The artist is unknown
The grotesque picture, the manifestation of the “ridiculous” tradition of folk art, which closes with the trunk line of development of painting in the 18th century. Perhaps this work was brought from Western Europe, but it is possible that it was created in Russia. A vivid description of the picture is found in the study of I. AT. Bruka, who believed that its existence “becomes clear in the context of Russian culture of the 1750-1760s, in a circle "forbidden “Works and. With. Barkova, "Iroi-comic “poems in. And. Maikova, who are reprising by vulgarisms, intentionally used. It’s kind of "Low calm “, Burleske in painting and at the same time-one of the many contacts of the Russian XVIII century with the Dutch-Flamantic genre picture. A wild brown man with a cat in his arms is depicted; Smiling dumbly, he demonstrates the viewer of Kotovo aside, the fingers of his right hand are folded into a cuckoo ”(Brooke. With. 126–129). Technological studies conducted in the timing in 1976 allowed the picture to date the end of the 18th – the beginning of the 18th century and to establish that it was originally an oval format and was supplemented to a rectangle later. Added pieces of canvas are primed with red-brown ocher with large inclusions of quartzite. According to the assumption with. AT. Roman-Korsakova, the picture was restored in the first half of the 18th century (in Russia?) and, probably, is a work of a Western European artist, its belonging to the Circle of Rossiye (Brooke. With. 248–249). N. X. Unknown artist. SPb, 2012. With. 35.
