The title of this painting may be direct, but the politics behind it are complicated.

This painting is one of many Vereshchagin painted while in Turkestan.  The other works from this era feature violent battle scenes, shady trades, and little boys dressed as little girls (known as batch or batchi) dancing seductively for older men Here, a young boy is being sold into slavery….to a man who is counting prayer beads.  This hypocrisy is meant to draw attention to what Vereshchagin called (repeatedly) the “barbarism” of Central Asia.  

Though these things were very much going on in Turkestan in the 1800s, Vereshchagin’s focus on them is all part of that much-used term by humanities majors, “Orientalism.” In other words, the exoticized, eroticized, and often barbaric portrayal of the East that serves to cement the moral superiority of the West (to Westerners anyway) often used to justify colonization. And justify colonization this did! In the exhibition catalogue for his Turkestan work Vereshchagin wrote, “The Central Asian population's barbarism is so glaring, it's economic and social condition so degraded, that the sooner European civilization penetrates into the land, whether from one side or the other, the better." Oof. I’d like to say you can’t get away with saying things like this now but hearing recent GOP speeches proves otherwise.

The Sale of the Child Slave, along with the rest of Vereshchagin’s paintings from his trip to Turkestan were first exhibited at the Crystal Palace in London. It was considered more cosmopolitan than Vereshchagin’s hometown of Moscow. An interesting choice considering London was super paranoid that Russia’s interests in Central Asia posed a threat to British Imperial India. Maybe they just wanted to get a look at the enemy? Or maybe it had to do with Vereshchagin’s hope that his work would, “assist in dispelling the distrust of the English public towards their natural friends and neighbors in Central Asia." Pro-tip: if you want to be neighborly, you may want to avoid terms like “penetrating” and “barbaric” in your welcome basket.

Selling little children as slaves was a big business in the 1870's.

This scene took place in Turkestan, an area which is today made up of 'stans,' specifically, the independent countries of Kazakhstan (Borat!!), Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.