1000x1400 mm, oil on canvas, №2265
«Working Days» is a major statement by Dmitry Kustanovich in the genre of industrial landscape, rarely explored in contemporary easel painting. The artist turns to the everyday life of a working city: factory chimneys, scaffolding, snow-covered rooftops, freight vehicles and passers-by on wet pavement are brought together in a single, rhythmically precise composition.
The canvas is executed in the artist's own style, Spatial Realism. The image is built through the physical plasticity of the paint layer: dense palette-knife strokes form a sculptural relief, while lines incised into wet paint render the graphic tracery of wires, structures and window frames. At close range the surface reads as an autonomous, almost abstract texture. From a distance it resolves into a deep, air-filled space that shifts with the light and the viewer's position.
The palette rests on a restrained harmony of silver-greys and lilac-blues, warmed by ochre light in the depth of the street. Brick-red chimney verticals and precise turquoise and scarlet accents give the composition its inner pulse. Vertical pulls of the knife in the lower register create reflections on wet asphalt — a hallmark device of the artist.
For the collector, the work combines large format, a mature and recognisable hand, and an uncommon subject: the industrial motif shows a new side of Kustanovich's urban series. It suits a private collection, a corporate holding or a representative interior. The original, signed and dated by the artist, is on view at the Kustanovich Gallery in St. Petersburg.
