Abram Efimovich Arkhipov

Collection of Dr Pierre Pobé, Basel
Auctiones A.G. Basel, Sammlung Dr. Pierre Pobé: Gemälde, Zeichnungen und Aquarelle, Möbel, Kunstgewerbe, Teppiche, 23-24 February 1979, lot 74
Private Collection, Basel
Thence by descent to the present owner

Structural Condition The artist's canvas is unlined and is securely attached to what appears to be the original keyed wooden stretcher. This is providing an even and stable structural support. There are intermittent fragments of residual brown gum tape running along the four edges of the composition. There is a small canvas patched repair in the lower left as viewed from the reverse. Paint Surface The paint surface has an even varnish layer. There are scattered areas of slightly raised craquelure, most notably within the figure's headscarf and the background in the upper right quadrant of the composition. These are stable and are not visually distracting. Inspection under ultra-violet light shows some small scattered retouchings, including a thin diagonal line within the lower part of the sitter's red dress, a few intermittent spots of retouching running above the lower horizontal framing edge, a small vertical retouching within the lower right of the sitter's dress corresponding to the small patched repair mentioned above, and some further small retouchings within the red pigments of the sitter's dress in the lower part of the composition. Summary The painting would therefore appear to be in very good and stable condition.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

Dating from 1922, Peasant Woman in a Red Dress is a magnificent example of Abram Arkhipov’s portraiture of the 1920s. An acclaimed genre painter who first made a name for himself with his masterpiece On the Volga at the 18^th Itinerant exhibition in 1890, Arkhipov increasingly turned to portrait painting during the second half of the 1910s. His most accomplished portraits of peasant women however date from the 1920s.

Arkhipov was born into a poor peasant family in a small village in Ryazan province, and the theme of Russian peasant life would be the dominating one of his career. True to the spirit of the Itinerant movement, Arkhipov’s genre works have an important undertone of social commentary. Works such as Washerwomen (first version late 1890s, State Russian Museum) address the effects of industrialisation on the rural peasant classes and the daily hardship that women had to endure.

Arkhipov’s portraits from the 1920s provide a stark contrast to his earlier genre work, showing an idealised image of Russian peasant life. With her red cheeks and confident smile, the sitter of the present work is a world apart from the washerwomen the artist had painted two decades earlier. Peasant Woman in a Red Dress bears all the hallmarks of Arkhipov’s technique, such as the heavy impasto which is juxtaposed with areas of blank canvas, in places revealing the charcoal underdrawing.