Petr Petrovich Konchalovsky

K.Frolova et al., Konchalovsky, Khudozhestvennoe nasledie, Moscow: Iskusstvo, 1964, p.138, listed
M.Neiman, Konchalovsky, Moscow, 1967, listed under 1937

In the summer of 1936, Konchalovsky travelled with his family to the far North of Russia. Olga Konchalovsky recalls their craving for the cooler climate of Murmansk during the intensely hot summer: ‘Even there everybody walked in white and bathed in the sun, while the unusually bright flowers blossomed and tomatoes ripened early.... Petr Petrovich and Misha did a lot of painting in the seaport. White nights allowed painting 24 hours a day. That is how the Murmansk series came about’ (quoted in Neizvestny Konchalovsky, 2002, p.128).  The following year, they spent some time in Kirovsk and the nearby town of Apatity on the shores of Lake Imandra, depicted in the present landscape. Konchalovsky’s numerous sketches and watercolours of the quayside, ports, railways and dams in the region reflect the rapid industrial developments during the period (fig.1). The development of the railways in the north was an important initiative, and in the present work he combines this message with an appreciation of the natural majesty of the landscape.