Culture of the 19th century is a culture existing bourgeois relations. By the end of the 18th century. capitalism as a system is fully formed. It covered all sectors of material production, which entailed corresponding transformations in the non-productive sphere (politics, science, philosophy, art, education, everyday life, social consciousness).
The culture of this period is characterized by a reflection of the internal contradictions of bourgeois society. The clash of opposing tendencies, the struggle of the main classes - the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, the polarization of society, the rapid rise of material culture and the beginning of the alienation of the individual determined the nature of the spiritual culture of that time.
In the 19th century a radical revolution is taking place t, associated with the emergence of a machine, which alienates man from nature, breaking the usual ideas about his dominant role, and turns man into a creature dependent on the machine. In conditions of intensifying mechanization, a person goes to the periphery of spiritual life, breaks away from his spiritual foundations. The place of craft work associated with the personality and creativity of the master was taken by monotonous labor.
Spiritual culture of the 19th century. developed and functioned under the influence of two important factors: successes in the field of philosophy and natural science. The leading dominant culture of the 19th century. there was science.
Various value orientations were based on two starting positions: the establishment and affirmation of the values of the bourgeois way of life, on the one hand, and the critical rejection of bourgeois society, on the other. Hence the emergence of such dissimilar phenomena in the culture of the 19th century: romanticism, critical realism, symbolism, naturalism, positivism, etc.
Peculiarities of worldview European culture of the 19th century. is a reflection of those contradictory principles that a developed bourgeois society represents, but, nevertheless, it has no equal in the depth of penetration into the existence and spiritual world of man and the creative tension in science, literature, philosophy and art.
In the first half of the 19th century Russian art develops within the academic school painting. The historical and battle genres are becoming widespread, which is associated with the victory in the Patriotic War of 1812 and the rise of national identity. Since the mid-60s of the 19th century, Russians artists They turn to themes of folk life, and a social and everyday genre appears in the visual arts. IN last decades century, it is partially replaced by landscape in the impressionist style, in paintings by Russian artists features of neoclassicism and modernism appear.
Academic school painting at the beginning of the 19th century she occupied a strong position as a legislator artistic styles and directions. The main method was classicism, the main genres were portrait, decorative landscape and historical painting. Young artists were dissatisfied with the implacable conservatism of the Academy and, in order not to write paintings on biblical and mythological subjects, turned to the portrait genre and landscape. Features of romanticism and realism increasingly appeared in them.
In portrait painting O. A. Kiprensky there are many romantic images: a portrait of a boy A. A. Chelishchev (1810-1811), spouses F. V. and E. P. Rostopchin (1809), spouses V. S. and D. N. Khvostov ( 1814), E. S. Avdulina (1822)
Portraits of V. A. Tropinin written in a realistic manner. The person depicted is the central image in them, all attention is focused on him. Figures and facial features are drawn with anatomical clarity and authenticity (portraits of Counts Morkov, 1813-1815; “Bulakhov”, 1823; “K. G. Ravich”, 1823).
Brushes by V. A. Tropinin belongs to one of the most famous portraits of A.S. Pushkin - the one where the poet put his hand on a stack of paper and seemed to listen to his inner voice.
IN picture K. P. Bryullov’s “The Last Day of Pompeii”, written according to all the canons of the academic school painting, reflected the development of Russian social thought, the expectation of change, which was associated with the rise of national self-awareness. Painting symbolized the courage of people facing a terrible catastrophe. Other famous paintings by K. P. Bryullov include “Italian Morning”, “Italian Afternoon”, “Horsewoman”, “Bathsheba”. In these and many others paintings to the artist Equally talented, he managed to capture the beauty of the human body and the beauty of nature.
Spiritual Awakening Ideas people were reflected in the works of A. A. Ivanov. Above the most famous painting, “The Appearance of Christ to the People,” he worked for about twenty years. Jesus on picture is depicted in the distance, and John the Baptist is brought to the foreground, pointing the people to the approaching Savior. The faces of the people waiting for Jesus brighten as he approaches, their souls are filled with joy.
Artists A.G. Venetsianov and P.A. Fedotov in the first half of the 19th century laid the foundations for social everyday genre V painting. A. G. Venetsianov in his paintings idealized the life of peasants, emphasizing the beauty and nobility of people, regardless of social status(“The threshing floor”, “At the harvest. Summer”, “On the arable land. Spring”, “Peasant woman with cornflowers”
Since the 50s of the 19th century, the main direction Russian fine arts realism becomes, and the main theme is the depiction of the life of ordinary people. The approval of the new direction took place in a stubborn struggle with adherents of the academic school painting. They argued that art should be higher than life, there is no place in it for Russian nature and social and everyday themes. However, the academicians were forced to make concessions. In 1862 all genres visual arts were equal in rights, which meant that only artistic merits were assessed paintings, regardless of the topic.
17. Russian art of the first half - mid-19th century. Romanticism, sentimentalism - directions of classicist art.
After the Patriotic War of 1812.: increasing interest in folk life; to human individuality led to the formation of a new ideal, which was based on the idea of a spiritually independent person, deeply feeling and passionately expressing his feelings. This ideal was reflected in the work of representatives of a new creative concept - romanticism, the establishment of which occurred simultaneously with the withering away of classicism.
In painting it was observed the withering away of classicism and the establishment of romanticism and realism
Romanticism- a direction in the art of the first half of the 19th century, which highlighted individuality and endowed it with ideal aspirations.
But the true successes of painting lay, however, in a different direction - romanticism. The best aspirations of the human soul, the ups and downs of the spirit were expressed by the romantic painting of that time, and above all by portraiture. In the portrait genre leading place should be given to Orest Kiprensky (1782-1836).
Kiprensky studied, starting from the Educational School, at the Academy of Arts, where he studied in the class of historical painting. The artist uses bold color effects that influence the modeling of the form; impasto painting promotes the expression of energy and enhances the emotionality of the image. It's fair to say D.V. Sarabyanova, Russian romanticism was never as powerful an artistic movement as in France or Germany. There is neither extreme excitement nor tragic hopelessness in it. In Kiprensky’s romanticism there is still much of the harmony of classicism, of the subtle analysis of the “twists” of the human soul, so characteristic of sentimentalism. “The present century and the past century,” colliding in the work of the early Kiprensky, who emerged as a creative personality in the best years of military victories and bright hopes of Russian society, constituted the originality and inexpressible charm of his early romantic portraits.
In the late Italian period due to many circumstances of his personal fate, the artist rarely managed to create anything equal early works. But even here we can name such masterpieces as one of the best lifetime portraits Pushkin(1827, Tretyakov Gallery), painted by the artist during the last period of his stay in his homeland, or a portrait of Avdulina (c. 1822, State Russian Museum), full of elegiac sadness.
An invaluable part of Kiprensky's work- graphic portraits, made mainly in soft Italian pencil with coloring in pastels, watercolors, and colored pencils. The appearance of quick pencil portraits-sketches is in itself significant, characteristic of the new time: they easily record any fleeting change in the face, any emotional movement. But in Kiprensky’s graphics there is also a certain evolution: in his later works there is no spontaneity and warmth, but they are more masterly and more refined in execution (portrait of S.S. Shcherbatova, Italian art., Tretyakov Gallery).
A consistent romantic can be called the Pole A.O. Orlovsky(1777-1832), who lived in Russia for 30 years and brought into Russian culture themes characteristic of Western romantics (bivouacs, horsemen, shipwrecks. “Take your quick pencil, draw, Orlovsky, sword and slaughter,” wrote Pushkin). He quickly assimilated on Russian soil, which is especially noticeable in his graphic portraits. In them, through all the external attributes of European romanticism with its rebellion and tension, something deeply personal, hidden, intimate is visible (Self-portrait, 1809, Tretyakov Gallery). Orlovsky also played a certain role in “blazing” the path to realism thanks to his genre sketches, drawings and lithographs depicting St. Petersburg street scenes and types, which brought to life the famous quatrain
Finally, romanticism finds expression in the landscape. Sylvester Shchedrin (1791-1830) began his creative career as a student of his uncle Semyon Shchedrin with classicist compositions: a clear division into three plans (the third plan is always architecture), on the sides of the scenes. But in Italy, where he left the St. Petersburg Academy, these features did not become stronger and did not turn into a pattern. It was in Italy, where Shchedrin lived for more than 10 years and died in the prime of his talent, that he emerged as a romantic artist and became one of the best painters in Europe along with Constable and Corot. He was the first to discover plein air painting for Russia. True, like the Barbizonians, Shchedrin painted only sketches in the open air, and completed the picture (“decorated”, according to his definition) in the studio. However, the motive itself changes emphasis. Thus, Rome in his canvases is not the majestic ruins of ancient times, but a living modern city of ordinary people - fishermen, traders, sailors. But this ordinary life under Shchedrin’s brush acquired a sublime sound.
Harbors of Sorrento, embankments of Naples, Tiber near the castle of St. Angela, people fishing, just talking on the terrace or relaxing in the shade of trees - everything is conveyed in the complex interaction of the light-air environment, in a delightful fusion of silver-gray tones, usually united by a touch of red - in clothes and headdress, in the rusty foliage of trees , where one red branch got lost. In Shchedrin's latest works, an interest in light and shadow effects was increasingly evident, foreshadowing the wave of new romanticism of Maxim Vorobyov and his students (for example, “View of Naples on a Moonlit Night”). Like the portrait painter Kiprensky and the battle painter Orlovsky, the landscape painter Shchedrin often paints genre scenes.
O.A. Kiprensky(1782-1836), portrait painter, most vividly embodied the romantic ideal. His style absorbed features of classical harmony and sentimentalism. Portraits reveal all that is best and significant in a person: his active and romantic nature; the thoughtfulness and ardor of a young man still learning about the world. In the last period, the best lifetime portrait of A.S. was created. Pushkin - the portrait of the great poet is historically specific and at the same time there is a desire to give a collective image of an ideal creative personality.
S.F. Shchedrin(1791-1830), landscape painter. He was the first to discover “plein air painting”, “New Rome”; "View of Sorrento near Naples."
