10:00 10.05.2026
Polar explorer, artist, and the first high-latitude photographer. How Nikolai Pinegin “painted” the Arctic
© Public domain
Nikolai Pinegin took part in numerous Arctic exploration expeditions and became one of those who shaped the image of the Russian North in the early 20th century. In his works, he sought to show that the Arctic is not a barren white space, but a universe of diverse colors and shades.
For more on the beginnings of the famous artist, photographer, and traveler, and how he managed to overcome the hardships of surviving in the unexplored northern lands, read an article posted on Development of the Arctic and the Far East website.
Nikolai Pinegin was born on May 10, 1883 in the city of Yelabuga. From the age of 17 he lived independently: in 1901, he entered the Kazan Art School. Even then he dreamed of travelling to the Arctic: “Buy plenty of paints, gunpowder, shot, bullets, and go to the land of wonders - the magical North.” In 1904, Pinegin went on his first expedition to the Northern Dvina River, where he and his companions explored the Catherine Canal.
Nikolai Pinegin. Study. 1912, oil on canvas.
© Public domain
In 1907, Pinegin entered the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, and the following year he went north again. This time he arrived in Arkhangelsk, where he became a member of the Society for the Study of the Russian North. With the Society’s support, Pinegin visited many places in the Murmansk Region: the Tuloma and Kola rivers, Lake Notozero, as well as Pechenga and the Ainov Islands, about which he later published travel notes.
A key milestone in Pinegin’s life was the expedition to the North Pole led by Georgy Sedov in 1912. Pinegin went not merely as an artist and a tourist, but as a serious explorer: he took part in the wintering on Franz Josef Land, kept diaries, made sketches, and filmed the surroundings. He became the first Russian polar cinematographer and managed to produce a documentary film about the expedition.
The journey took place under extremely harsh conditions: polar night set in, the ship often struggled against the pressure of ice, and supplies gradually ran low. As an experienced hunter, Pinegin caught birds to provide food for his companions. Once, temperatures dropped below -50°C. Pinegin described the cold in his notes:
“No one of us expected that the temperature could drop so low: such temperatures had never before been observed on Novaya Zemlya. Mercury had long since frozen. With careless shaking of the thermometer, the mercury ball would break the glass and fall out like a pellet. Kerosene turned into a thick oily mass.”
Nikolai Pinegin. Polar Station on Rudolf Island (in Franz Josef Land). 1936, oil on canvas.
© Public domain
The expedition was further overshadowed by the death of Georgy Sedov, who never reached the North Pole. In 1914, the expedition returned to Arkhangelsk, and a year later Pinegin presented his sketches at the Academy, for which he received the Kuindzhi Prize.
Flights over the Kara Sea and the founding of a museum
After 1917, Nikolai Pinegin lived abroad for some time, but his passion for Arctic exploration could not be extinguished, and in 1923 he returned to Russia. Soon he began working at the Polar Commission of the Academy of Sciences, and a year later again traveled to Novaya Zemlya as part of the Northern Hydrographic Expedition.
This time Pinegin’s main task was mapping and sketching surrounding waters for the study of underwater relief. Together with polar pilot Boris Chukhnovsky, he made nine flights over Novaya Zemlya and the Kara Sea on Yu-20 airplane.
“In hurried handwriting, tightly gripping the pencil which, under the force of the terrible air stream, tries to tear itself from my hands, I hastily record observations, sketch the most important irregularities in the coastline, marking underwater hazards visible from above as clearly as pebbles on the bottom of a clear stream,” Pinegin wrote in his Notes of a Polar Explorer.
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Nikolai Pinegin. Sea Ice in April. Foka Bay, Novaya Zemlya Archipelago. Spring 1913. From the collections of the Northern Maritime Museum.
© Public domain
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Nikolai Pinegin. Ridged First-Year Ice. Yuzhny Krest Islands, Novaya Zemlya Archipelago. 1912–1913. From the collections of the Northern Maritime Museum.
© Public domain
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Nikolai Pinegin. Professor Popov Glacier. Glacier, Severny Island, Novaya Zemlya Archipelago. Summer 1913. From the collections of the Northern Maritime Museum.
© Public domain
In 1927, Pinegin led an expedition to Bolshoy Lyakhovsky Island in Yakutia, tasked with establishing a geophysical base which could operate jointly with a lab in Yakutsk. To do so, he needed to build a radiostation which Pinegin accomplished fairly quickly despite severe weather.
In 1930, Pinegin returned to Leningrad and began working at the All-Union Arctic Institute. Later, the Museum of the Arctic and Antarctic was established at the institute, and Pinegin became its director. The museum assembled a collection of artifacts and documents from the first Russian polar explorers. Until 1935, Pinegin continued his travels to the North and also worked on books about his adventures. He continued working and creating Arctic-related works until his death in 1940.
The diversity of the Russian North
Nikolai Pinegin made a major contribution to Arctic research and to popularising the region among the general public as an artist, photographer, and traveler.
Pinegin is considered one of the first high-latitude photographers. Despite extremely low temperatures, he managed to create works that were rarely included in official reports and that depicted real life in the Arctic: in his expedition photographs, he captured everyday life during the expedition.
Just as important are the paintings created by Pinegin. In them, he sought to portray the Arctic not as a static space, but as an ever-changing environment across different seasons. In Nikolai Pinegin’s works, his attention to detail is especially evident, particularly in his depiction of snow and ice. He aimed to show that the Arctic is not a uniform white color, but a vast spectrum of the shades of white. This diversity of snow tones later became one of Pinegin’s key artistic features.
Nikolai Pinegin. Killed Polar Bear, Novaya Zemlya. 1912–1914.
© Public domain
His research activities also played a significant role. Pinegin published materials about the Arctic, shared expedition experiences, and gave talks about life in the North. His writings allowed general audiences to see the Arctic not as an abstract white spot on the map, but as a space where people live, work, and explore.
It is also important that his works captured the Arctic in a period preceding the large-scale development of the region. Today, Nikolai Pinegin’s photographs and artistic works are regarded not only as works of art, but also as a window into a different era, allowing us to see the virtually unexplored Arctic of the early 20th century.
A number of geographical features have been named in honor of the explorer: the southwestern cape of Inostrantsev Bay on the western coast of Novaya Zemlya, a cape on the eastern side of Bruce Island, and a lake in the northern part of Alexandra Land in the Franz Josef Land Archipelago. Streets in St. Petersburg and in his hometown Yelabuga have also been named after Pinegin.
Today, Nikolai Pinegin’s paintings are held in the Russian Museum and the State Museum of the Arctic and Antarctic. In winter, his works were exhibited at the Tretyakov Gallery as part of the exhibition “Arctic. Pole of Color,” which runs until June 21.
