December 11 — the first exhibition of the Peredvizhniki opened at the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts — realist painters and sculptors of a democratic bent who belonged to Russia’s largest artistic association, the “Society for Traveling Art Exhibitions.”
The exhibition featured portraits by Ivan Kramskoy, Nikolai Ge’s canvas “Peter I Interrogates Tsarevich Alexei,” landscapes by Ivan Shishkin, Vasily Perov’s genre scene “Hunters at Rest,” and many other works. The “highlight” of the event was Alexey Savrasov’s landscape “The Rooks Have Arrived,” painted shortly before the exhibition opened.
The exhibition in St. Petersburg closed in January 1872. After a small addition of new works, the show visited two major Ukrainian cities — Kyiv and Kharkiv — where it was highly successful.
In total, more than 30,000 people visited the exhibition. A significant number of works were sold for a total sum of more than 23,000 rubles. More than 4,000 rubles were distributed among the members and participants of the exhibition, and 5% of the proceeds from the sold works — 1,032 rubles 5 kopecks — was also paid into the Society’s fund.
Later, Peredvizhniki exhibitions were held in many cities across Russia, and the last one, the 48th, took place in Moscow in 1923.