“Carnivals of St Petersburg” by Mikhail Shemyakin

About the cycle

By Shemyakin's own account, the impulse for the carnival theme came from the Petrine festivities with their jesting processions and court masquerades; he also drew on the commedia dell'arte, the Russian lubok print, Petrushka and the freaks of Peter's Kunstkamera. Dmitry Likhachev wrote about the Petrine era in connection with Shemyakin in his essay “Mikhail Shemyakin and the Petersburg of Peter the Great”. In 2017 easel works from the series were included in the exhibition “Mikhail Shemyakin. The Artist and the Theatre”.

The collection holds 10 works from the cycle: 8 lithographs of 1982 and 1995, an ink drawing of 1991 and a set of eight numbered figures. The technique and size are given on each work's page; the set has a page of its own.