Midday offers an excellent example of Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin’s unique painterly system. The master often addressed common human themes and this picture is perceived as a philosophical and slightly melancholic reflection on the eternal problems of existence. The work was actually inspired by the death of the artist’s father. As in his other canvases, the artist employs the motif of the environs of his native town of Khvalynsk in Saratov Province, reproducing the hilly landscapes criss-crossed by rivers, ravines and roads. The great cycle of human life – birth, childhood, youth, labour, relaxation, love, maternity, old age and death – is depicted against a natural background of the eternally young and bountiful earth. The tritone principle and the device of spherical perspective, shifting the composition along the diagonal axis, transform this small corner of Russia into a metaphor for the endless space of our green and blue planet.

Petrov-Vodkin Kuzma

Petrov-Vodkin, Kuzma Sergeyevich
1878, Khvalynsk (Saratov Province) -1939, Leningrad
Painter, graphic artist, writer on art, history painter, portraitist. Studied at the Baron Stieglitz Central School of Technical Drawing (1895-97), under Abram Arkhipov and Valentin Serov at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture (1897-1904), at Anton Aube''s school in Munich (1901) and private academies in Paris. Contributed to exhibitions (from 1898). Contributed to the Salon d''Automne (1906-07, 1908), Sergei Makovsky Salon (1909), Union of Russian Artists (1909, 1910), Golden Fleece (1909), Union of Youth (1910), World of Art (191124), Second Post-Impressionist Exhibition (1912), First Free Exhibition of Works of Art (1919), Association of Artists of Revolutionary Russia (1923, 1928), Four Arts (1925-29), World Exhibition in Brussels (1910) and the International Exhibitions in Rome (1911), Malmo (1914) and Venice (1924, 1928). Taught at the Elizaveta Zvantseva School of Painting and Drawing in St Petersburg (1910-15) and the Free Art Studios/Academy of Arts (1918-38). Honoured Artist of Russia (1930).