ILYA I. MASHKOV (1881-1944)

ILYA I. MASHKOV (1881-1944)
Moscow-Volga Canal. 1935.

Oil on cardboard
73 x 26.5 cm
Provenance:
Collection of Mashkova Maria Ivanovna, the widow of the artist;
Collection of the artist Alexei Dementevich Shmarinov (born in
1933);
Auction Koller, 7 December 2005, lot 3074;
Auction Sotheby’s, London, 27 November 2007, lot 311.

In 1935, the famous architect Alexei Shchusev, who worked on the
construction of the hotel "Moscow", addressed to Mashkov with
the request to issue a banquet hall of the hotel. The artist executed
a series of monumental murals dedicated to the achievements
of the Soviet state (Artek, the Moscow metro, explorers, and
others.). Now the panels are stored in the Moscow Museum
of Architecture. This work is the first one for the preliminary
development composition "Channel Moscow-Volga". Two more
Mashkov sketches on this topic are in the Moscow collection of
Ina Bazhenova.
The construction of “Moscow-Volga Canal” - one of the major
projects of the Soviet state in 1930. 128-meter canal still gives
Moscow more than 60% of the water consumed, provides power
to the Moscow area, and creates the shortest water-transport
communication between Moscow and upper Volga.