Tolstoy, resting in the forest

by Ilya Repin (1891)

This astonishing painting by Ilya Repin shows the Russian writer Leo Tolstoy resting in the shade of a tree, reading a book. He’s wearing a simple white tunic and peasant’s hat.

The artist Ilya Repin and Tolstoy knew each other well. When they first met Tolstoy was already an established author, but had recently embraced a simpler way of life, rejecting the vanities of status and wealth. He wanted to lead a humble and modest existence, and this led him into the studio of Ilya Repin.

In 1880 Repin had started making a name for himself as someone who depicted the social inequality of rural Russia. His realist depictions of scenes taken from peasant life had made an impression on Tolstoy. When he walked into Repin’s small studio in Moscow, the relatively young artist (36) was shocked to see the venerable author (52) keen to engage with him.

Self-portrait of the artist Ilya Repin

Tolstoy made an enormous impression on Repin. Afterwards, his head still reeling, he wrote to a friend, the critic Vladimir Stasov : “My God, what an all-embracing soul this Tolstoy has! Everything that has been born, and lives and breathes, the whole of nature – all this is truthfully reflected in him, without the slightest falsehood and, once read, remains before your eyes forever…"

After that day, Repin and Tolstoy would go for frequent walks together, discussing everything from art to politics and religion. Like true friends they often vehemently disagreed with each other, and yet remained close for the rest of their lives. Repin would visit Tolstoy frequently at his estate, the two men laughing at their old age and getting into heated arguments all over again.

Over the course of his life Ilya Repin painted 12 portraits of Tolstoy. They reveal him in all his complexity; Instead of just depicting him as the stereotypicl titan of Russian literature, he sought to humanize Tolstoy, showing him in his daily life.

In these portraits we see Tolstoy sitting with his wife Sophia (below), or lying on the couch under a blanket, reading. (also below).

These portraits and sketches come to us as a great gift. They reveal an otherwise hidden side of the Russian writer. Between the duelling caricatures of Tolstoy the grand master and Tolstoy the mystic, we get something more realistic and precious: an insight into who Tolstoy really was, or at least how he appeared to his lifelong friend Ilya Repin.

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Julian