Autumn 1919

Boris Kustodiev made this drawing using expressive lines to capture the essence of an autumn day in the Russian countryside. I can imagine him working at the paper with a thin brush, allowing the ink to flow freely, defining the forms of the trees, the rolling hills, and the figures on horseback. Looking at this work, I think about what it was like to be Kustodiev. He suffered from tuberculosis of the spine, which eventually confined him to a wheelchair. Perhaps this scene is something he could no longer experience directly, but it lives on as a memory in his mind's eye. The dynamic energy of the hunting scene – the dogs in full flight, the riders urging their horses forward – seems infused with a longing for physical freedom. There is also a sense of melancholy here, evoked by the bare branches and the muted palette. It reminds me that artists are always in conversation with one another, borrowing, referencing, and building upon the ideas of those who came before. Kustodiev taps into a tradition of landscape painting that stretches back centuries, but he infuses it with his own unique vision and emotional sensibility.