Pavel Kovalevsky (1843-1903) - Russian artist-batalist, who in addition to battle scenes wrote and interesting genre paintings, clearly reflecting the life and manners of his time and also quite harsh methods of education.
Pavel's father worked as a professor at Kazan University, was a man of enlightened and intelligent, and therefore, noticing his son's love and a certain ability to paint, made every effort to get him into the Academy of Arts. There ambitious Kovalevsky chose the battle class - artists-batalists have always been on the radar, their paintings were willingly bought by various government agencies, and the war of 1812 contributed to the development of patriotic sentiment.
Crossing the Danube
His studies were easy enough, Kovalevsky was one of the best in the Academy and received the right to a pensioner's trip to Italy at public expense. Upon his return, he traveled to the Caucasus - a place for any artist-batalist especially noteworthy, as there were unceasing clashes with radical Islamists under the leadership of Imam Shamil. The acquired skills came in handy when creating battle paintings dedicated to the Russian-Turkish war of 1877-1878.
The battle of Ivanovo-Chiflik on October 2, 1877
Kovalevsky wrote a lot of them, however, most of them are written in the only welcome then bravura-victory propaganda manner, which, according to the bosses, should raise the morale of the people. Of course, Kovalevsky saw the real war, not the poster-victory, as in his paintings, but he had to write only what was appropriate, and for which there would be no claims from the top on the part of his superiors. Therefore, unlike Vereshchagin, he usually depicted only battle scenes.
Halt
However, the artist's skill here is undeniable, and everything is relatively accurate from the historical point of view. Therefore, he can be compared with war correspondents of the Second World War, but instead of using a camera, Kovalevsky used a brush and paints, and wrote from sketches quickly sketched during the battle or eyewitness accounts.
Cavalrymen's halt
Tired of battle scenes, Kovalevsky found an outlet in genre paintings, which he wrote more for himself, depicting his view of some of the customs of the time, including the education of children. Thus, in 1880 he created the painting "Flogging".
Flogging
A boy has done something wrong, perhaps he has not learned his lessons or has been misbehaving, so his parents decided to teach him a lesson in the way that was considered the only right way at that time. Two maids hold him by his arms and legs, and his mother is ready to hit him with a bunch of thin rods on his soft spot. The procedure is both painful and humiliating: the boy is quite grown up, he is ashamed to flaunt his bare soft spot in front of the maids and his mother, and even more shameful is the helplessness of his position, when you can not move neither hand nor foot, nor break free, just lie there and endure the torture. And it is not known whether the guilt corresponds to such a severe punishment.
A tour of the diocese
And the main thing is that the case takes place in a rich family: this is directly indicated by the furnishings of the luxurious bedroom. True, it is unknown: merchant or noble, but it is not so important. What is worse is that the people who will occupy a privileged position in the future are already from childhood a "flawed generation", have gone through humiliation and pain, and therefore have surely learned that one should do only as commanded from above, otherwise reprisals and punishment are inevitable. And how to change this way of thinking and subconscious fear of superiors is still unknown. So it all starts with a small thing.
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