Portrait of a Man 

Vasily Perov created this ‘Portrait of a Man’ in Russia, and though undated, it’s likely from the 1870s. Perov was a founding member of the ‘Wanderers,’ a group of Russian realist artists who broke away from the Imperial Academy of Arts. They rejected academic conventions, choosing instead to depict the lives of ordinary people, and critique social inequality. In Tsarist Russia, art was dominated by the Academy, which promoted Neoclassical and Romantic styles that glorified the aristocracy and the state. Perov, along with the Wanderers, aimed to challenge this by creating art that was accessible and relevant to the common person. His portraits often depicted peasants, intellectuals, and members of the lower classes, humanizing these figures and offering a counter-narrative to the idealized images promoted by the establishment. Art historians look at the biographies of the subjects, exhibition records, and the writings of critics to better understand the painting’s social meaning.