Her face is one of faith, his of vision. Together they express the ideal relationship of a man and a woman, he fighting the great fight, living life as it ought to be lived, she supporting him with her faith and her love.
Nesterof when he was yet a boy began to paint frescoes in churches, and has painted in his time many a wonderful Madonna and Child. In this picture where he has descended to paint just a woman and a man in the midst of daily life you may see a sort of suggestion of the Mother and Child, a reflection of some other composition, of some Russian Madonna and leaping Babe. Here also the man is really a child, though his eyes have the knowledge of the ideal and the quest, and the woman’s face has purity and love and foreknowledge of the suffering that must come.
The background of the picture is Russia, the green forest of pines and firs, the melancholy placid lake, the wan white church with its swelling coloured dome. Russia is in the background. Russia bore them, and their hearts yearn towards her.
So it can be a popular Russian war picture and be hung on many walls and looked into and loved in this strange year of grace 1916.
The words printed below are the famous lines of the poet Khomiakoff:
The podvig is in battle:
The podvig is in struggle:
The highest podvig is in patience,
Love and prayer.
I leave the word podvig because, as I wrote in my chapter explaining the word in “Martha and Mary,” it is difficult to render it by any one word in English. But it is one of the most important words in the Russian language. Here possibly the nearest word is “trial.” It means a noble deed, an act of faith, a noble battle against fearful odds, a great sacrifice or act of renunciation, a shaming of the devil, a bold religious affirmation. Volumes might be written on it. The acts of the anchorites and hermits are podvigs. St. George killing the dragon performed a podvig. The seven champions of Christendom would in Russia be the seven podvizhniks and their heroic exploits podvigs, but there we have not a word. For performing podvigs Russian soldiers are decorated. But, as Nesterof tells us in his picture, there are the greatest for which there is no decoration.