Igor Emmanuilovich Grabar
A Moscow Street, Tverskoy Boulevard
1880s
oil on canvas
48.5 х 59.7 cm
Omsk Regional Museum of Fine Arts named after M. A. Vrubel

This landscape shows a panoramic view from a window, overlooking a street stretching towards the horizon. Grabar enhanced the geometric architectural volumes with the expressive silhouette of a church dome and steeple; the shining gold of the bulbous domes and the bright brick wall offset the rather monochrome and austere work. The static appearance of the old houses contrasts with the dynamic life that the painter captures from almost a bird’s-eye view. The pedestrians, horses, and cabriolets are depicted with a gracious and lively brush. The downy snow on the rooftops is rendered with broad, confident brushstrokes in pure white. For the snow on overhangs and ledges, he uses short thick brushstrokes, but these do not yet reflect the Impressionistic technique that the painter acquired early in the 1900s. Nevertheless, his love of Moscow’s bygone beauty is already indicative of an interest appropriate to the eminent Russian art historian that Grabar would later become.