Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park

Title, artist and date

The catalogue record for the painting carries three title forms: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park in English, Akhtyrka. Park Pond as a variant, and Akhtyrka, étang du parc in French. The place name Akhtyrka stands at the head of each, and the descriptive element (pond in the park) shifts position and language from one form to the next, which is characteristic of records that travel between English- and French-language cataloguing traditions. The work is described as a landscape painting showing a pond in a park at Akhtyrka, so the record's genre and description fields tie the scene directly to the named place rather than treating the landscape as generic.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d., File title and Wikidata labels; Genre and description fields)

Wassily Kandinsky is recorded as the artist. The painting is dated 1917, and the record gives its medium as oil on canvas. The object date (1917) belongs to the making of the painting; it should not be confused with later dates that would attach to cataloguing, collection entry or documentation, none of which the supplied record sets out. The painting measures 29.5 centimetres in height by 37.5 centimetres in width, a small-scale canvas. It is recorded in the collection of the Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre national d'art et de culture Georges Pompidou, Paris, with the accession number AM 81-65-40. The discovery record also links to a Centre Pompidou resource page, but that page was not supplied among the research excerpts, so the institutional catalogue entry itself could not be checked here.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d., Artist field; Date field; Dimensions field)

Interpretation

Read together, the documented fields establish a compact, securely identified object: a small oil landscape bearing a Russian place name in its title, attributed to Kandinsky and dated 1917, now recorded in a Paris museum collection under a specific accession number. What the record does not explain is what Akhtyrka meant to Kandinsky, when he was there, or why he painted this particular view. The place name comes from the record; no supplied evidence attaches a narrative, commission or personal purpose to the choice of subject. The attribution and date are catalogue facts as recorded, and the record's own qualifications should travel with them: the linkage to a fuller institutional entry is noted but unverified in the material at hand.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d., File title and Wikidata labels; Artist field; Date field; Genre and description fields)

The painting is titled Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, also called Akhtyrka. Park Pond and Akhtyrka, étang du parc.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)

Wassily Kandinsky is recorded as the artist of the painting.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)

The painting is dated 1917.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)

The painting measures 29.5 centimetres in height and 37.5 centimetres in width.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)

The work is described as a landscape painting showing a pond in a park at Akhtyrka.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)

The Documented Support and Medium

The documented record for Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park establishes a single material fact about the work: it is an oil painting on canvas. That medium designation, recorded in the medium field of the Wikimedia Commons discovery record, is the only technical information supplied here, and it should be given its proper weight. It tells us the paint vehicle and the support, and nothing in the available evidence describes the canvas weave, the ground or priming, the presence or absence of an underdrawing, the pigments used, the order of layers, or any conservation treatment. Statements about how the paint was handled, whether it was applied thinly or heavily, or what tools were used cannot be grounded in these materials and are therefore not part of this account. The identification is attributed to the Commons record itself, which is cataloguing data rather than the report of a technical examination.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d., Medium field)

The same Composite record groups the medium statement with other cataloguing facts: the artist is recorded as Wassily Kandinsky, the date as 1917, the dimensions as 29.5 centimetres in height and 37.5 centimetres in width, the collection as the Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre national d'art et de culture Georges Pompidou, Paris, and the accession number as AM 81-65-40. These are framing conditions for any future technical study rather than findings of one. The dimensions establish a small easel-scale canvas, and the accession number and collection identify the specific physical object to which any examination would attach. The Commons record is annotated as only partially consulted and notes a link to a Centre Pompidou resource page that was not supplied, so the museum's own documentation, which might carry condition or analysis data, remains outside the evidence assembled here.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d., Medium field)

What the Medium Does and Does Not Establish

Interpretation

It is worth separating what the record documents from what the picture's subject invites a viewer to infer. The record describes a landscape showing a pond in a park at Akhtyrka, and the title variants Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, Akhtyrka. Park Pond and Akhtyrka, étang du parc attach the work to that place. Nothing in the evidence, however, describes the paint itself: there is no account of how the water, the reflections, the trees or the floating lilies were rendered, no statement of pigments, no mention of glazing, scumbling or wet-in-wet work. Visual impressions of a reflective surface or layered picture space belong to the description of the scene, not to a materials analysis. The distinction matters because oil on canvas is compatible with a very wide range of handling, and the cataloguing entry does not narrow that range.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d., Medium field)