V.A.Tropinin, introduces elements of romanticism into genre portraits. Brought up on the sentimentalist traditions of the late 18th century. Experienced the romantic influence of the early 19th century. (portraits of his son; A.S. Pushkin; self-portrait). He embodied in the images of peasants not only spiritual purity, but also nobility. Household details and labor activity are brought closer to genre painting (“The Lacemaker”, “The Goldsmith”).
Historical painting of the 30-40s: the intersection of classicism and romanticism.
Russian historical painting of the 30-40s developed under the sign of romanticism. One researcher (M.M. Allenov) called Karl Pavlovich Bryullov (1799-1852) the “genius of compromise” between the ideals of classicism and the innovations of romanticism. Bryullov's fame came while still at the Academy: even then, Bryullov turned ordinary sketches into finished paintings, as was the case, for example, with his “Narcissus” (1819, Russian Russian Museum). After completing the course with a gold medal, the artist left for Italy. In his pre-Italian works, Bryullov turns to biblical subjects (“The Appearance of Three Angels to Abraham at the Oak of Mamre”, 1821, Russian Museum) and ancient (“Oedipus and Antigone”, 1821, Tyumen Regional Museum of Local Lore), engages in lithography, sculpture, writes theatrical scenery, and draws costumes for productions. The paintings “Italian Morning” (1823, location unknown) and “Italian Afternoon” (1827, Russian Museum), especially the first, show how close the painter came to the problems of the plein air. Bryullov himself defined his task as follows: “I illuminated the model in the sun, assuming illumination from behind, so that the face and chest are in the shadows and are reflected from the fountain illuminated by the sun, which makes all the shadows much more pleasant in comparison with simple lighting from the window.”
The tasks of plein air painting thus interested Bryullov, but the artist’s path, however, lay in a different direction. Since 1828, after a trip to Pompeii, Bryullov has been working on his equal work - “The Last Day of Pompeii” (1830-1833). Real event ancient history- the death of the city during the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD. e. - gave the artist the opportunity to show the greatness and dignity of man in the face of death. Fiery lava is approaching the city, buildings and statues are collapsing, but the children do not leave their parents; the mother covers the child, the young man saves his beloved; the artist (in which Bryullov portrayed himself) carries away the colors, but, leaving the city, he looks broadly with open eyes, trying to capture the terrible sight.
Even in death a person remains beautiful how beautiful the woman thrown from the chariot by maddened horses is in the center of the composition. Bryullov’s painting clearly revealed one of the essential features of his painting: the connection between the classicist style of his works and the features of romanticism, with which Bryullov’s classicism is united by a belief in nobility and beauty human nature. Hence the amazing “livability” of a plastic form that maintains clarity, a drawing of the highest professionalism, prevailing over other means of expression, with the romantic effects of picturesque lighting. And the very theme of inevitable death, inexorable fate is so characteristic of romanticism.
As a certain standard, established artistic diagram, classicism in many ways limited the romantic artist. The conventions of academic language, the language of the “School”, as the Academies were called in Europe, were fully manifested in Pompey: theatrical poses, gestures, facial expressions, lighting effects. But we must admit that Bryullov strived for historical truth, trying to reproduce as accurately as possible specific monuments discovered by archaeologists and which amazed the whole world, to visually fill in the scenes described by Pliny the Younger in a letter to Tacitus. Exhibited first in Milan, then in Paris, the painting was brought to Russia in 1834 and was a resounding success. Gogol spoke enthusiastically about her. The significance of Bryullov’s work for Russian painting is determined by the well-known words of the poet: “And the “Last Day of Pompeii” became the first day for the Russian brush.”
K.P. Bryullov- a representative of historical painting, whose work intertwined elements of classicism and romanticism. "The last day of Pompeii"
“Horsewoman”, Self-portrait.
P.A.Fedotov- genre writer. He has a deep understanding of life and its dramatic essence. His talent was most fully revealed in genre painting, where he progressed from caricatured subjects (“Fresh Cavalier”; “The Picky Bride”), to tragic and laconic images (“The Widow”), to the metaphorical nature of the figurative system. His art served as a model for several generations of artists: the Itinerants adopted and developed the critical pathos of his work, artists of the turn of the 19th - 20th centuries. attracted drama and metaphor;
A.A.Ivanov- “The Appearance of Christ to the People” - the painting from which all subsequent generations of Russian artists studied, reflected the most intimate meaning of the Gospel and the essence of the spiritual aspirations of the people.
A.E. Martynov, a landscape painter and engraver, completed one of the first lithographed series, “Collection of views of St. Petersburg and its environs.”
From the beginning of the 19th century. in Russian fine arts such a direction is developing as sentimentalism(from English sentimental - sensitive) - a movement in the art of the 18th century. It was prepared by the crisis of educational rationalism. However, elements of sentimentalism in the work of Russian masters were usually combined with elements of classicism or romanticism. The features of sentimentalism were most fully embodied in the works of the remarkable artist A.G. Venetsianova, who lovingly wrote Central Russian village landscapes, portraits of peasants.
Characteristic features of Russian sentimentalism:
Attention to human personality;
Cult of feeling and imagination;
Development of family psychological plots;
Image of nature.
The real founder of the everyday genre was Alexey Gavrilovich Venetsianov(1780-1847). A land surveyor by training, Venetsianov left his service for the sake of painting, moved from Moscow to St. Petersburg and became a student of Borovikovsky. He took his first steps in the “arts” in the genre of portraiture, creating amazingly poetic, lyrical, sometimes romantic images in pastels, pencils, and oils (portrait of B.S. Putyatina, Tretyakov Gallery). But soon the artist abandoned portraiture for caricatures, and for one action-packed caricature, “The Nobleman,” the very first issue of the “Magazine of Caricatures for 1808 in Persons,” which he had conceived, was closed. Venetsianov’s etching was, in fact, an illustration for Derzhavin’s ode and depicted petitioners crowding in the reception room, while in the mirror a nobleman was visible in the arms of a beauty (it is assumed that this is a caricature of Count Bezborodko).
At the turn of the 10-20s, Venetsianov left St. Petersburg for the Tver province, where he bought a small estate. Here he found his main theme, devoting himself to depicting peasant life. In the painting “The Threshing Barn” (1821-1822, Russian Museum), he showed a labor scene in the interior. In an effort to accurately reproduce not only the poses of the workers, but also the lighting, he even had one wall of the threshing floor cut out. Life, as it is, is what Venetsianov wanted to portray when he painted peasants peeling beets; a landowner giving a task to a yard girl; sleeping shepherdess; a girl with a little squirrel in her hand; peasant children admiring the butterfly; scenes of harvest, haymaking, etc. Of course, Venetsianov did not reveal the most acute conflicts in the life of the Russian peasant, did not raise “thorny issues” of our time. This is a patriarchal, idyllic life.
But the artist did not introduce poetry into it from the outside, did not invent it, but drew it from the people’s life itself, which he depicted with such love. In Venetsianov’s paintings there are no dramatic plots or dynamic plots; on the contrary, they are static, “nothing happens” in them. But man is always in unity with nature, in eternal work, and this makes Venetsianov’s images truly monumental. Is he a realist? In the understanding of this word by artists of the second half of the 19th century, it is unlikely. His concept has a lot of classicist ideas (it’s worth remembering his “Spring. On the Plowed Field”, Tretyakov Gallery), and especially from sentimentalist ones (“At the Harvest. Summer”, Tretyakov Gallery), and in his understanding of space there are also romantic ones. And, nevertheless, Venetsianov’s work is a certain stage on the path to the formation of Russian critical realism of the 19th century, and this is also the enduring significance of his painting. This determines his place in Russian art as a whole.
Venetsianov was an excellent teacher. Venetsianov's school, the Venetsianovites, are a whole galaxy of artists of the 20-40s who worked with him both in St. Petersburg and on his Safonkovo estate. This is A.V. Tyranov, E.F. Krendovsky, K.A. Zelentsov, A.A. Alekseev, S.K. Zaryanko, L.K. Plakhov, N.S. Krylov and many others. Among Venetsianov's students, many came from peasant backgrounds. Under the brush of the Venetian artists, not only scenes of peasant life were born, but also urban ones: St. Petersburg streets, folk types, landscapes. A.V. Tyranov painted interior scenes, portraits, landscapes, and still lifes. The Venetians especially loved “family portraits in the interior” - combining the concreteness of the images with the detail of the narrative, conveying the atmosphere of the environment (for example, Tyranov’s painting “The Chernetsov Brothers Artists’ Workshop”, 1828, which combines a portrait, a genre, and a still life).
18. The problem of academicism in Russian painting of the second third of the 19th century.
Academicism- direction in European painting of the 17th-19th centuries. Academic painting arose during the period of development of art academies in Europe. The stylistic basis of academic painting at the beginning of the 19th century was classicism, and in the second half of the 19th century - eclecticism. Academicism grew by following the external forms of classical art. Followers characterized this style as a reflection on the art form of the ancient ancient world and the Renaissance. Academicism helped the arrangement of objects in art education, complemented the traditions of ancient art, in which the image of nature was idealized, while compensating for the norm of beauty.
For Russian academicism of the first half of the 19th century centuries are characterized by sublime themes, high metaphorical style, versatility, multi-figures and pomp. Were popular biblical stories, salon landscapes and ceremonial portraits. Despite the limited subject matter of the paintings, the works of the academicians were distinguished by high technical skill. Representative - K. Bryullov (“Horsewoman”).
In the middle of the 19th century. realism began to take hold in a stubborn struggle against academism, represented by the leadership of the Academy of Arts. The academy's leaders instilled in students that art was higher than life and put forward only biblical and mythological themes for creativity. Fourteen students from the history class did not want to paint pictures on the proposed theme from Scandinavian mythology and submitted a petition to leave the academy. The rebels united into a kamunna, headed by Kramskoy.
And in 70, the Society of Itinerants was formed. The Peredvizhniki" were united in their rejection of "academicism" with its mythology, decorative landscapes and pompous theatricality. They wanted to portray living life. Genre (everyday) scenes occupied a leading place in their work. The peasantry enjoyed particular sympathy with the “Itinerants”. Perov (“Troika”, “Old Parents at the Grave of their Son”, “Tea Party in Mytishchi”). S. A. Korovina “On the World” Myasoedov “Mowers”. Kramskoy - portraits of Nekrasov, Tolstoy, “Christ in the Desert”, also Myasoedov, Savrasov, Ge.
