Vasily Maksutov

Vasily Maksutov’s paintings read like a time capsule someone left half-open. He spent years sketching military parades in the bone-chilled courtyards of the Winter Palace, standing so close to the horses that you can still smell the damp wool of their blankets. His 1861 canvas Nicholas I before the Unit Formation is packed with tiny, crisp details: the way an officer’s boot sinks into snow, the frost on a cannon’s wheel. You’ll feel the cold before you notice the tsar’s stiff collar.