Like a bird soaring across the landscape, the viewer's eye surveys a desolate, empty scene by Levitan, painted on the shore of Lake Udomlia. Colouration is blocky and the palette limited, yet the landscape remains expansive and recessional, sublime and awe-inspiring. Nature is monumental and dominates here, with no human in sight. Instead, this is 'eternal tranquility', a frozen moment captured in a blissfully peaceful landscape. Levitan was captivated by the potentiality of the Russian landscape throughout his life. Earlier works show the percolation of French Impressionism into Russian art, where a quickness of brushstroke and dappled sunlight produce landscapes including Birch Forest (1885). Equally, Levitan's final painting depicting a lake of 1900 is almost a homage to Monet with its impasto paint application and shimmering, reflective waters, far from the stillness he presents here. The painting in question, however, suggests a move towards the forms of Russian