1844 -1930 · Chuguyev, Saint Petersburg, Paris and the Penates

In the international form Ilya Repin, the collection brings together portraits, crowds, work, history and political crisis in a realistic painting of exceptional psychological power.

Ilya Iefimovich Repin was born in 1844 in Chuguyev, in what is now Ukraine, then integrated into the Russian Empire. A first apprenticeship with icon painters formed his hand before entering the Imperial Academy of Fine Arts in Saint Petersburg. He obtained the great gold medal there in 1871, then traveled to Italy and France. The Volga Boatsmen had already imposed a new realism: the arduousness of collective work remained visible, but each man retained a face, an age, a rhythm and a character. Repin gets closer to the Peredvizhniki, the Ambulants, whose traveling exhibitions take art outside of official institutions alone. His large canvases unite documentary observation and rigorous orchestration. Religious procession in Kursk province transforms a crowd into a cross-section of society. They did not expect it condenses the political consequences of exile into a domestic moment regulated by looks and hesitation. The Zaporozhian Cossacks writing a letter to the sultan makes historical research an explosion of laughter, gestures and collective independence. His story scenes always go beyond illustration. Ivan the Terrible and his son place the viewer before the remorse that immediately follows the act of violence. The portrait occupies an equally essential place. In Modeste Mussorgsky, the quick Touch records illness, intelligence and dignity without a theatrical mask. Repin taught at the Academy and received major public commissions, including the monumental Session of the Council of State. He then settled at the Pénates, in Kuokkala. The territory became Finnish after 1917 and the artist remained there until his death in 1930. For more than half a century, he combined technical virtuosity, attention to human behavior, social conflict and the expressive force of the material. For more than half a century, he combined technical virtuosity, attention to human behavior, social conflict and the expressive force of the material. For more than half a century, he combined technical virtuosity, attention to human behavior, social conflict and the expressive force of the material. For more than half a century, he combined technical virtuosity, attention to human behavior, social conflict and the artist's expressive force of the material. For more than half a century, he combined technical virtuosity, attention to human behavior, social conflict and the expressive force of the material. For more than half a century, he combined technical virtuosity, attention to human behavior, social conflict and the expressive force of the material. The "Ilya Repin" selection notably compares Les Batel

Repin makes the story visible in the behavior: a hand, a look or the weight of a body reveals the moral pressure that acts in the scene.