The territory of Kazakhstan and Kazakhs in the works of Russian artists of the 19th–early 20th centuries, kept in museums and art galleries

This article considers the contribution of pre-revolutionary artists of the Russian Empire to the study of the local history of Kazakhstan. It is known that the lands and Kazakh population of Western, Northern, Eastern and Southern Kazakhstan found their worthy reflection in the paintings of famous artists. So, for example, the sacred monuments of the Mangyshlak Peninsula, the plain of Ustyurt, the northern Aral Sea and the Caspian Sea were deoicted in the paintings and sketches of the great Ukrainian poet and playwright T.G. Shevchenko (1814–1864). He was exiled for ten years in Kazakhstan (1847–1857) in the Orenburg steppes, in the fortress of Orsk, and then in the Novopetrovsk fortification on the Mangyshlak Peninsula and on the banks of the Caspian Sea. His participation in the work of two expeditions of Aral (1848–1849) and Karatau facilitated the creation of several paintings and graphic works of landscapes, which have a direct relation to the study of local lore and life of the Kazakhs. Original albums and sketches of the Tomsk artist P.M. Kosharov (1824– 1902) depicting types of architecture, the material culture of Western Siberia and Northern Kazakhstan are also of note. Participating in an expedition of P.P. Semenov-Tyan-Shansky to Zhetysu in 1852–1857, he managed to issue the early documentary image of Verny, mineral source Kapal-Arasan, etc. The Southern Kazakhstan and Zhetysu found the reflection in V.V. Vereshchagin's sketches (1842–1904), who was the authorof the pictures «Turkestan Series» (1871–1874), and the illustrated books «Turkestan. The etude from nature» (1874), «Essays, sketches, memoirs» (1883). A similar contribution to the subject under consideration was made by the member of the Turkestan circle of lovers of archaeology, founder of the Semirechensky department of the Russian Geographical Society N.G. Khludov (1850–1935). He created a set of realistic art paintings devoted to Zhetysu and Zailijsky Alatau. Thus, the article shows the contribution of the above-mentioned pre-revolutionary artists to the development of the subject posed by us.