The Last Day of Pompeii

Painted in Italy between 1830 and 1833 by the Russian academic master Karl Bryullov (1799–1852), 'The Last Day of Pompeii' is a 4.65 × 6.51 metre history painting depicting the city's inhabitants fleeing through streets lit by lightning, falling columns, and a blood-red ash sky during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79. Combining Neoclassical composition with Romantic storm, it caused a sensation at the Brera in Milan in 1834 and made Bryullov the leading Russian painter of his generation. Since 1851 it has hung at the State Russian Museum in St Petersburg as the summit of Russian academic history painting.

Exhibition Venue

Russian Museum

Saint Petersburg, Russia