[1][2] The painting depicts two elderly women: a lady and her maid, sitting on the wing's threshold of an outhouse on a sunny spring day.

[1] Maximov worked on the painting itself in 1888-1889 at the Lubsha estate on the banks of the Volkhov River, which was inherited by his wife Lydia Alexandrovna in 1885.

In order to earn a living for himself and his family, he repeated this painting many times, which was very popular with buyers: in total, more than 40 author's repetitions were written.

[13] According to his daughter Ariadna Maximova-Skalozubova, it was there, in Shubino, in 1866, where Vasily Maximov "had the idea of painting 'All in the Past', which he nurtured for almost 30 years".

[1]In the same area Maximov met his future wife, Lydia Alexandrovna, daughter of Alexander Alexandrovich Izmailov, a state councillor (later a full active state councillor), and his wife, Nadezhda Konstantinovna Izmailova, who owned a small estate called Lyubsha, located not far from Staraya Ladoga, on the banks of the Volkhov River (today the place where the estate was located is part of the village of Seltso-Gorka).

In the same year, Maximov celebrated a house-warming party and soon painted a picture on a related theme, called "Housewarming"[4] (now in the Musée d'Orsay).

[4] In a letter to the artist Ilya Ostroukhov dated December 5, 1895, Maximov told about the creation of the painting "Everything in the Past":"I composed the house and the whole landscape before I worked on the figures, over whose twists and turns I pondered for a long time, and only in the painting itself did I come up with an idea, which I worked on with charcoal.The whole costume and all the furnishings were a legacy from my mother-in-law, a Frantikha professor of the forties".

During this time the exhibition visited Astrakhan (in May), Saratov (in June), Kharkov (in September), Poltava (in October), Odesa (in November) and Kyiv (in December–January).

[28] The painting "All in the Past" was the only work by Maximov presented at the exhibition,[29] and it received good reviews from the audience and critics.

[30] In a letter to his wife Natalya Vasilyevna dated February 21, 1889, the artist Vasily Polenov wrote: "Maximov has painted a picture called "All in the Past".

[7] Maximov and the art critic Vladimir Stasov, who published a review of the traveling exhibition "Our Wandering Artists Now" in April 1889 in the magazine "Severny Vestnik",[6] were positive about the new painting.

[33] Discussing the reasons why the author's versions of the painting "All in the Past" were more popular than the repetitions of other paintings by Maximov, the art historian Alexei Leonov wrote that "it was probably due to its poetically told theme, which found an echo in the soul of each viewer and awakened in many memories of the past, of his youth, of the lived life".

Both are sitting on the threshold of the outhouse, while in the background the main building of the manor is in a desolate state, with boarded up windows.

A lilac bush blossoms on the outbuilding, and the lady and the maid sit in its shade on this sunny spring day.

[3] The theme chosen by the artist recalls the motifs of Ivan Kramskoi's paintings "Inspection of an Old House" (1874, State Tretyakov Gallery)[30] and Vasily Polenov's "Grandmother's Garden" (1878, State Tretyakov Gallery)[40] as well as Anton Chekhov's 1903 play "The Cherry Orchard".

The cut down old tree and the stunted young growth "are perceived as a kind of metaphor, reminding of the extinction of 'noble nests'".

The artist had worked with her before: a quarter of a century earlier she had served as a model for her mother in the painting "The Sick Child" (1864),[23] and also posed for the canvas "Grandma's Fairy Tales" (1867).

[42]Between the lady and the maid there is a table covered with an embroidered tablecloth, on which are placed expensive porcelains, left over from earlier times.

[5] The artist skillfully shows the contrast between the two women, who belong to different social types, representing different classes of the old village.

According to Goldstein, "striving to convey the light and air environment, to achieve a more complete and coherent perception of nature, he [Maximov], at the same time, comes to an excessive motley and colorful, noticeable and in the figures, and especially in the landscape".

[46][48]The Tyumen Museum of Fine Arts has a sketch for the painting "All in the Past" (1880s, canvas on cardboard, oil, 31×34.5 cm, inventory number IK-990), depicting a house with a mezzanine and a veranda.

[46] The State Russian Museum in St. Petersburg also has a copy of the painting "All in the Past", executed in half the size of the original (1890s, cardboard, oil, 37.5×45.9 cm, inv.

[49] Other painting's repetitions made by the author are located at the Arkhangelsk Museum of Fine Art (1904, canvas or cardboard, oil, 33.5×47.5 cm, inv.

Zh-1414),[53] Vladimir-Suzdal Historical and Artistic-Architectural Museum of the artist N. A. Yaroshenko (paper, cardboard, wood, oil, 20×27.5 cm, inv.

[56] In the article "Our Peredvizhniki Artists Today" published in the April 1889 issue of Severny Vestnik, the art critic Vladimir Stasov praised the painting "Everything in the Past".

[58] The artist Yakov Minchenkov in his "Memories of the Peredvizhniki" noted that of all Maximov's works "the greatest popularity in society received his painting "All in the Past".

In the fading old landlady, living out his last days in a poor peasant environment, perfectly expressed the memory of the former wide and luxurious landlord's life".

[59] Art historian Alexander Zamoshkin called the painting "All in the Past" a "novel" and wrote that its theme —"the disintegration of "noble nests" in the conditions of life in post-reform Russia"— was revealed by Maximov with great skill.

According to him, the picture is written in "light and sound," everything is told very subtly — in particular, "the connection of the two main psychological motifs" is shown extremely convincingly.

[9] The art historian Alexei Leonov noted that in emphasizing the social inequality of the two old women —the landlady and the maid— Maximov "did not leave out a single essential detail so that it would not serve his artistic purpose".