1884–1888
oil on canvas
160,5 x 167,5

The painting was the final one in a series of the artist’s paintings devoted to the Russian revolutionary movement. Here we see depicted the unexpected return home of a political exile. The reaction of the household is various – from unbelieving surprise (the maid at the door), caution (the little girl behind the table) to an outburst of joy (the wife seated at the piano and the boy at the table) and the moral shock expressed in the hunched over figure of the mother. The pictures on the wall – Golgotha, Emperor Alexander on his funeral bier, the portraits of T.G. Shevchenko and N.A. Nekrasov explain what has occurred and sum up the spiritual and intellectual atmosphere of the house of this intelligentsia family. Repin redid the face of the banished man trying to convey the expression of uncertainty and doubt of a man who has returned to his former world after many years. The times have changed, and the attitude towards revolutionaries, their ideals and methods of combat have become more unequivocal.

at 10, Lavrushinsky Lane, Hall 30