Religious Procession in Kursk Governorate

[2] Behind them follow a crowd mostly of peasants, but ranging from beggars and disabled people, police and military officers to figures from the provincial elite.

At the right, burly peasants carry a platform holding the icon inside an elaborate neo-classical case; only gleams of light reflecting off the gold riza icon-cover can be made out.

Lines of peasants joining hands hold back the crowd, the foremost at the left trying to stop the crippled boy breaking through the cordon with his stick.

[5] The writer Richard Brettell summarised the painting as "a sort of summa of Russian society, diverse members of which move uneasily but restlessly together down a dusty path through a naked landscape towards a future that cannot be seen even by the painter.

"[6] Critic Christian Brinton saw a mixture of "fat, gold-robed priests, stupid peasants, wretched cripples, cruel mouthed officials, and inflated rural dignitaries".