Within a larger history of materials, the oil-on-canvas designation is nonetheless consequential because it places the object in a specific tradition of portable easel painting. Oil on canvas was the standard medium for landscape painting in early twentieth-century Europe, and a work of these modest dimensions, recorded at 29.5 by 37.5 centimetres, belongs to the scale of a painting made for a domestic or intimate setting rather than a monumental one. This is a contextual observation about the medium's conventions, not a claim about this canvas's particular preparation. The evidence supports the medium, the size and the 1917 date; it does not by itself support inferences about the artist's materials supplier, the canvas manufacturer, or the number of sessions in which the paint was applied.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d., Medium field)

The work is an oil painting on canvas.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)

Collection and display

The painting Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, also recorded under the title variants Akhtyrka. Park Pond and Akhtyrka, étang du parc, is registered in the collection of the Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre national d'art et de culture Georges Pompidou, Paris. Within that institution it carries the accession number AM 81-65-40. These two facts locate the work at a specific public collection and identify it by a unique inventory reference, which is the essential starting point for any account of where the object can be consulted and how it is catalogued. The accession number matters beyond bookkeeping: it fixes this canvas, rather than another view of the same place, as the object under discussion, and it is the identifier through which the museum's own records organize the painting.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d., Collection field; Accession number field)

The painting is recorded in the collection of the Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre national d'art et de culture Georges Pompidou, Paris.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)

The painting has the accession number AM 81-65-40 in the Musée National d'Art Moderne.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)

Interpretation

The Wikimedia Commons record that anchors this research identifies the painting as Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, also called Akhtyrka. Park Pond and Akhtyrka, étang du parc. It attributes the work to Wassily Kandinsky, dates it to 1917, and describes it as an oil painting on canvas measuring 29.5 centimetres in height by 37.5 centimetres in width. The work is recorded in the collection of the Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre national d'art et de culture Georges Pompidou, Paris, under accession number AM 81-65-40, and it is described as a landscape showing a pond in a park at Akhtyrka. These are the concrete facts on which any discussion of the object's value must rest, and they define a small-scale early twentieth-century Russian-period oil by an artist of museum-caliber standing. The Commons record functions as a discovery aid, not an official institutional valuation, and its annotation notes that the Centre Pompidou resource page it links to was not supplied in the research excerpts, so the collection attribution rests on the Commons record itself as consulted.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)

Recorded values

The only valuation figure supplied is explicitly a calculated working insurance estimate, recorded as a working calculation generated 2026-10-30. It gives a working range of US$800K to US$2.5M. The methodology states that the band was derived from confirmed context only: the Kandinsky attribution, the 1917 date, the landscape title, the small 29.5 by 37.5 cm scale, and the Centre Pompidou holding under accession AM 81-65-40. The range reflects the artist's museum-caliber prominence and the rarity of early twentieth century Russian-period oils, then applies a downward, wide-band adjustment for the modest dimensions, for the landscape genre relative to prominent abstract works, and for the absence of supplied auction, sale, or appraisal data. No comparable sales or private insurance records were used; the band is intended solely to bracket a review figure for a qualified specialist. The figure therefore expresses a relationship between documented attributes and market categories, not a measured price, and it should be read as a structured extrapolation from the object's recorded characteristics.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)

The qualification attached to the calculation is as important as the number. The document states that it is a model-generated working insurance range for manual review only, not an official insurance value, appraisal, auction estimate or result, or sale price, and that it has not been verified against comparables, condition reports, provenance, or title review. The supplied Wikimedia Commons record is identified as a discovery aid that does not constitute an official Centre Pompidou valuation. Any later scholarship or institutional record that supplies comparables, condition reporting or provenance documentation would supersede this bracket rather than confirm it, and the estimate should not be cited as evidence of what the painting is worth or has fetched.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)

Working estimate

Calculated working insurance estimate, not a sale price: Working range: US$800K to US$2.5M Recorded date: Working calculation, generated 2026-10-30. Methodology: Broad conservative working range derived from confirmed context only: an oil on canvas by Wassily Kandinsky dated 1917, a landscape titled Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, small in scale at 29.5 by 37.5 cm, held by the Musee National d'Art Moderne, Centre Pompidou, Paris, under accession AM 81-65-40. The range reflects the artist's museum-caliber prominence and the rarity of early twentieth century Russian-period oils, while applying a downward, wide-band adjustment for the modest dimensions, the landscape genre relative to prominent abstract works, and the absence of supplied auction, sale, or appraisal data. No comparable sales or private insurance records were used; the band is intended solely to bracket a review figure for a qualified specialist. Qualification: This is a model-generated working insurance range for manual review only. It is not an official insurance value, appraisal, auction estimate or result, or sale price, and it has not been verified against comparables, condition reports, provenance, or title review. The supplied Wikimedia Commons record is a discovery aid and does not constitute an official Centre Pompidou valuation.(Wikimedia Commons: Akhtyrka, Pond in the Park, n.d.)