Solving some of the Platov brothers endgame studies...
The photo has nothing to do directly with the Platov brothers. I've just tracked it while searching and thought it fits. Like setting positions and solving problems and studies from a book, in an old way. Anyway...
Platov brothers, Vassily & Mikhail Nikolaevich, had composed over 200 endgame studies, most of them together, and are considered of the founders of the modern study school. Vassily [Riga, 1881 - Moscow, 1852], was an honored doctor & editor of the study column in Шахматное обозрение, Шахматы & 64. Mikhail [Riga, 1883 - Kargopol, 1938] was an engineer [some highlights of their lives, one of each & outside chess, in the end of this post].
They are regarded as successors of Alexey Troitsky. On this, an enlightening article about Troitsky had been published by Vassily, in Nikolai Grekov's Шахматы [5/1923, p. 14]. There Vassily Platov writes that in the modern endgame studies of his time [especially Rinck's and Platov brothers'], one can track motifs that firstly were presented in Troitsky's work. While it seems that Troitsky himself was highly regarding the work of Rinck and Platov brothers, as in his words made him more attentive.
From the article: "среди произведений позднейших композиторов (в особенности, Г. Ринка и бр. Платовых) можно подобрать группы этюдов, составленных на разные темы, но об'единенных одной руководящей идейной игрой, выраженной у них во многочисленных ва риациях, лейтмотив же этой игры мы находим еще в первых произведениях А. А. Троицкого, нередко в художественной интерпретации." & "Что касается внешней стороны произведений, то, по словам А. А. Троицкого, совершенство техники Г. Ринка и бр. Платовых заставляло его во втором периоде деятельности более внимательно относиться к обработке своих произведений;"
Speaking of Troitsky, a beautiful study with a simple mating idea, published in the above mentioned article.
_
In this blog are presented the about 200 studies that can be found in Platov brothers' Сборник шахматных этюдов, 1928. I firstly filtered them by composer, choosing the ones made by both together, and noticed that one of their preference were the minors. I've picked nine of them with basic criteria variety and beauty. They are all white to play and win...
One
_
Two
_
Three
_
Four
_
Five
_
Six
_
Seven
_
Eight
_
Nine
_
While the Platovs had been working together for many years on chess studies, life created some contradiction.
Mikhail Platov died in 1938 [around Sep] in Kargopol, in a camp. He had been arrested a year before, on Oct 4, 1937, for anti-revolutionary activity, and was sentenced with 10 years of penal labor [correctional/disciplinary]. This, as he had spoken unfriendly about Stalin during a production meeting of a factory in Serpukhov, where he was working as a leading engineer. His last letter was dated on Aug 22, 1938, describing a worsened health [Igor Polovodin in 64/13-1990 p. 12 as continuation/response to a Sergey Grodzensky's article in 64/24-1989 p. 24].
On the other [brighter & more heroic] side, Vassily Platov, as a doctor, participated in a rescue expedition searching for general Umberto Nobile and his crew of airship Italia in the Arctic ocean. This information comes from a publication in Шахматы [6/1928, p. 136]. [check also this article by Владимир НЕЙШТАДТ in Russian]
On May 5, 1928, airship Italia crashed near Nordaustlandet, while returning from North Pole during a scientific exploration journey [map in jpeg from Das interessante Blatt of 21 Jun 1928]. Many countries were involved in the effort to rescue Nobile and his crew, while these news had been front page for weeks. Even the famous & experienced explorer Roald Amundsen tried, but unsuccessfully and in the end paying with his life. Soviets sent two icebreakers and the hydrographical Perseus. On the latter our Vassily had embarked. In the end and two months later, the Soviet icebreaker Krassin was the first to reach Nobile and his crew. Seventeen in total of the Italia's crew & rescuers died...
....
