The painting is considered "the inaugural work of the Russian Symbolist movement" and is in the collection of the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow.

[1] The image of St. Sergius of Radonezh, who had been born Bartholomew, was near and dear to the artist since childhood and was the embodiment of the moral ideal for Nesterov.

The painting illustrates an episode from "The Life of St. Sergius" by Epiphanius the Wise: One day his father sent him to look for a lost foal.

The artist did his sketches of landscapes in 1899 in the vicinity of the Trinity Sergius Lavra, settling in the village of Komyakovo near Abramtsevo and Radonezh.

[3] The painting, which caused the most contradictory opinions, became a sensation at the XVIII Peredvizhniki exhibition and was bought by Pavel Tretyakov for his gallery.

Вот если через тридцать, через пятьдесят лет после моей смерти он ещё будет что-то говорить людям — значит, он живой, значит, жив и я[4] A later version of the painting, dating from 1922, was sold at Sotheby's in 2007 for $4.3 million (equivalent to $6.3 million in 2023).