Fedot Sitchkov

Fedot Sychkov (1870-1958) was born in a Mordovian village a thousand kilometres from the capital of the empire. While he completed only three years of secondary school, he was a gifted artist from an early age, painting icons and portraits of his fellow villagers. Sychkov’s fate was sealed with a chance encounter, when General Ivan Arapov, a local landowner and functionary at the horse breeding administration, spotted the young man. With the help of Arapov, 22-year-old Sychkov enters the Drawing School of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts in St. Petersburg and, 3 years later, the Higher Art School at the Academy of Arts. At 30, he is awarded the title of artist.

Throughout his remarkably long creative life both in the Russian Empire and, later, in the Soviet Union, Fedot Sychkov will remain true to the traditions of realism and the theme of the Russian countryside. The artist was, above all else, a brilliant master of the folk portrait. His peasant women are distinctive and beautiful. Almost every Sychkov’s work projects a soft, benevolent view of the world, sincerity and humanity.

In Soviet Russia, Sychkov’s art filled with manifest joy of human existence was quite in tune with the official art guidelines exhorting creation of life-affirming images of Soviet citizens. Nevertheless, Sychkov’s characters always exude sincerity and individuality. Regardless of the realities of the times and fashion, the artist invariably portrayed his models smiling, dressed in Russian traditional sarafans, bright scarves and beads. Until his last day, Fedot Sychkov worked with rapture and inspiration, creating paintings full of refreshing emotions.