EXTRACTS: Illustrators issue 20 © 2017 The Book Palace (96 PAGES in Full edition)

15 A group of Moscow artists had been asked to record the grandeur of the Russian Empire, which the students declined to do. They thought instead of forming a society independent of state-support, such as the one that had begun in Saint Petersburg almost a decade earlier. At the time, the Artists’ Artel was running into problems and heading towards collapse: dissidents leaving for various reasons, usually owing to differences of opinion. The two groups decided to join forces, and started what became known as the ‘Society for Itinerant Art Exhibitions’. Contrary to the Artel, the society’s Text continues on page 19 TOP LEFT: Viktor Vasnetsov, Tsar Ivan the Terrible , oil on canvas, 247 x 132 cm, 1897. TOP RIGHT: Konstantin Makovsky, Children Running From a Thunderstorm, oil on canvas, 1872.