19. Association of Traveling Exhibitions
In the 70s, progressive democratic painting wins public recognition. She has her own critics - I.N. Kramskoy and V.V. Stasov and his collector - P.M. Tretyakov. The time for Russian democratic realism to flourish in the second half of the 19th century is coming.
At this time in the center of the official school- St. Petersburg Academy of Arts - a struggle is also brewing for the right of art to turn to real, real life, which resulted in the so-called “revolt of 14” in 1863. A number of Academy graduates refused to paint a programmatic picture on one theme of the Scandinavian epic, when there were so many exciting modern problems around, and, not receiving permission to freely choose a topic, left the Academy, founding the “St. Petersburg Artel of Artists” (F. Zhuravlev, A. Korzukhin, K. . Makovsky, A. Morozov, A. Litovchenko, etc.). "Artel" did not exist for long. And soon the Moscow and St. Petersburg advanced artistic forces united into the Association of Traveling Art Exhibitions (1870). These exhibitions were called traveling because they were organized not only in St. Petersburg and Moscow, but also in the provinces (sometimes in 20 cities during the year). It was like “going to the people” of artists. The partnership existed for over 50 years (until 1923). Each exhibition was a huge event in the life of the provincial city. Unlike the Artel, the Peredvizhniki had a clear ideological program - to reflect life with all its acute social problems, in all its relevance.
Myasoedov claimed that the success of the first performance should predetermine in many ways the future fate of the Partnership - and he turned out to be right. First general meeting The Association, which took place on December 6, 1870, scheduled the opening of the exhibition "on September 15 of the future 1871 and not later than October 1." But this deadline could not be met: the first exhibition opened only on November 29, 1871 and closed on January 2, 1872. Thus, it was available for viewing for a little over a month. But this month was crucial in assessing the new organization. The exhibition immediately brought recognition, although only 16 artists showed 47 works at it in St. Petersburg. This alone distinguished it from academic exhibitions that were more extensive in the number of exhibits.
“The partnership has the goal,” says § 1 of the Charter, - the organization, with proper permission, of traveling art exhibitions in the following ways: a) providing the opportunity for interested residents of the province to get acquainted with Russian art and follow its successes, b) developing love for art in society, c) making it easier for artists to sell their works."
The art of the Peredvizhniki was an expression revolutionary democratic ideas in domestic artistic culture of the second half of the 19th century. The social orientation and high citizenship of the idea distinguish it in European genre painting of the 19th century.
The partnership was created on the initiative of Myasoedov, supported by Perov, Ge, Kramskoy, Savrasov, Shishkin, the Makovsky brothers and a number of other “founding members” who signed the first charter of the Partnership. In the 70-80s they were joined by younger artists, including Repin, Surikov, Vasnetsov, Yaroshenko, Savitsky, Kasatkin and others. Since the mid-80s, Serov, Levitan, and Polenov have taken part in exhibitions. The generation of “older” Peredvizhniki was mostly of different ranks in social status. His worldview developed in the atmosphere of the 60s. He was a leader and theoretician of the Wandering Movement. Ivan Nikolaevich Kramskoy(1837-1887), who in 1863 led the “revolt of the 14,” a remarkable organizer and outstanding art critic. He was characterized by an unshakable faith, first of all, in the educational power of art, designed to form the civic ideals of the individual and improve him morally. The themes of Kramskoy's own work, however, were not typical of the Wanderers.
He rarely painted genre paintings, turned to gospel stories. But him " Christ in the desert" - the thought of a deeply lonely person sitting against the backdrop of a deserted rocky landscape Christ, his willingness to sacrifice himself in the name of the highest goal - all this was understandable to the populist intelligentsia of the 70s. In the genre of portraiture, he is also occupied by an exalted, highly spiritual personality. Kramskoy created a whole gallery of images of the largest figures of Russian culture - portraits of Saltykov-Shchedrin, Nekrasov, L. Tolstoy. Kramskoy's artistic style is characterized by a certain protocol dryness and monotony of compositional schemes. The best in terms of brightness characteristics is the portrait of L.N. Tolstoy, written by order of Tretyakov, in which the viewer is struck by the insightful, all-knowing and all-seeing gaze of calm gray-blue eyes. The portrait of A. G. Litovchenko is distinguished by its picturesque richness. Kramskoy was an artist-thinker. He is conservative in his creativity.
In addition to Kramskoy, among those who signed the Charter of the Partnership, there was another artist who was interested in Christian subjects - Nikolai Nikolaevich Ge(1831-1894). Graduated from the Academy, receiving a Major gold medal for the painting “Saul at the Witch of Endor”. In 1863 he performed his first big an independent work"The Last Supper". Light and shadow, good and evil, the collision of two different principles lie at the heart of Ge’s work. This is emphasized by light and shadow contrasts and the dynamics of expressive poses. “The Last Supper” expressed the artist’s desire for a generalized artistic form, to its monumentalization, to great art based on the traditions of the great masters of the past. It is no coincidence that he was awarded the title of professor for this painting.
Ge did a lot of portrait painting. His portraits differ from Kramskoy’s works in their emotionality, sometimes dramatism, such as the portrait of Herzen: the bitterness of doubt, the torment of thoughts, reaching the point of pain, can be read on the model’s face. The portrait of the historian N.I. Kostomarov is unusually temperamental, fresh, and freely written. Ge, like Kramskoy, is one of the organizers of the Partnership. At the first exhibition in 1871, he showed the historical painting “Peter I interrogating Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich in Peterhof.” The artist strove to convey the utmost concreteness of the situation. All of Ge's works of recent years are permeated with the moral and religious idea of restructuring the world. He also solves formal problems in a unique, new way - the search for color, light, texture. He boldly violates academic canons, often uses fragmentary compositions, sharp light and color contrasts, and writes emotionally and expressively. (“Calvary”, “What is truth? Christ and Pilate”)
Organizers of Kramskoy's Peredvizhniki and Ge in their work follow a different path than their comrades in the association, genre artists. They turn to Christian subjects, they have a different figurative and pictorial-plastic structure, more likely to gravitate towards the traditions of art of the first half of the 19th century: in Ge - to the romantic, in Kramskoy - to the rational-classical.
Vasily Maksimovich Maksimov(1844-1911) already in the first multi-figure composition - “The Arrival of a Sorcerer at a Peasant Wedding” - he comes to his main theme - the depiction of peasant life, which he himself, a native of peasants, knew perfectly well. Subsequent paintings lack a festive feeling. In them, in all its nakedness, the image of impoverished post-reform Russia emerges (“Family Division”, “Dashing Mother-in-Law”, “Everything is in the Past”).
The Wanderers of the 70s in the framework genre were able to raise the most important, most acute problems public life, as it did Grigory Grigorievich Myasoedov(1834-1911) in the film “The Zemstvo is having lunch.” The sincerity of the faith of Russian peasants was shown by Konstantin Apollonovich Savitsky (1844-1905) in the large painting “Meeting of the Icon.” Master of multi-figure compositions. “Repair work on the railway”, “To the war”.
Nikolai Alexandrovich Yaroshenko(1846-1898): “Stoker” and “Prisoner”, of which “Stoker” is the first image of a worker in Russian painting, and “Prisoner” is the most relevant image during the years of the turbulent populist revolutionary movement. “Student” is a type portrait.
Vladimir Egorovich Makovsky- “At the Doctor’s Waiting Room”, “Visiting the Poor”, “Waiting”, “Convict”, “Bank Collapse”, “Date”, “On the Boulevard”. Makovsky managed to respond to many topics. His paintings reveal the dramatic fates of not only individual people, but entire layers and generations. Makovsky did not always avoid sentimental and melodramatic situations (for example, his “I won’t let you in!”), but in his best works he remained faithful to the truth of life and amazed with the completeness of the pictorial story, the completeness of the picture, which grew out of everyday everyday scenes noticed by his keen eye.
20. Everyday genre
Genre scenes in medieval art, specific observations of everyday life arose, as a rule, with the development of secular humanistic tendencies within the framework of the dominant religious worldview and were often woven into religious and allegorical compositions. They are common in paintings, reliefs and miniatures - Russian paintings of the 17th century.
In Russia, the development of the everyday genre in the 2nd half of the 18th century. connected (with the exception of I. Firsov's "home stage" Young painter") with interest in the peasant; and here the idyllicity of idealized rural scenes (I. M. Tankov) was opposed by the loving and accurate depiction of traditional peasant life in the paintings of M. Shibanov, the harsh, uncompromising truthfulness of the display of peasant poverty in the watercolors of I. A. Ermenev.
In the 19th century democratic artists addressed to the everyday genre as a programmatic art that made it possible to critically evaluate and expose social relations and the moral norms that prevailed in bourgeois-noble society, and their manifestations in everyday life, to defend the rights of working, oppressed people, to make the viewer a direct eyewitness to the social contradictions and conflicts that filled everyday life. In the 1st half of the 19th century, a truthful, but one-sided, captivating with poetic innocence and touching sincerity depiction of the bright, cloudless aspects of the life of the peasantry and urban democratic strata (A. G. Venetsianov and the Venetsian school in Russia) played an important role in the aesthetic affirmation of everyday life.
In the everyday genre of Russian critical realism the satirical exposure of the serfdom and sympathy for the disadvantaged were complemented by a deep and accurate penetration into the spiritual world of the characters, a detailed narrative, and a detailed dramatic development of the plot and relationships of the characters. These features clearly emerged in the mid-19th century. in the paintings of P. A. Fedotov, full of burning mockery and pain, in the drawings of A. A. Agin and the Ukrainian artist T. G. Shevchenko, who combined direct and sharp journalism with a deep lyrical experience of the life tragedies of the peasantry and the urban poor.
On this basis grew having composed new stage, the everyday genre of the Itinerants, which played a leading role in their art, which exclusively fully and accurately reflected the people's life of the 2nd half of the 19th century, intensely comprehending its fundamental patterns. A detailed, typified picture of the life of all layers of Russian society was given by G. G. Myasoedov, V. M. Maksimov, K. A. Savitsky, V. E. Makovsky and - with particular depth and scope - I. E. Repin, who showed not only barbaric oppression of the people, but also the powerful vital forces hidden in it and the heroism of the fighters for its liberation. Such a breadth of tasks for a genre painting often brought it closer to a historical composition. In the paintings of N. A. Yaroshenko, N. A. Kasatkin, S. V. Ivanov, A. E. Arkhipov in the late 19th - early 20th centuries. reflected the contradictions of capitalism, the stratification of the countryside, the life and struggle of the working class and the rural poor.
