Mitrofan Grekov. Tachanka. A Shell Burst

This 1925 painting by Mitrofan Grekov is a headlong scene from the Civil War. In the middle of the scorched steppe, rearing horses pull a tachanka — a machine-gun cart — carrying three Red Army men, one of whom has been killed. Behind them a shell bursts, and on the left, in the middle distance, a mounted soldier can be seen. Yellow, orange and bluish-grey tones dominate the palette.

Mitrofan Grekov (1882–1934) was a Russian and Soviet battle painter. In the 1920s he painted Budyonny's First Cavalry Army and created a whole series of pictures about the Civil War; his "Tachanka" of the same year, 1925, is among the artist's best-known works. Since 1934 the studio of military artists in Moscow has borne Grekov's name.

The picture is painted in oil on plywood.