deep emotions. The image of the changeable sky takes the major part of the painting. The tranquillity and peace spilled in the evening landscape are only looking like that. Emotional tension is emphasized by contrast contour of the dark figures of the teamster and the oxen harnessed to the cart against the background of the tender blueish-pink sea slick and the sunset.
The landscape On the Sea Shore has an inscription on its reverse side: ‘I confirm the authenticity of the authorship by F.A. Vasiliev. Ostroukhov’. It was made by Ilya Ostroukhov, an acquaintance of Pavel Tretyakov and a landscape painter.
In the winter of 1870, during the period of working on the painting Thawing, Vasiliev caught a cold, and later tuberculosis was diagnosed for him. The artist spent the remaining summer months in real estates of Stroganov family in Voronezh and Kharkov Provinces; however, his health did not improve. The Society for the Encouragement of Artists sponsored his trip to the Crimea, where Vasiliev spent two last years of his life. In the Crimea, he created many drawings, sketches with sepia and watercolours, oil paintings; he worked very hard, often to the detriment of his health. Nikolay Ghe, the artist, used to say about Vasiliev:‘Young and strong, he lived as an artist for only five years … and still was able to achieve great altitude in art … He discovered wet, light moving skies and the beauty of the landscape, which he depicted in hundreds of his pieces’.
In Yalta, a town in the Crimea, in the last year of his life the artist painted On the Sea Shore.
The landscape is remarkable for its intimacy. Despite the small dimensions of the piece, the artist was able to convey the vastness and the infinity of Russian landscape. Vasiliev filled the image of the nature with deep emotions. The image of the changeable sky takes the major part of the painting. The tranquillity and peace spilled in the evening landscape are only looking like that. Emotional tension is emphasized by contrast contour of the dark figures of the teamster and the oxen harnessed to the cart against the background of the tender blueish-pink sea slick and the sunset.
The landscape On the Sea Shore has an inscription on its reverse side: ‘I confirm the authenticity of the authorship by F.A. Vasiliev. Ostroukhov’. It was made by Ilya Ostroukhov, an acquaintance of Pavel Tretyakov and a landscape painter.