Household genre from the 1860s-70s. a new type was also approved genre painting, associated in many ways with impressionism and developed in France by E. Manet, E. Degas, O. Renoir, A. Toulouse-Lautrec. What comes to the fore is the beauty of everyday life transformed by art, the expressiveness of a seemingly random, fragmentary, unexpected aspect of life, instantly captured situations, changeable moods and states, the acute specificity of the appearance and habitual movements of characters, and interest in people who stand outside social norms. A number of stylistic features of this type of genre painting were adopted in many countries by masters of the everyday genre, who sought to combine the breadth of perception of folk life with freshness and unexpected aspects (V. A. Serov, F. A. Malyavin, K. F. Yuon in Russia).
In Soviet art, the everyday genre acquired new features, conditioned by the formation and development of a socialist society - historical optimism, the affirmation of selfless free labor and a new way of life, based on the unity of social and personal principles. From the very first years of Soviet power, artists (B. M. Kustodiev, I. A. Vladimirov) sought to capture the changes brought by the revolution to the life of the country. In the work of A. A. Deineka and Yu. I. Pimenov, who were part of the OST association, the characteristic and later for them cheerful, energetic structure of paintings dedicated to construction, industrial labor, and sports began to be determined. The quest of the masters of AHRR and OST organically entered into the joyful, life-affirming art of the 1930s. Painters S. V. Gerasimov, A. A. Plastov, T. G. Gaponenko, V. G. Odintsov, F. G. Krichevsky, sculptor I. M. Chaikov captured the light, colorful sides of urban and collective farm life.
In the Soviet everyday genre. the difficult front-line and rear life of the war years with its sorrows and joys were also reflected (paintings by Yu. M. Neprintsev, B. M. Nemensky, A. I. Laktionov, V. N. Kostetsky; graphics by A. F. Pakhomov, L. V. Soifertis), and spiritual aspiration, enthusiasm for collective work and social life, typical features of the everyday life in post-war years(paintings by T. N. Yablonskaya, S. A. Chuikov, F. P. Reshetnikov, S. A. Grigoriev, U. M. Japaridze, E. F. Kalnyn, engravings by L. A. Ilyina). From the 2nd half of the 1950s. Soviet masters. B.f. They strive to expand the circle of observations of modern life, to show the courage and will of the Soviet people, growing stronger in creative work, in overcoming difficulties. In the paintings of G. M. Korzhev, V. I. Ivanov, E. E. Moiseenko, Yu. P. Kugach, T. T. Salakhov, G. S. Khandzhyan, E. K. Iltner, I. A. Zarin, I. N. Klychev, in the engravings of G. F. Zakharov, V. M. Yurkunas, V. V. Tolly, the everyday life of the people appears rich and complex, full of great thoughts and experiences.
Russian artistic culture achieved great success in the first half of the 19th century. It was at this time that Pushkin, Gogol, Lermontov, Griboyedov, Zhukovsky, Krylov were creating. This rapid flowering of artistic culture was associated with the rise of national self-awareness in the advanced circles of Russian society during the Patriotic War of 1812. The struggle for the liberation of the homeland from foreign intervention, which caused a wave of high patriotic feelings, could not but affect the phenomena of Russian art.
The advanced Russian ideology of this time took shape under the direct influence of the Patriotic War of 1812 and the noble revolutionary movement that took shape in the Decembrist program.
The Patriotic War raised people's self-awareness, feelings of patriotism and national pride to an unusually high level. Folk character wars and patriotic exploits of ordinary Russian people for a long time attracted the attention of the progressive public of Russia and caused a kind of revaluation of aesthetic values: folk images and national subjects occupied an extremely significant place in Russian art, incommensurate with the episodic role they played in the work of most masters of the 18th century . The appeal to the people injected new strength into Russian artistic culture. Advanced creative trends were based on the range of ideas put forward by noble revolutionary thought.
Criticism of the time pointed to the “powerful direction of modern genius towards the people” in all areas of art. “Nationalism” became the central problem of advanced Russian culture in the twenties and thirties of the last century. Even reactionary publicists tried to use the concept of nationality, including it in the official formula of government policy (“Orthodoxy, autocracy, nationality”). In contrast to the official interpretation of nationality in advanced artistic circles, a completely different understanding of it developed, formulated by one of the progressive art theorists in the early thirties: “By nationality I mean that patriotic animation of the fine arts, which, feeding on native impressions and memories, reflects in its works the native blessed heaven, native holy land, native precious traditions, native customs and morals, native life, native glory, native greatness.”
The first half of the 19th century was a bright page in Russian culture. All directions - literature, architecture, painting of this era are marked by a whole constellation of names that brought Russian art world fame. In the 18th century, the style of classicism dominated Russian painting. Classicism played a significant role at the very beginning of the 19th century. However, by the 1830s this direction is gradually losing its social significance, and is increasingly turning into a system of formal canons and traditions. Such traditional painting becomes a cold, official art, supported and controlled by the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts. Subsequently concept of "academicism" began to be used to denote inert art, divorced from life.
He brought new views to Russian art romanticism- a European movement that developed at the turn of the 18th - 19th centuries. One of the main postulates of romanticism, opposite to classicism, is affirmation of a person’s personality, his thoughts and worldview as the main value in art. Securing a person’s right to personal independence gave rise to a special interest in his inner world, and at the same time presupposed the artist’s freedom of creativity. In Russia, romanticism acquired its own peculiarity: at the beginning of the century it had heroic coloring, and during the years of the Nikolaev reaction - tragic. At the same time, romanticism in Russia has always been a form of artistic thinking, close in spirit to revolutionary and freedom-loving sentiments.
Having as its peculiarity the knowledge of a specific person, romanticism became the basis for the subsequent emergence and the formation of a realistic direction, established in art in the second half of the 19th century. A characteristic feature of realism was its appeal to the theme of modern folk life, the establishment of a new theme in art - the life of peasants. Here, first of all, it is necessary to note the name of the artist A.G. Venetsianova. The most fully realistic discoveries of the first half of the 19th century were reflected in the 1840s in the works of P.A. Fedotova.
Overall cultural life during this period was ambiguous and diverse: some prevailing trends in art were replaced by others. Therefore, researchers, when examining the art of the first half of the 19th century in more detail, usually divide it into two periods - the first and second quarters of the century. However, it is worth noting that this division is conditional. In addition, there is no need to talk about classicism, romanticism and realism in their pure form during this period: their differentiation, both chronologically and by characteristics, is not absolute.
Painting in the first half of the 19th century acquired much greater significance in the life of society than it did in the 18th century. The development of national self-awareness, caused by the victory in the Patriotic War of 1812, raised people's interest in national culture and history, to domestic talents. As a result, during the first quarter of the century, public organizations arose for the first time, the main task of which was the development of the arts. Among these organizations were such as Free Society of Lovers of Literature, Science and the Arts, Society for the Encouragement of Artists. Special magazines appeared, and the first attempts were made to collect and display Russian art. Thus, the small private “Russian Museum” of P. Svinin became famous in educated circles, and the Russian Gallery was created at the Imperial Hermitage in 1825. Since the beginning of the century, the practice of the Academy of Arts has included periodic exhibitions, which attracted many visitors. At the same time, a great achievement was the admission of ordinary people to these exhibitions on certain days, which, nevertheless, caused objections from some magazine critics.
Outstanding achievements in Russian art of the early 19th century are characterized by portrait painting. Throughout the century, the Russian portrait will be the genre of painting that most directly connected artists with society, with outstanding contemporaries. After all, as you know, artists received a large number of orders from individuals specifically for portraits.
OREST KIPRENSKY (1782-1836)
Orest Kiprensky, one of the greatest painters of the first half of the 19th century - Self-portrait (1). The art of this artist, like any great master, is heterogeneous. In his creative aspirations, Kiprensky is subject to influenced by both romanticism and classicism. The works of an artist even from the same period are often dissimilar. Kiprensky's best paintings highlight a romantic understanding of the human personality. In his works the artist endows a person with spiritual qualities- intelligence, nobility, character, ability to think and feel. That is why in his portraits Kiprensky mainly depicted or prominent contemporaries– among his works are portraits of Pushkin, Batyushkov, Zhukovsky, heroes of the Patriotic War of 1812, or your close friends. The gallery of portraits created by him is the pride of Russian fine art. Immediately after graduating from the Academy of Arts Kiprensky devoted entirely to portraiture. One of the best works of the then young artist was portrait of Davydov (2). Kiprensky created the image of a Russian officer characteristic of the era - a participant in the struggle for the independence of his homeland. Kiprensky's high artistic skill was revealed in the emotional elation of the portrait and its richness of colors. In other portrait works and in a whole series of pencil drawings, the artist captured images of war participants, officers, and militias with whom he was personally well acquainted. In all of Kiprensky’s portraiture, along with the features of romantic elation, one can clearly see the desire for a realistic disclosure of human psychology. Of exceptional interest is portrait of A. S. Pushkin (3), truthfully capturing the image of the great poet for future generations. The importance of Kiprensky, a subtle draftsman and colorist, in Russian art of the first half of the 19th century is enormous.
Contemporaries compared his works with the genres of lyrical poetry, poetic dedication to friends, which was well common in Pushkin’s time. Kiprensky's portraits are always endowed with deep thoughtfulness; they seem to peer into the world. Kiprensky in many ways discovered new possibilities for himself in painting. Each of his portraits is distinguished by a new pictorial structure, well-chosen light and shadow, varied contrast - “Neapolitan girl with fruits” (4), “Gypsy with a branch of myrtle” (5), “Girl in a poppy wreath with a carnation in her hand (Mariuccia)” (6), “Young gardener” (7), “Portrait of E.P. . Rostopchina" (8). By truthfully conveying the individual features of his models, K. managed to embody great social content in his best portraits, to show the human dignity and depth of spiritual culture of the people depicted: behind their external calm, living human feelings are always felt.
