This painting shows a group of women walking down a street at night carrying parcels

and babies. The lowly lit streets and the large amounts of baggage they are carrying seem to create a solemn mood and show great difficulty in the mere act of walking, back home to rest. The work depicts the city of Kovno in Russia, modern-day Lithuania,

where Werefkin was staying with her brother in 1909 (Dias, 2018). 

 

Return Home is considered to be one of Werefkin's early works of her mature period. 

While she found the city captivating, she was drawn to the suffering of the city's people.

The use of her iconic hunched women in black was also first introduced here (Dias, 2018).

 

The baggage can represent the huge responsibilities rested upon their shoulders

during that period of time. War was ongoing and their fathers, brothers or husbands must have left to protect the country. This may have resulted in the women having to carry the burdens upon their own shoulders.