[11][12] The artist and critic Alexandre Benois wrote that Savitsky became "an important pillar of the Peredvizhniki" with the creation of the painting Repair Work on the Railway in 1874, and noted that this canvas was "homogeneous in spirit and theme" with Ilya Repin's Burlaks on the Volga.

"[14] In 1862–1873 (with interruptions), Konstantin Savitsky studied at the Academy of Arts in the class of historical painting, where his mentors were Fyodor Bruni, Alexey Markov and Pavel Chistyakov.

In the period between 1868 and 1870, Savitsky was awarded several small silver medals, including one for his work The Sharman Man and another for his sketch The Crucifixion of Christ.

[19] Savitsky himself commented on the event: "I was expelled suddenly, without being given the opportunity to justify myself, if I was guilty of anything, and several years of my work at the Academy were irrevocably lost to me.

They lived near the Kozlovka Zaseka railway station (the name Kozlovka-Zaseka is used in a number of publications), where Savitsky observed the work of reinforcing the tracks.

[20] At that time, Kozlova Zaseka (now Yasnaya Polyana station) constituted part of the Moscow-Kursk railway, constructed between 1864 and 1868 at the expense of the state treasury.

[22] In a letter to the artist Ilya Repin dated 3 August 1873, Ivan Kramskoi wrote: "Savitsky begins to write 'Zemlekopy', found the plot here on the railway and ignited."

Repin replied in a letter dated 2 September 1873, calling Savitsky by his patronymic: "I wish a brilliant ending to Apollonich, the idea is glorious."

In a letter to the collector and patron of the arts Pavel Tretyakov, dated 11 August 1873, Kramskoi wrote: "Savitsky is working on a picture of 'Zemlekopy' on the railway, the sketch is good, what will come out – it is impossible to say.

In a letter dated 25 December 1873, addressed to Repin, who was in Paris at the time, Kramskoi reported that Savitsky "finished [his canvas] not bad, even good."

On 29 January 1874, Savitsky wrote to the artist Vasily Polenov, who was in Paris at the time: "I[,] your humble servant[,] also published my brainchild, I am not a judge myself.

In a letter to the art critic Vladimir Stasov, dated 20 January 1874, commenting on the forthcoming showing of the painting Repair Work at the travelling exhibition, Repin wrote: "How happy I am for Savitsky!

"[28] In letters to Nikolai Ge and Ivan Kramskoi, dated 3 March 1874, Pavel Tretyakov asked them to tell Savitsky that he was interested in buying the painting for his gallery.

The patron of the arts wrote: "Having examined it once again, I decided to offer 1000 roubles for it, <...> for this price I will be very happy to buy it because in it, despite the dull general tone, there is a lot of great dignity."

[32][31] A number of canvases from Pavel Tretyakov's collection, including the painting Repair Work on the Railway, were proposed for display at the 1878 World's Fair, which was to be held in Paris.

In order for Savitsky's painting to be included in the Russian section, it was necessary for it to prevail against the opposition of Andrey Somov, the chairman of the selection committee.

Polenov says that it is absolute nonsense; and the main thing that I am annoyed about is that this is a great nuisance to Savitsky; they always do this – very fond of putting down, so that a young man does not become conceited.

[14] Art historian Elena Levenfish has noted that the Burlak Kanin and the Worker with a White Armband, the central figures in Repin's and Savitsky's paintings, are characterised differently by the artists: while the "sad, questioning, intelligent gaze of the 'philosopher' Kanin" is turned towards the viewer "as if calling for sympathy," the worker in Savitsky's painting is "silent, concentrated, deep in thought," so that the viewer begins to believe that "behind his physical strength lurks a great spiritual power, that behind this silence ripens a protest.

One of them, stopping to let a worker with a white bandage on his head pass with his wheelbarrow, is "a tired, dejected teenager, sorrowfully lowering his eyes before the strongman, who casts a sympathetic glance at him".

[5] He is depicted wearing greasy boots, a black waistcoat, and a red shirt, which serves as a striking contrast against the "general dim background."

According to art historian Zinaida Zonova, the artist mastered this task perfectly, managing to make "the content of the painting immediately perceptible through the clarity of the means used to express the idea of the plot."

To fill the void in the centre of the painting, which was "too conspicuous in the overall busyness of the composition," Savitsky placed a puppy next to a tub [ru] and a broken wheelbarrow slightly to the right.

The desolate mood of the canvas corresponds to the "somewhat monotonous landscape with thinning forest on the hillside behind the embankment and a series of alternating telegraph poles.

[15] It seems likely that this is the same study that appeared in a 1959 monograph under the title Earthworks near the railway track (canvas on cardboard, oil, 12.3 × 32.5 cm), which was described as having been kept in a private collection in Moscow.

[45] This sketch was gifted by Savitsky to the writer Alexei Moshin, was then in the collection of the Ryazan artist Yakov Kalinichenko and was given to the Museum by his widow.

[2] Another sketch with the same title (cardboard, watercolour, 20.5 × 26.5 cm), kept in the collection of the Kyiv Art Gallery until 1941, was lost during the Great Patriotic War.

Benois noted that Savitsky's canvas, depicting "unfortunate day labourers with wheelbarrows" weaving through dust and sand, was "homogeneous in spirit and theme" with Ilya Repin's Burlaks on the Volga.

"[48] Sokolnikov noted that Savitsky, in his first multi-figure composition,[49] was one of the first in Russian fine art – after Repin's Burlaks – to "raise the subject of the working man" and draw society's attention to "one of the sickest phenomena of reality.

"[48] In Sokolnikov's view, Savitsky's handling of the complex subject matter of the painting Repair Work is marked by "great artistic tact", with the content "logically unfolding from the entire ensemble of the composition.

"[49] In a book published in 1955, the art historian Dmitri Sarabianov also noted that the painting Repair Work on the Railway had some similarities with Burlaks on the Volga.