The Nikolaev reaction that followed the defeat of the Decembrists forced the artist to leave again in 1828 for Italy, where he died.
VASILY TROPININ (1776-1857) –(9)
A significant phenomenon in the history of Russian painting was the work of V. Tropinin, a remarkable realist artist, a significant part of my life former serf.
Vasily Andreevich Tropinin was even somewhat older than Kiprensky, but unfavorable circumstances delayed the development of his talent for a long time.
In those years when Kiprensky created the portrait of Davydov, marking the pinnacle of Russian romantic painting, Tropinin was still an unknown serf artist on the Ukrainian estate of Count Morkov and combined the duties of a pastry chef and senior footman with painting. Due to the whim of the landowner, he was unable to complete his education at the Academy of Arts. Tropinin's youth was spent self-taught, despite obstacles, mastering technical skills and achieving professional excellence. In his studies, he chose the path that self-taught artists of his time usually followed: he worked hard and a lot from life and copied paintings in private art collections, to which he had access thanks to the connections of his landowner. He studied painting techniques not in an academic workshop, but from his own experience and from the works of old masters, and life in Ukraine, as the artist himself later said, replaced his trip to Italy.
This system of self-education, with all its shortcomings, could still have some positive aspects for an artist with great and original talent. Freedom from routine academic teaching partly helped Tropinin maintain intact the purity and originality of his artistic perceptions. Lively communication with nature and knowledge of folk life, supported by constant work from nature, contributed to the development of realistic tendencies inherent in Tropinin’s talent. But in his younger years, forcibly separated from the artistic environment, he was not yet at the level of the advanced tasks of the art of his time. Tropinin's work, even at the end of the 1810s, was closer in style not to the works of his peers, but to the art of the 18th century.
The long-awaited freedom from serfdom came only in 1823, when Tropinin was already forty-seven years old; The flowering of his talent dates back to this time. It was during this period that his own, independent artistic system arose, which uniquely reworked the legacy of classicism and painting techniques of the 18th century, and the one created by Tropinin finally took shape. genre of intimate everyday portrait. Experts call Tropinin’s portraits the “antipode” of Kiprensky’s portraits, since his paintings show a free, uninhibited, “homely” person.
“A portrait of a person is painted for the memory of people close to him, people who love him,” Tropinin himself said; This somewhat naive statement contains, in essence, a whole program that characterizes Tropinin’s tasks and his attitude to reality. In Tropinin's portraits it is conveyed intimate, “homely” appearance of the people of his era; Tropinin’s characters do not “pose” in front of the artist and the viewer, but are captured as they were in private life, around the family hearth.
Tropinin turned to genre motifs, dedicating depiction of a simple working person a number of works. In his works, he pays great attention to the study of nature - all his portraits truthfully reproduce the life around the artist, there is nothing deliberate or contrived in them - “Girl with a Doll” (10), “Old Coachman Leaning on a Whip” (11), “Lacemaker” (12).
His softly painted portraits are distinguished by high pictorial merits and ease of perception; human images are perceived as characteristic truthfulness and calmness without much inner excitement .
Some of these works, despite their quite obvious realistic character, have features of sentimentalism - “Girl with a pot of roses” (13), “Woman in the window. (Treasurer)” (14).
At the end of 1826, S. A. Sobolevsky, a close friend of Pushkin, approached Tropinin with a proposal to paint a portrait of the poet. The attributes of “homeliness” - a robe, an unbuttoned shirt collar, disheveled hair - are perceived not as evidence of the intimate ease of the poser, but rather as a sign of that “poetic disorder” with which romantic art so often associated the idea of inspiration “Portrait of Pushkin” (15). In its figurative structure, the portrait of Pushkin echoes the works of contemporary romantic painting by Tropinin, but at the same time Tropinin managed to create a romantic image without sacrificing the realistic accuracy and truthfulness of the image. Pushkin is depicted sitting, in a natural and relaxed pose. The face, shaded by the whiteness of the shirt lapel, is the most intense colorful spot in the picture and is also its compositional center. The artist did not seek to “embellish” Pushkin’s face and soften the irregularity of his features; but, conscientiously following nature, he managed to recreate and capture it high spirituality. Contemporaries unanimously recognized the impeccable resemblance to Pushkin in Tropinin’s portrait. In comparison with the famous portrait of Pushkin by Kiprensky, the Tropinin portrait seems more modest and, perhaps, intimate, but is not inferior to it either in expressiveness or in pictorial power.
In the first quarter of the 19th century, important processes took place in the area LANDSCAPE PAINTING. If the landscapes of artists of previous times were largely conventional and deliberately constructed, and, as a rule, they were painted in the studio, without nature or had very little to do with it, now landscape painters bring much more into their work life truth, keen observation and emotional beginning. The most significant place here belongs, of course, to Sylvester Shchedrin.
SYLVESTER SHCHEDRIN (1791- 1830)
Master of Russian landscape romanticism and lyrical interpretation of nature. The work of Sylvester Feodosievich Shchedrin marked the boundary between old and new in the history of Russian landscape. The artist brought to perfection what his predecessors had strived for and laid the foundation for a new realistic development of Russian landscape painting. His works clearly show a persistent work from life. He was the first Russian painter to turn to plein air work. All his landscapes accurately convey the character of nature. Shchedrin also introduces people into his landscapes, however, no longer in the form of faceless figures for scale, as was the case before, but living people who are truly connected with nature. In his best works, he successfully overcame the conventional, “museum” flavor and truthfully conveyed the natural state of nature- nuances of sunlight, a light blue haze in the distance, gentle tints of the blue sky. He had a subtle lyrical sense of nature.
After graduating from the Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg, in 1818 arrived in Italy and lived for more than 10 years. He deserved something incredible for those times. popularity among Italians Those who wanted to buy his paintings sometimes had to write many copies of their most successful works, which quickly sold out. His famous works - “New Rome “Castle of the Holy Angel” (17), Mergellina Promenade in Naples (18), Grand Harbor on the island of Capri (19) and others. Having overcome the tradition of the “heroic landscape” and the understanding of nature developed at the Academy of Arts as a reason for historical memories, turning to living, contemporary reality and real nature, Shchedrin at the same time overcame the conventional academic scheme for the artistic solution of the landscape theme.
Having lived a short but creative life, Shchedrin was never able to return to Russia. Magnificent Italian landscapes reflected all the unique beauty of the nature of this region, which many Russian artists imagined as a paradise - a promised land - “Grotto in Florence” (20), “Italian landscape. Capri" (21), "Moonlit Night in Naples" (22), "View of Lake Nemi in the vicinity of Rome."
In this small canvas belonging to the best creatures Russian landscape painting, the main features of Shchedrin’s new artistic system appear with full clarity. “View of Lake Nemi” is alien to those deliberate effects that constitute the very essence of the academic landscape. In the Shchedrin landscape there are no classical groves, no waterfalls, no majestic ruins; idealization is replaced by a living and truthful recreation of the image of nature. The basis of the new method is not the “composition” of a landscape, but direct and precise observation of nature.
A narrow path, lined with old trees, winds along the shore and leads the viewer's gaze into the depths of the picture. In the foreground there are several figures: two peasant women are talking on the shore, a monk is walking, and a boy driver is leading a donkey behind him. Further on you can see the calm, light waters of the lake; in the depths, covering the horizon, a high mountain covered with forest turns blue. Soft diffused light floods the picture, sun glare falls through the tree branches onto the sandy path, the water glistens silver in the sun, and a transparent airy veil envelops near and distant objects.
The realistic mastery of space is one of Shchedrin’s main achievements in this film. There are no backstage scenes, no object markers marking the depth. Linear perspective gave way to aerial perspective. True, the three traditional plans are still preserved in the picture, but the road going deeper connects them together and makes the space continuous. The artist is no longer satisfied with the truthful reproduction of individual details; he achieves the integrity of the overall impression and the organic unity of all the elements that make up the landscape. Transmission of light and air, unity of lighting, connecting objects and spatial plans, is the main means through which the picture acquires this integrity.
The painting system developed by Shchedrin based on the study of nature in the open air (the so-called plein air painting) opens a new page in the history of landscape. It is not surprising that the innovation of the Russian master was not immediately appreciated and caused protests from conservative art criticism. It seemed to the ideologists of academic art that Shchedrin “adhered to a slavish imitation of nature, not allowing deviations even in favor of the elegant.” Indeed, the artist consciously abandoned conventional and fictitious effects, which were considered “elegant” in circles close to the Academy of Arts. But, of course, he was very far from passively copying nature. His painting not only captures the real appearance of the shores of Lake Nemi, but also reveals with deep and genuine penetration the poetry of Italian nature, its sunny tranquility and bright, peaceful harmony.
The artist became interested in another motif - a terrace covered with grapes overlooking the sea - “Veranda entwined with grapes” (24).
ALEXEY VENETSIANOV (1780-1847) – (25)
Venetsianov is called founder of Russian genre (everyday) painting. This is not entirely true - he had predecessors back in the 18th century. But it begins with Venetsianov rise of realistic trends in Russian art, accompanied by an appeal to the world of national and folk images and an increase in interest in modern life.
Venetsianov's creativity is imbued with patriotic and authentic democratic attitude. The era of social upsurge associated with the Patriotic War opened the artist’s eyes to the deep moral qualities of a simple Russian man from the people, to his heroism and human dignity. IN Russian serf peasantry Venetsianov, an artist-humanist, was able to discern the features not of a slave, but, on the contrary, of a higher human type.
Wonderful Russian genre painter and portrait painter Alexey Gavrilovich Venetsianov for the first time in Russian painting combined images of peasants and national nature. Venetsianov - the creator of an entire gallery peasant portraits - “The Sleeping Shepherd” (26).
