Viktor Vasnetsov was a talented painter, illustrator, decorator, and architect, founder of the singular ‘Russian style’. The artist often adressed the plots of Russian fairy tales, and gained reputation as a ‘storyteller’. Vasnetsov was also one of the most prominent religious painters of his time. He participated in the creation of artmurals and the decoration of churches. His ‘Descent from the Cross’ is a sketch for the mosaic of the Resurrection Cathedral in Saint Petersburg, often called ‘The Church of the Savior of Spilled Blood’, since it was built on the place of the mortal wound of Emperor Alexander II.
The subject of Passion, and the Jesus’s descent from the cross in particular, has been presented by artists of many different countries and times. Each one of them interpreted it differently. Victor Vasnetsov was extremely accurate and portrayed precisely those people who, according to the Holy Scriptures, were present at this event. The three female images on the left are Virgin Mary, supporting the head of Christ; Mary Magdalene, easily recognizable by her long flowing hair; and Mary of Clopas, the mother of the brothers apostles James and Joseph. In the center is depicted John the Apostle, who holds the body of Jesus. On the right, an elderly man with a turban is Joseph of Arimathea, a noble Jerusalem resident, secret follower of Christ who bought his body for burial, and Nicodemus, the author of the apocryphal Gospel, holding the shroud of Christ.
The artist’s creativity enriches the work with deep spirituality and an unusual feeling of sublime and enlightened sadness that unites all the characters in the picture. The unusual format, connected with the architecture of the building, set a difficult compositional task. Nevertheless the artist completed it using the image of the cross as a vertical accent. The mournful grandeur of the scene is enhanced by the mystical effect of three light sources: the starry sky, the approaching dawn, and the lamp held by the hand of Mary of Clopas.
Vasnetsov’s work exerts an incredibly powerful emotional impact, thanks in part to its precise composition, in which all the eyes of tear-filled participants are focused on Jesus’ face. The figure of the kneeling Mary Magdalene, the only character who does not look at Christ, completes the circular motion around his dead body, making the composition closed. The close people of Jesus who surrounded his cross, are restrained in their suffering.
