Yevgeny Korneev. Painted Canvas of the Diorama “The Siege of Leningrad”

The canvas of the diorama “The Siege of Leningrad” was painted in 1995, for the 50th anniversary of the Victory, by Yevgeny Korneev (born 1951), an artist of the Grekov Studio of Military Artists and a State Prize laureate. Among the six dioramas of the Victory Museum this one stands apart: as the museum describes it, there are no soldiers, no tanks and no fighting in it. The artist showed the besieged city itself.

The canvas shows the Neva, the Spit of Vasilyevsky Island, the Peter and Paul Fortress and the Griboyedov Canal with the Bank Bridge. According to the museum, the view is deliberately framed and does not match the real topography. The side walls of the diorama hall depict Leningraders: the poet Olga Berggolts, the composer Dmitri Shostakovich and the writer Alexander Kron.

The city lies under snow, searchlight beams cross above the roofs, buildings burn at the left edge, and the sky is veiled in smoke. The canvas, measuring 10.5 × 33 metres, is painted in oil.