Georg Emmanuel Opitz, 1775-1841

This grand scene by Georg-Emmanuel Opitz shows the Makarievsky Market at Nizhny Novgorod at the height of its grandeur. Its success was such that it attracted almost 200,000 visitors, and sold goods worth an estimated 50 million roubles. Key to this accomplishment was the market’s strategic position on the Volga. It earned the town the unofficial title of ‘Russia’s bourse’, and the wealth to bring the French architect Montferrand to supervise the construction of the Orthodox cathedral of the Holy Saviour, which is visible on the hill above the town. 

In 1836, Nicholas I became the first Russian emperor to visit the market, an indication in itself of Nizhny Novgorod’s significance. It attracted merchants from all the corners of the empire, which Opitz brings to the forefront of this work. Immediately to the Emperor’s right is a Cherkassian warrior, and beyond him Chuvash, Mordovian and Kalmyk women. On Nicholas’ left are a Ukrainian cossack, Cherkassians and Ingush on horseback, and a collection of Tatar men and women smoking around a campfire. The delicate accuracy with which each of these figures is rendered reveals the artist’s keen interest in ethnography, as well as showing the glorious ruler close to his prosperous and varied subjects.