The painting “The Sleeping Shepherd” occupies a prominent place in this cycle. She is one of Venetsianov's most poetic creations. The artist depicted peasant children with particular warmth and lyrical elation. The purity and harmonious clarity of his artistic thinking perfectly suited the tasks of recreating a child's world. None of the Russian masters of his time achieved such insight, such acute truthfulness and, at the same time, such strength of poetic feeling in the depiction of children's images and childhood experiences. This, however, does not exhaust the content of “The Sleeping Shepherd.” Here all the main features of Venetsianov’s artistic language, the entire structure of his imaginative thinking, all the progressive aspects of his art, but at the same time the historically explainable limitations of his realism appear clearly and clearly. There is no action in The Sleeping Shepherdess. A peasant boy is depicted falling asleep in a field; he sits on the bank of a narrow river, leaning against the trunk of a large old birch tree, and behind him in the background of the picture opens a typical Russian landscape with a rickety hut, rare fir trees and endless fields that stretch to the horizon. But deep emotional content is embedded in this simple plot. Venetsianov’s painting is imbued with a feeling of peace and tranquility, a lyrical love for nature and man.
The main theme of the picture is the harmonious fusion of man with nature, and Venetsianov undoubtedly echoes here the sentimentalism of the late 18th century. In “The Shepherdess” there are no traces of deliberate posing; on the contrary, the entire appearance of the sleeping boy is marked by features of lively and relaxed naturalness. Venetsianov with particular care emphasizes the national Russian type in him and gives his face an expression of genuine touching spiritual purity. Critics sometimes reproached Venetsianov for the somewhat mannered pose of a shepherdess, but this reproach is unfair - it is the pose of the sleeping boy, with its peculiar numbness, which well conveys the state of sleep, that testifies to the artist’s keen observation and the closeness of his images to living nature. The landscape plays a particularly significant role in the picture. It no longer becomes a “background” for the image of a person, but an independent and essential means in conveying feelings and in constructing an image. It was in landscape that Venetsianov acted as the founder of a new direction, which was later widely developed by Russian art of the 19th century. Venetsianov turned to the simple, “unadorned” nature of his native country and recreated it not only with careful accuracy, but also with a deep lyrical feeling.
The image of nature, just like the image of man, in Venetsianov’s art becomes the bearer of an idyllic worldview.
“Fortune telling by cards” (27), “Reapers” (28), “Peasant woman with a scythe and rake (Pelageya” (29), “Bathers” (30), “On the arable land. Spring” (31) . In his works of art, the painter expresses his ideological and aesthetic position. Venetsianov showed the spiritual attractiveness of the peasants, asserted his personality, thereby defending his human rights. In his works depicting peasants, the artist sought to reveal spiritual and physical beauty of a simple Russian person. The painter deeply sympathized with the peasant lot, put a lot of effort into alleviating the situation of serf artists, but at the same time he was far from social criticism. Venetsianov’s work was greatly influenced by the classical heritage: he was not afraid to use the means of old painting in his works. At the same time, being a realist in his aspirations, along with the sublime harmony of the classicists, he was close to the respect for the individual characteristic of romanticism. The broad appeal of the “father of the Russian genre” to the peasant theme was a genuine artistic revelation for that time and was warmly received by the leading part of Russian society.
Venetsianov's innovation was manifested not only in the fact that he turned to a range of images that were new in Russian painting, but also in the fact that to implement them he developed new realistic visual means. Venetsianov openly broke with the old conventional art of the Academy and called to learn from life, from nature, to study it and imitate it.
Great importance of Venetsianov as a teacher. On his Safonkovo estate, he created an art school, in which a whole galaxy of painters, the so-called Venetians, were educated. These artists, following the precepts of their teacher, worked primarily in the field of genre, depicting domestic life, street scenes, the work of peasants and artisans, and rural landscapes.
The exorbitant expenses associated with the need to maintain the school and provide for its students placed a heavy burden on the estate. In the end, he was forced to mortgage the estate to the Board of Guardians. Trying to somehow improve his financial situation, Venetsianov took on commissioned work. For the most part, these were portraits and icons for churches. On December 4, 1847, having completed sketches of icons for one of the Tver churches, he wanted to personally take them to Tver. On the way down the steep mountain, the horses began to skid, Venetsianov was thrown out of the sleigh, and he became entangled in the reins. The troika dragged the already lifeless body to the village of Poddubye.
KARL BRYULLOV (1799-1852) - (32)
Karl Petrovich Bryullov - an outstanding Russian historical painter, portrait painter, landscape painter, author of monumental paintings; winner of honorary awards: large gold medals for the paintings “The Appearance of Three Angels to Abraham at the Oak of Mamre” (1821) and “The Last Day of Pompeii” (1834), Order of Anna, III degree; Member of the Milan and Parma Academies, the Academy of St. Luke in Rome, professor of the St. Petersburg and Florence Academies of Arts, honorary free associate of the Paris Academy of Arts.
In the family of academician of ornamental sculpture P.I. Brullo, all seven children had artistic talents. Five sons: Fedor, Alexander, Karl, Pavel and Ivan became artists. But the glory that fell to Karl overshadowed the successes of the other brothers. Meanwhile, he grew up as a weak and frail child, practically did not get out of bed for seven years and was so exhausted by scrofula that he “became an object of disgust for his parents.”
Karl Pavlovich Bryullov was one of the brightest, and at the same time controversial artist in Russian painting of the 19th century. Bryullov had a brilliant talent and independent way of thinking. Despite the trends of the times (the influence of romanticism), the artist was unable to completely get rid of the classicist canons. Perhaps that is why his work was highly valued by the far from advanced St. Petersburg Academy of Arts: in his youth he was its student, and later became an emeritus professor. However, with the exception of Fedotov, the artist did not have students of significant talent. His followers for the most part became superficial salon painters, having adopted only some of Bryullov’s external techniques. Nevertheless, during his lifetime, Bryullov, or “the great Karl,” as the elite nicknamed him, was revered not only in Russia, but also by many prominent people in Europe. In the second half of the 19th century, during the heyday of realism, artists and critics saw in Bryullov only a representative of an “academic” trend that was unacceptable to them. Many years passed before the artist took his rightful place in the history of Russian art.
Bryullov was a man of enormous talent, which he demonstrated in a wide variety of genres of art. Development Russian historical painting, portrait, drawing, decorative painting owes a lot to his work. In each of these genres, the virtuoso skill of this remarkable artist has left a deep mark.
Having received his initial education from his father, a professor at the Academy of Arts, and subsequently at the Academy itself, Bryullov discovered outstanding artistic abilities from his youth.
While a pensioner in Rome and having studied the classical heritage, he produced works that immediately revealed not only the maturity of his talent, but also the fruitfulness of his search for realistic expressiveness of the artistic image. Such paintings by Bryullov as "Italian morning" (33), “Noon” and some others, dedicated to the life of the Italian people, evoked in St. Petersburg the reproach of the defenders of classicism for the young artist’s excessive commitment to real life. This did not bother Bryullov at all, and he continued to work on his largest canvas with great enthusiasm. "The last day of Pompeii" (34), which brought him fame as the best painter of the era. Having done a huge amount of preliminary work, he created a truly dramatic epic, the romantic elation of the images of which made a colossal impression on his contemporaries. This painting was a triumph of Russian fine art, convincing evidence of its maturity.
The understanding of the historical theme expressed in “The Last Day of Pompeii” directly resonates with the range of historical ideas developed by advanced Russian literature and social thought of the 1820-1830s.
In contrast to previous historical painting with its cult of heroes and emphasized attention to the individual, opposed to the impersonal crowd, Bryullov conceived “The Last Day of Pompeii” as crowd scene, wherein the only and true hero would be the people. All the main characters in the film are almost equal exponents of its theme; The meaning of the picture is embodied not in the depiction of a single heroic act, but in a careful and accurate transmission of the psychology of the masses. Work on “The Last Day of Pompeii” dragged on for almost six years.
The theme of the painting is taken from ancient Roman history.
Pompeii (or rather Pompeii) - an ancient Roman city located at the foot of Vesuvius - on August 24, 79 AD, as a result of a powerful volcanic eruption, it was filled with lava and covered with stones and ash. Two thousand residents (of which there were about 30,000 in total) died on the streets of the city during a stampede.
For more than one and a half thousand years, the city remained buried underground and forgotten. Only at the end of the 16th century, during excavation work, a place was accidentally discovered where a lost Roman settlement had once been located. Since 1748, archaeological excavations began, especially intensified in the first decades of the 19th century.
In the center of the picture is the prostrate figure of a young woman who fell to her death from a chariot. It can be assumed that in this figure Bryullov wanted to symbolize the entire dying ancient world; a hint of such an interpretation is also found in the reviews of contemporaries. It is no coincidence that next to the central figure of the murdered woman the artist depicted a beautiful baby, as a symbol of the inexhaustible power of life. In the picture there is both a pagan priest and a Christian priest, as if personifying the departing ancient world and the Christian civilization emerging on its ruins.
Being a painter of great talent, Bryullov destroyed the narrow framework of academic canons with his works. His works were invariably distinguished by their breadth of concept.
In his work the artist mainly paid attention to the person, revealing the power of his mind and affirming the nobility of his aspirations. In every work of Bryullov, in any of his canvases and in any of his drawings, love and respect for man are invariably embodied - “The Genius of Art” (35), “Narcissus Looking into the Water” (36), “Sleeping Juno” (37).
The artist’s achievements in the field of portraiture are not accidental. Bryullov printed a whole series of images of his contemporaries. Along with official commissioned portraits, he left us a number of deep realistic images of artists, people of his circle - writers, artists, actors - “Horsewoman” (38), “Fortune Telling Svetlana” (39), “Portrait of Princess Volkonskaya” (40), “Turkish Woman” (41), “Dream of a Nun” (42), “Profile of Glinka’s Head” (43).
ALEXANDER IVANOV (1806-1858)
A new and even more significant page in the history of Russian painting was the work of Alexander Ivanov. Having received art education in St. Petersburg, Ivanov, as a pensioner of the Society for the Encouragement of the Arts, was sent to Italy to improve and study classical art.
Raised by his father, a professor of historical painting at the Academy of Arts, in the traditions of Russian classicism, Ivanov acutely felt the decline of this style in new historical conditions and the collapse of the aesthetic ideals and ideas that had recently dominated. He set the goal of his entire life to return art to its social significance. The creative achievements of the great classical artists, in his opinion, should have been linked with new advanced ideas of Russian society. “To combine Raphael’s technique,” he wrote, “with the ideas of a new civilization - this is the task of art at the present time.”
