This is a portrait of Praskovia Fyodorovna Torgoshina, the mother of the great Russian painter Vasily Surikov. She was born in the village of Torgashino on the right bank of the Yenisey, opposite Krasnoyarsk, into the Torgoshin family, who were of Cossack origin and were engaged in tea transportation from the Chinese border.

Praskovia was a skilled craftswoman from childhood, known for her artistic sewing and embroidery. She married late by the standards of her time, at the age of 26, to Ivan Vasilyevich Surikov, a widower, who had a daughter Elizaveta from his first marriage.

Praskovia Fyodorovna had six children, three of whom died between the ages of two months and two years. The oldest children, Katya and Vasya, and the youngest, Sasha, survived. The father of the family had ailing lungs, so he took a job as a wine inspector in the village of Sukhoy Buzim, Yeniseysk Governorate, where the family lived for five years.

After her husband’s death, Praskovia Fyodorovna and her three children returned to Krasnoyarsk and began letting the second floor of Surikov’s large house to tenants. They lived poorly, Praskovia Fyodorovna and Katya sewed things for sale and started a vegetable garden. The landlady always did everything around the house and for the tenants herself, maintaining exemplary order. Praskovia Fyodorovna had fine artistic taste: the rushnik towels and tablecloths she made were real works of art.

After graduating from the district school, Vasily Surikov joined the governorate administration and served as a scribe. Governor Pavel Zamyatnin heard about the young artist’s talent and encouraged him to enroll in the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg. The money for the education of the gifted Krasnoyarsk painter was provided by Pyotr Ivanovich Kuznetsov, a major city industrialist and philanthropist.

It was hard for Praskovia Fyodorovna to part with her son, and from 1868 their constant correspondence began. The artist’s mother was unable to read, so her youngest son Sasha read the letters aloud to her. The greatest joy for Praskovia Fyodorovna was Vasily’s visits to Krasnoyarsk. They saw each other for the last time in 1894.

In 1895, Surikov sent home a letter about the success of his painting “The Conquest of Siberia by Yermak Timofeyevich” and soon received news of his mother’s death. This was a great blow to the artist.

Vasily Surikov created two portraits of his mother: he donated one to the Tretyakov Gallery, and kept the second one in the Surikovs’ house in Krasnoyarsk. According to the will of the artist’s brother Alexander, after his death the portrait was transferred to the Krasnoyarsk Museum together with all the furnishings of the Surikovs’ house.