Ilja Jefimowitsch Repin

(Tschugujew 1844-1930 Penaty)
A portrait study of a man with his arm propped up, sígned with cyrillic letters, graphite and pencil on paper, 30,5 x 20,2 cm, browned, unmounted, unframed, (Sch)
Provenance:
Private collection, Germany.

We are grateful to Ljudmilla Andruschenko (Ilja Repin Museum, Penaty) for the scientific support by means of a photograph. We are also grateful to Dr. Olga Sugrobova-Roth for the scientific support.

The present portrait is a study for the figure of false Dimitri (Russian Tsar 1605-1606) in the drawing of the Museo Militaria in Hämeenlinna in Finland and it was used for the figure of the Boyar Fjodor Romanov (Mitropolit Philaret 1553-1633), who was the progenitor of the Romanov dynasty, in the painting “The Monk Filaret imprisoned in Antoniev-Siysk Monastary” (1888; the painting is only known through an old postcard, its whereabouts are unknown). Repin was fascinated of Alexander Puschkin‘s play „Boris Godunov” and dedicated himself quite often to themes in regard of troubled times in Russia (1598-1613).