самоварAuthor:  Grabar, I.E. (1871 - 1960)

 

Title: At the Samovar  

 

 Date: 1905

 

Media:  Oil on canvas

 

Size:  80 х 80 cm

 
 Provenance: Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia 
 
Accession number: # 22541

 

Subject: Grabar - Indoor tea-drinking – Samovar- PortraitStill lifeImpressionism

 

 
 
 
At the table covered with table-cloth is a paunchy copper samovar surrounded   by glasses, cups, and jam saucers.Sense of warmth and quiet coziness of twilight is created by punky coals in the samovar. The artist used to live for a long time at the estate of his friend N.V.Mescherin. The girl at the evening tea-drinking, his niece, is a future wife of the artist. Grabar wrote about the life style in the house," ... a samovar in Dugino has never left the table - either in the day or at night. For the night samovar has been wrapped into quilted blankets and  woolen clothes in order to keep water hot till next morning".

 

 

 

Author: Korovin, K. A. (1861-1932)

 

Title: At the Tea-Table

 

Date: 1888

 

Media: Oil on canvas

 

Size:  48,5 х 60,5 cm

 

Provenance: The Museum Estate of V.D.Polenov, Tula Region, Russia

 

Accession number:

Subject: Korovin - Outdoor tea-drinkingSocial gathering - Samovar- Group portrait -Gentry - Still life - Impressionism

 

 

 

 

 

Afternoon tea of close friends at dacha of the artist V.D. Polenov. It is a widespread tradition of having tea at a terrace of a country house during a summer time. The painting conveys warmth of friendship, poetry of sensible human being, modest steady private life full of intellectual interests, and harmony of everyday being. Still life on the table with the samovar in the center creates a sense of unity. The samovar sparkles with greenish and golden reflections and determines emotional atmosphere of the moment.

 

 

 

 

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   Author:  Kustodiev, B.K. (1878-1927)

 

   Title:      At the Terrace (Group Portrait of the Artist’s Family)

 

   Date:     1906

 

   Media: Oil on canvas

 

   Size:    175 x 200

 

   Provenance: The State Museum of Fine Arts, Nizhniy  Novgorod, Russia

 

   Accession number:

 

   Subject:  Kustodiev - Outdoor tea-drinking – Family - Samovar- GentryGroup portrait Impressionism

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A deep traditional feature of Russian tea-drinking is that that it always served to the goal of a family reunion, when all members - old and young - gathered around the samovar. Thus, Russian tea ceremony helped to strengthen the family relationships, to find mutual understanding between different generations. At the tea table the family gets imbued with atmosphere of peace and love. B.Kustodiev wrote, “One says that Russian way of life had died… It’s rubbish! Life cannot be killed, because life is a human being.”