The Unequal Marriage

The painting depicts the artist himself, Pukirev.

The painting undoubtedly deserves the recognition that V. Pukerev received for this work. It also impressed me with the expressiveness of the images and the way the artists conveyed their thoughts to the viewer during its creation. Indeed, where the fiancé Varensov was depicted in the sketches, Pukerev portrayed himself in the original painting. However, it turns out that Varensovs fiancé himself asked to have his image removed from the painting because he had long forgotten Sophia, who is depicted in the painting, and was preparing for a wedding with a new bride. Ultimately, the painting impresses viewers with its drama, while the explanations accompanying the painting describe it as an ordinary marriage of a wealthy landowner who bought a bride like a toy from her parents. This work simply needs to be seen and admired for the artists skill. However, such drama was commonplace at that time. The painting certainly evokes emotions and touches the soul; it is a masterpiece by a true master of imagery, which modern genre portrait artists should study. Pure admiration!

Vasily Vladimirovich Pukirev can be called a genius of one work. The beginning of the artists creative path was marked by a masterpiece. It seemed that fame and universal recognition awaited him, but he never managed to create anything as profound and impactful as his first painting. Studying the authors subsequent works, one can notice how strikingly uniform they are and how different they are from other paintings of the second half of the nineteenth century. The work Unequal Marriage is an example of a true masterpiece that will be discussed by posterity for many centuries to come.

All the genius of this painting lies in the details. If you ignore them, the work becomes just a skillfully painted canvas. It is precisely the details that one must pay attention to in order to discover the true meaning of the work.

Of course, other artists known to modern viewers also depicted suffering young brides, calculating parents, and elderly wealthy grooms. In these works, everything was overly dramatic: clenched hands, tears, faces contorted with grief. But in this painting, one sees a genuine sadness, a real deep feeling, precisely at the moment when the priest puts the ring on the girls finger. Such unions were quite common at that time. For example, sixteen-year-old Anna Kern, to whom A. S. Pushkin dedicated the lines I remember a wonderful moment..., was given in marriage to a 52-year-old general.

There are details in Pukirevs masterpiece that disturb the viewer most of all. These are two old women, one of whom stands to the right and behind the groom, and the second peeps out from behind him. But what is so unusual about this? Could they be the grooms sisters? It is enough to pay attention to their appearance to suspect something amiss. Both old women have wedding wreaths on their heads, one of them is dressed in a white garment resembling a burial shroud, and the other stands behind the priest, violating church rules. It is not difficult to guess that these women are dead. After such a discovery, the scene depicted in the painting is perceived completely differently. The respectable posture of the priest tells us about the sacrifice that the bride makes, because she is not just marrying an old man; she is condemning herself to suffering.

The light in the painting, similar to the light in Caravaggios paintings, falls from above and to the left, indicating to the viewer the semantic center of the work. This is the helplessly reaching for the ring hand of a very young girl. The gazes of the characters in the painting also say a lot. Those same ruined brides look at the groom, everyone else is turned towards the bride, and the unfortunate girl has passively lowered her eyes. It is here that the viewer notices the figure of the artist himself, who depicted himself in his own painting. He turned away from everything happening with bitterness.

The further biography of Vasily Vladimirovich Pukirev was very unsuccessful. After selling his first masterpiece, he left Russia for several years, trying to escape a personal tragedy. This is not surprising, because the bride in the painting, Praskovya Varentsova, was the artists beloved. Pukirevs fate ended in poverty, oblivion, and alcoholism. The model herself was also not happy; she spent her last days in a almshouse.

Its definitely an amazing thing. I recommend copying it. It really reminds me of the dramatic paintings of the unforgettable Caravaggio thanks to the lighting 👍👍👍🤝