“The Appearance of Christ to Mary Magdalene” (44), - belongs to the early period of Ivanov’s work and has all the features inherent in classicism: a balanced composition, distribution of figures and objects according to plans, smooth pattern and local color, emotional expressiveness in the interpretation of traditional mythological and evangelical themes.
Leading value for Ivanov are images of the art of the Italian Renaissance. Completes early period creative artist painting “Apollo, Hyacinth and Cypress, engaged in music and singing” (44a), created by Ivanov already in Rome, which is distinguished by its unusually subtle compositional and coloristic harmony and the poetic sublimity of its interpretation of the images of ancient myth. This is antiquity perceived through the Renaissance. The artist seems to reveal the hidden divine meaning of nature.
The great Russian artist Alexander Andreevich Ivanov enriched Russian and European painting of the 19th century with depth philosophical thought. In his work, Ivanov raised many problems of contemporary life: the artist was the first in Russian painting to raise the question of social inequality of people. His worldview was formed under the influence of N.V. Gogol, with whom the artist was friends during these years. Gogol largely influenced Ivanov’s ideas about the educational tasks of art. Ivanov realized educational and prophetic role of the artist, he believed that art should serve the transformation and moral improvement of humanity. The artist sought to comprehend
The crisis of serfdom slows down the development of the capitalist system. Freedom-loving ideas are emerging in secular circles, the Patriotic War of 1812 is going on, as well as Russian troops participating in the liberation of European states from Napoleon, the Decembrist uprising in 1825 against tsarism, all this has an impact on painting.
What is the difference between painting in the era of the genius A.S. Pushkin?
Probably the embodiment of the bright and humane ideals of a freedom-loving people...
Along with classicism, the romantic movement was developing, and realism was being formed.
The romantic direction of Russian painting became the beginning of the development of realism in subsequent decades. This is how rapprochement goes Russian artists, romantics with real life, which was the essence of the artist movement of this time. The wide distribution of exhibitions at the same time speaks of the rapprochement of the Russian people with the world of art; people of all classes strive to visit exhibitions. It is believed that the painting by K.P. Bryulov’s “The Last Day of Pompeii” served as such a rapprochement. St. Petersburg people of all classes tried to see her.
Russian painting is becoming multinational, paintings acquire national shades, students of different nationalities are accepted into the Academy. Natives of Ukraine, Belarus, the Baltic States, Transcaucasia and Central Asia study here.
In the first half of the 19th century, painting was represented in all genres: portrait, landscape, still life, historical painting.
Famous Russian artists in the first half of the 19th century:
Masterpieces of Russian painting
- Painting by Bryullov K.P. "The last day of Pompeii"
- Painting by Aivazovsky I.K. "The Ninth Wave"
- Painting by Bruni F.A. "Copper Serpent"
- Painting by Venetsianov A.G. "The threshing floor"
- Painting by Tropinin V.A. "The Lacemaker"
Painting of the first half of the 19th century
The beginning of the 19th century is traditionally called the golden age of Russian culture. This is the time when the genius of A. Pushkin, A. Griboyedov and N. Gogol shone, and the Russian school of painting in the person of K. Bryullov received European recognition. The masters of this historical period, despite the dramatic circumstances of life, strived in art for serene harmony and a bright dream, avoiding the depiction of earthly passions. This was largely due to the general mood of disappointment in the active struggle that reigned in Western Europe and Russia after the collapse of the ideas of the Great French Revolution. People begin to “withdraw into themselves” and indulge in solitary dreams. The era of romanticism is coming, which in Russia coincided with the beginning of the reign of the new Emperor Alexander I and the war with Napoleon.
The portrait art of the early 19th century reflects the hidden world of emotional experiences, melancholy, and disappointment. The main representative of the romantic trend in Russian portrait art was Orest Adamovich Kiprensky (1782–1836). A graduate of the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, Kiprensky lived a stormy life in which there was everything: crazy romantic impulses, passionate love, the rise of fame and death in poverty in a foreign land. From the first, St. Petersburg period of his life, a precious legacy remains - brilliant paintings in the portrait genre (“Portrait of A.K. Shvalbe”, “Portrait of E.V. Davydov”, “Portrait of Countess E.P. Rostopchina”, “Portrait D. N. Khvostova”, etc.). The heroes of Kiprensky’s portraits are emphatically restrained, do not show their emotions, but on the face of each of them lies the stamp of “preparedness” for the trials of fate, the significance of the human personality, characteristic of romanticism, regardless of class, gender and age.
In the first years of the 19th century, the Empire style came to Russia from Napoleonic France - a new return of classicism. Rational clarity, harmonious balance, majestic severity, overcoming earthly passions for the sake of the ideals of patriotic valor - all these features of the classicist style were in demand during the Patriotic War with Napoleon. The most striking exponent of classicism in Russian painting was Fyodor Petrovich Tolstoy (1783–1873), a wonderful sculptor, painter and draftsman. In his captivating still lifes, fruits and flowers appear as “pearls of creation,” as the ancient ideal of harmonious perfection, purified of everything “earthly” and random.
The fire of Moscow, the partisan movement, the victorious end of the war with Napoleon - all this for the first time forced the nobility to take a new look at the people, realize their position and recognize their human dignity. In the works of Alexei Gavrilovich Venetsianov (1780–1847), the world of the serf peasantry appears for the first time. This artist went against the established academic routine - he began to paint not according to academic schemes, but “a la nature,” which was a great courage in those days. His serfs, residents of the village of Safonkovo, Tver province, posed for Venetsianov. The peasant world in Venetsianov’s paintings is seen as if from the window of a romantic noble estate: there is no place in it for criticism of social injustice or overwork. Venetsianov’s world is full of harmonious perfection, quiet, clear peace, unity of people and nature. For the first time, Venetsianov’s poetically conventional peasant genre is penetrated by the modest, quiet charm of quiet northern Russian nature, which constitutes the special charm of his paintings. Using his own funds, Venetsianov established a school for artists on his estate, whom he recruited mainly from the serf class. Some of his students worthily continued his line in art. Thus, the poetic interiors of Kapiton Alekseevich Zelentsov (1790–1845), landscapes of Grigory Vasilyevich Soroka (1823–1864) and Evgraf Fedorovich Krendovsky (1810–after 1853) are worthy of attention. According to A. Benois, “Venetsianov alone raised an entire school, an entire theory, and sowed the first seeds of Russian folk painting.”
The best graduates of the Academy of Arts received the right to an internship in Italy - the country of “living” antiquity and beautiful masterpieces of the Renaissance. Many of the artists, having left for Italy, stayed in this country for long years, not wanting to return to Russia, where the spirit of government regulation of art reigned, the painters depended on orders from the imperial court.
The talented artist Mikhail Ivanovich Lebedev (1811–1837), who died early, painted his best romantic landscapes in Italy. Captivating Italian nature and the generous southern sun inspired the most gifted landscape painter of this generation, Sylvester Feodosievich Shchedrin (1791–1830). Shchedrin went on a retirement trip to Italy in 1818 and lived there due to illness until his death in 1837. He repeated the same motifs many times - majestic panoramas of Rome, serene views of rocks and sea on the southern coast of Italy in the vicinity of Naples and Sorrento. Shchedrin was the first who began to paint landscapes in the open air (open air), freeing him from the traditional academic conventions of paint. We will not encounter romantic storms and rainy bad weather in his landscapes; bright sun and serene peace, people live a united life with the surrounding nature, and nature gives people bliss, relaxation, and “helps” in everyday work.
Karl Pavlovich Bryullov (1799–1852) was the most famous painter among all Russian masters of the early 19th century. His grandiose painting “The Last Day of Pompeii,” created in Italy, was a resounding success in Europe and Russia. In his homeland, Bryullov was greeted as a national hero. A virtuoso draftsman, in love with the external beauty of the world, Bryullov managed to “pour new blood” into the dying academicism, filling it with bright romantic experiences. Both in narrative paintings and in portraits, Bryullov represents life in the forms of theater. His large ceremonial portraits, where a person is depicted as if caught at the moment of a “role-playing” action (“Horsewoman”, “Portrait of N.V. Puppeteer”, etc.), enjoyed great success among customers. The artist did not set himself the task of conveying the unique individuality of the individual; he was primarily concerned with the captivating external beauty of women, the splendor of expensive clothes, and the luxury of interior decoration. In the last years of his work, Bryullov moved away from the ideal of “serene” external splendor, his portraits became more intimate and psychologically deep (“Portrait of A. N. Strugovshchikov”, “Self-portrait” of 1848.)
The figure of the brilliant master Alexander Andreevich Ivanov (1806–1858) rises above all the artists of the first half of the 19th century. According to A. Benoit, “there lived in him a childish, angelic, inquisitive soul, a real soul of a prophet, thirsty for truth and not afraid of martyrdom.” In Italy, where Ivanov was sent on a retirement trip after graduating from the Academy of Arts, he worked for about twenty years on the grandiose canvas “The Appearance of Christ to the People” and only shortly before his death returned to his homeland. The Russian public did not appreciate the painting, and its author soon died suddenly of cholera in St. Petersburg, not having time to receive money for the main painting of his life, acquired by the emperor.
Ivanov’s preparatory landscape sketches for “The Appearance of Christ to the People” became real masterpieces. Working in the open air in the vicinity of Rome, the artist, in search of the truth of color, made amazing coloristic discoveries, anticipating the achievements of the French impressionists. Ivanov was a true artist-sage of religious feeling, who managed in the watercolor cycle “Biblical Sketches” to say a new word in the history of religious painting, to present the most grandiose and incomprehensible with “truly Easter solemnity” (A. Benois).
Vasily Andreevich Tropinin (1776 (?) - 1857) became the first professional Moscow portrait painter, the founder of the Moscow school of painting. For a serf artist, he had a happy fate: his master, Count Morkov, paid for his studies at the Academy of Arts, encouraged his creativity, and in 1823 gave him his freedom. Immediately after this, Tropinin, already popular among Muscovites, received the title of “appointed academician.” The artist left us a whole gallery of faces of post-fire Moscow, in which a special atmosphere of freedom reigned, the hospitality of the residents, and the ability to indulge in the joys of life. Tropinin's portraits amaze with their vitality and at the same time affectionate, kind look at a person.
