Reading the Newspaper, the Artist’s Father

Artwork Description

Nicolai Fechin painted this portrait of his father, Ivan Alexandrovitch Fechin, in Russia, seven years before the artist and his young family moved permanently to the United States. Ivan Fechin was a master wood craftsman and gilder who taught his son traditional Russian folk art carving. Nicolai later used these techniques to redecorate his New Mexico house, hand carving designs on the doors, ceiling beams, window frames, and furniture. The younger Fechin did not make preliminary sketches and instead painted directly from life. In Reading the Newspaper, the Artist's Father, he employed a technique he developed early in his career to capture gesture and movement, using a palette knife to block in larger strokes of paint. He portrayed his father in a quiet moment of leisure as opposed to hard at work as a craftsman.