Reply of the Zaporozhian Cossacks

Repin worked on the picture for over a decade, travelling to Ukraine to sketch weapons, costumes and faces. The heads are portraits of his friends and acquaintances, and every one has a distinct laugh: the bare-chested giant slapping the table, the old man wheezing at the back, the elegant fellow in the tall fur hat, the toothless one showing his gums. Look at the still life of objects on the table and the way the light picks out the white paper, the one calm thing in the composition. The texture ranges from fine detail on the shaven heads to broad slashes of paint in the smoke and the crowd behind.

Tsar Alexander the Third bought the painting in eighteen ninety one for thirty five thousand roubles, then the highest price ever paid for a Russian picture, and it hung in the imperial collection before passing to the Russian Museum. A second version is in Kharkiv. The painting has a life of its own: the letter has been printed on posters and mugs and turned into songs. A memorable detail is the scar-faced Cossack at the right with the enormous moustache and bandaged head, who seems to be composing the next line with pleasure.

Did You Know? Repin used friends as models, including the historian Dmytro Yavornytsky who posed as the scribe, so the Cossacks are really a portrait gallery of his own circle.