The cupboard is listed in the catalog of M.K. Tenisheva from 1909 under No. 2680: ‘A cupboard of three partitions; on the doors of the upper partitiont, outside on the left, there is a man in a 18th century suit. From the inside — an allegorical image of passions restrained by faith; on the right outside — a plump woman with keys and a stick in her hands; on the back is an allegorical image of truth… on the doors of the lower partition is a drawing with the inscription “condemnation”, depicting two people, one has a log in the eye, another is a straw, on the back are the venerable men, embodying “reading” and “silence”. From the Kostroma province, of simple work. 18th century’.

This type of cupboards appeared in Russia in the era of Peter the Great. Their form was oriented towards Western European models, primarily Dutch furniture. In the paintings of Dutch artists of the 17th-early 18th centuries you can see similar cupboards in the interiors of small cozy houses. They were designed for storing alcoholic beverages and tableware. The cupboard from the Smolensk Museum is decorated with didactic painting: in the upper part there is a condemnation of the vice of drunkenness, in the lower part there is an illustration of the proverb ‘we see a mote in our brother’s eye and don’t sec a beam in our own’.

The nature of the painting suggests that it was not done by a professional artist, but by a manor serf craftsman. The characters depicted on the cupboard doors are dressed typical for the second half of the 18th century fashion and easily get definition. ‘The master’ — a young man in a red jacket, ‘housekeeper’ — a woman in black with a bunch of keys. Allegorical characters are shown in a manner typical of 18th century book graphics. In this regard, it is very interesting that on one of the doors the author depicts reading as one of the human virtues.

A curious detail escaped observation upon the item’s arrival to the M.K.Tenisheva museum: the cupboard was painted dark blue, hiding the original texture of the wood. Unfortunately, the cupboard has survived to this day damaged: the drawers and the folding board in the central part, as well as the painting on one of the doors in the lower part, have been lost. It should be noted that such pieces of furniture were widespread in Russia and remained in the merchants’ everyday life until the beginning of the 20th century. In the 19th century, such cupboards lost their genre paintings, but retained ornamental compositions on particular parts.