The Wanderer (Fyodor Konyukhov) Painting

The son of a shoemaker is a shoemaker, and the son of a submariner is a submariner. Viktor Kobzev jumped to the conclusion and he went honestly through six combat services on the K-424 missile submarine cruiser. But then, with the rank of captain-lieutenant, he went ashore and began to paint. In 2007 the Baltic Shipyard solemnly launched a new nuclear-powered icebreaker “50 Years of Victory”. And former colleagues invited Victor to ride it to the North Pole. Kobzev took an easel and paints just in case. - That's when I first was at the North Pole. But once before in this area I surfaced in a submarine. But this does not count, - Kobzev jokes. Since then he has been there more than three dozen times - every year there were several “trips”. Now Kobzev has an official position, his task is to draw the ice of the North Pole. After all, he is an expeditionary artist, but simply the Tube. He became the Tube in a submarine. - We knocked in ice, and there was a hole on the cabin. My colleagues took apart the wooden tea boxes and went to paint and boil them up. I hear on the speakerphone: "Kobzev, take brushes, paint and go up." And I still had the last tube of black paint, I reported to the captain. In response, from decent words I heard only "Tube." Since then, I became the Tube in the Navy, ” Victor says. In the Arctic, Tube prefers to work at night. At this time, the sun constantly shines there, but everyone sleeps and no one bothers. The habit of staying awake at night remained with him from a submarine: at that time there was usually a shift. An unpleasant roar of breaking ice is heard in the workshop around the clock. But the Tube has not paid any attention to this for a long time. His paintings are now in the largest museums in the world, as well as in private collections of the English Queen Elizabeth II, Margaret Thatcher, Tonino Guerra, Francois Mitterrand, Galina Vishnevskaya, Alla Pugacheva. He forgot the number of international exhibitions. The Tube paints fish of all stripes and colors more often. And everywhere they grin. When the icebreaker reaches the North Pole, the team begins to look for a “clearing” - a place for landing passengers on the ice. A technical team comes out first to test the ice for durability. The Tube pulls out an easel and begins to draw. He has little time.