Until the 1920s, the territory of the modern-day Komi Republic was sparsely populated and largely unexplored. Two decades after the region’s development began, this theme appeared in Soviet art, and a regional branch of the Artists’ Union was established in Komi.
In the mid-20th century, geological exploration was supervised by the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs, because the Soviet Union was in dire need of raw materials for its industry. Political prisoners and camp inmates worked in oil, coal, and timber production. The Pechora Railway was laid within a very tight schedule through the territory of permafrost regions. It connected the mineral deposits in the north with central Russia.
By 1954, the total length of the North Pechora Railway had reached almost two thousand kilometers. It was one of the top-priority construction projects of the Soviet authorities. For example, the bridge across the Pechora River was built using structures from the Palace of the Soviets, which was being constructed in Moscow on the site of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, and from one of the bridges over the Moscow-Volga Canal. This is why the spans of the Pechora Bridge look different from each other.
People used to say that the Pechora Railway was “built on bones”, just like the Vorkuta and Inta mines, and the towns that emerged on the sites of Gulag camps. Those were the most tragic years in the development of the Komi Republic.
Panteleimon Mityushov visited Vorkuta in 1947 when the city was nicknamed “the polar stokehold”. He painted “Construction of the Pechora Railway” later, in Syktyvkar, inspired by this trip. The young artist managed to show how workers suffered in the dire conditions of the construction site and struggled with the elements and harsh weather conditions.
Those who witnessed the construction of the railway argued that the painting is unrealistic and historically inaccurate. It was painted five years after the construction had been finished. Contemporaries criticized the painting for its lack of emotional content, the depiction of only manual labor, and the absence of women who worked alongside men. The National Gallery of Komi also houses a study for this painting in which the artist already defined the composition of his future work.