Pavel Andreevich Fedotov (1815–1852) was a guards officer in the Finnish Regiment, but at the age of 29 in 1844 he left military service and devoted himself entirely to art. Fate gave him about eight years to create - Fedotov died at the age of 37 in a psychiatric hospital, having managed to paint not many paintings, but each of them is a precious pearl that entered the treasury of Russian art. The artist worked in the field of everyday genre, giving it a new height and sharpness. He fills scenes from the life of the merchants and nobility with gentle humor, making fun of modern mores (“The Major’s Matchmaking,” “The Picky Bride,” etc.). Fedotov depicts the world of people and their objective environment with amazing pictorial perfection, loving insight, tenderness and truthfulness. The last painting of a seriously ill artist, “Anchor, more anchor!”, is desperately quiet and gloomy, reminiscent of the muddy dreams of a fever. In it, admiration of the world and radiant serenity disappear - a new, sober and deeply critical image of reality - realism - enters the historical scene.
SYLVESTER SHCHEDRIN. New Rome. Castle of St. Angel.1824. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
In Shchedrin's landscape the image Eternal City both majestic and intimate. The heavy stone bulk of the Castel Sant'Angelo is balanced by buildings and boats on the left bank of the Tiber. The majestic, smooth flow of the river “leads” the viewer’s gaze to the ancient arched bridge and the silhouette of St. Peter’s Cathedral - a symbol of the greatness of Rome. In the foreground, the daily life of the townspeople flows peacefully and slowly: they pull the boat ashore, prepare to go sailing, rush about their business... All the details of the landscape are alive, seen in nature, devoid of academic conventions. The painting itself is very beautiful: everything is enveloped in air, permeated with the morning soft, diffused light.
SYLVESTER SHCHEDRIN. Grotto Matromanio on the island of Capri.
From the shaded cave of the grotto there is a captivating view of the waters and rocks of the sea bay, which seem to bask under the dazzlingly bright rays of the sun. The arch of the grotto forms a kind of backstage that effectively fences off the distant space of the sea bay from the world of people’s everyday life that is close to the viewer.
SYLVESTER SHCHEDRIN. Small harbor in Sorrento overlooking the islands of Ischia and Procido.1826. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
Of all the numerous views of Sorrento by Shchedrin, this landscape is the most Hellenic in spirit. The sun's rays “tangibly” descend from the sky, reflecting in the calm silvery surface of the bay, softly illuminating the coastal huts and boats, emphasizing the leisurely and measured movements of the small figures of fishermen, busy with their daily chores. The colors of the landscape are luminous, the shadows are transparent, everything is filled with air.
SYLVESTER SHCHEDRIN. Veranda entwined with grapes.
One of the artist’s best landscapes, painted in the vicinity of Naples, is permeated with the Hellenic spirit of clear peace and bright harmony. Nature appears in Shchedrin as an image of heaven on earth. It blows with the fresh and moist breath of the sea, the aroma of heated grape leaves. Taking refuge on the veranda from the scorching sun, people indulge in blissful relaxation. Golden rays of the sun penetrate through the intertwined branches of the grapes, fall as reflections on the stone supports of the veranda, and are reflected in bright reflections on the burnt grass... Shchedrin masterfully conveys the most complex lighting effect, achieving a unity of light, color, and air element previously unseen in the landscape.
MAXIM VOROBYEV. Autumn night in St. Petersburg (Pier with Egyptian sphinxes on the Neva at night).1835. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
In one of his best St. Petersburg views, Vorobyov conveys the fullness of romantic delight in front of the wonderful city and its architecture. The glow of the full moon turns a real corner of St. Petersburg into a wonderful vision. The famous stone sphinxes frame the granite embankment with dark silhouettes; the lunar path on the Neva leads the viewer’s gaze into the distance and invites one to admire the impeccable proportions of the palaces on the opposite bank. Contemporaries in Vorobyov's landscapes admired the “transparency of colors,” their saturation with light and warmth, “freshness and gradualism in the shadows.”
MAXIM VOROBYEV. An oak shattered by lightning.1842. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
This landscape was created as an allegory to unexpected death the artist's wife, Cleopatra Loginovna Vorobyova, née Shustova. A blinding flash of lightning split the trunk of a mighty tree. In the thickening blue twilight, the earth merges with the sky, at the foot of the oak tree, angry sea waves rise, into which a lone figure rushes, almost invisible in the whirlpool of the elements. The artist embodies here a favorite motif of romanticism: the tragic helplessness of man before the blow of a majestic but merciless element.
MIKHAIL LEBEDEV. In Chiji Park.1837. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
After graduating from the Academy of Arts, Lebedev went on a retirement trip to Italy to continue his studies, from where he wrote: “It seems to me that it is a sin in Italy (and everywhere) to work without life.” In one of his best works, the artist boldly deviates from the canons of the classical landscape traditional for this time. The composition is built diagonally and is full of movement. The atmosphere of a sultry day and the lush strength of southern vegetation are excitedly and vividly conveyed; The rocky soil of the wide road, painted in loose strokes, seemed to have absorbed the heat of the sun.
Along with Silv. Shchedrin, Lebedev, who died early, became the pioneer in Russian painting of a living, direct sense of nature.
GRIGORY CHERNETSOV. Parade on the occasion of the opening of the monument to Alexander I in St. Petersburg on August 30, 1834.1834. State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
Chernetsov was a court painter of Emperor Nicholas I, who considered himself a great connoisseur of art. Chernetsov’s works accurately reflect the tastes of the emperor - having a penchant for military affairs, Nicholas I demanded from artists a “protocol” recording of nature in the depiction of parades, uniforms, weapons, etc. The panorama of Palace Square seems to be drawn along a ruler, the huge northern sky with rain clouds is spectacular “overshadows” the parade of troops in front of the Alexander Column, built according to the design of the French architect Montferrand.
OREST KIPRENSKY. Portrait of A. K. Schwalbe.1804. State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
The portrait depicts the artist’s father Adam Karlovich Schwalbe, a serf of the landowner A. S. Dyakonov. Kiprensky liked to tell how this portrait, shown at exhibitions in Naples and Rome, was mistaken for the work of Rembrandt or Rubens. The artist managed to convey the character of the person being portrayed - energetic and firm. The face is superbly sculpted with deep wrinkles and a strong chin, and the light highlights the hand confidently holding a cane. This early work belongs to the undisputed masterpieces of Kiprensky’s brush, testifying to his deep assimilation of the painting techniques of the old masters.
OREST KIPRENSKY. Portrait of Count F.V. Rostopchin.
Moscow mayor Fyodor Vasilyevich Rostopchin (1765–1826) had a rare sense of humor and was engaged in literary activities. The entire elite of Moscow at that time gathered in the famous Rostopchin salon. During Napoleon's invasion, rumors attributed to Rostopchin the order to burn Moscow.
In this work, excellent in design and color, we will not see any special characteristics of the model’s character: the portrait is simple and even modest. Compared to the masters of the previous era, Kiprensky pays less attention to accessories and clothing details. The black frock coat and folded hands are perceived almost as a single spot. This is how Rostopchin himself spoke about this work: “I sit with folded hands, idle and bored.”
OREST KIPRENSKY. Portrait of Countess E. P. Rostopchina.1809. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
The portrait was executed by Kiprensky as a pair to the portrait of the husband of Countess F.V. Rostopchin. Ekaterina Petrovna Rostopchina (1775–1859) was a maid of honor to Catherine II. She secretly converted to Catholicism and lived a very secluded life in recent years. Kiprensky creates a soft, benevolent, sincere image of the person being portrayed. Her entire appearance breathes silence and self-absorption. The color scheme is rich in subtle and gentle transitions of silver and olive tones, which matches the mood of the portrait.
OREST KIPRENSKY. Portrait of Life Hussar Colonel E.V. Davydov.1809. State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
The portrait shows a cousin famous poet and the hero of the War of 1812 Denis Davydov - Evgraf Vladimirovich Davydov (1775–1823). At the time of painting the portrait, he was a colonel of the Life Guards Hussar Regiment and took part in the battle with Napoleon at Austerlitz. The figure is surrounded by a mysterious romantic twilight, in which you can see olive foliage against the backdrop of a black-blue sky. Kiprensky finds a wonderful consonance of color: the red color of the uniform, gold braiding, white leggings... In Davydov’s face there is more external charm than deep psychologism. The brave, fearless hero demonstrates his courageous bearing and the cheerful prowess of his youth.
OREST KIPRENSKY. Portrait of A. A. Chelishchev.1808 – early 1809. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
Alexander Alexandrovich Chelishchev (1797–1881) was brought up in the Corps of Pages from 1808, and later participated in the War of 1812 - that is, he belonged to the generation that determined the fate of Russia at the beginning of the 19th century. In the appearance of an 11-year-old boy, Kiprensky notices a special, unchildish expression on his face. Dark beady eyes thoughtfully and carefully look at the viewer, they show seriousness and “preparedness” for difficult life trials. The color scheme of the portrait is based on Kiprensky’s favorite contrasting combination of black, white, red and bright gold.
OREST KIPRENSKY. Portrait of D. N. Khvostova.1814. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
One of Kiprensky’s most captivating female images is filled with a mood of quiet, thoughtful contemplation. Daria Nikolaevna Khvostova (1783–?) was the niece of M. Lermontov’s grandmother.
Unlike portrait painters of the previous era, the artist does not stop the viewer’s attention on the accessories of her clothing: they are presented delicately, with general large spots. The eyes live in the portrait - amazing dark eyes, which seem to be covered with a fog of disappointment, sad memories and timid hopes.
OREST KIPRENSKY. Portrait of E. S. Avdulina.1822 (1823?). State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
Ekaterina Sergeevna Avdulina (1788–1832) - the wife of Major General A. N. Avdulin, a great connoisseur of the arts and an active participant in the Society for the Encouragement of Artists, the owner of a mansion on Palace Embankment and a home theater at the Kamennoostrovskaya dacha. She is dressed in a fashionable cap that fits her head, and holds a fan in her hands - an indispensable attribute of a lady of this time outside the home. Her folded hands are a quotation from Leonardo da Vinci's La Gioconda, which Kiprensky undoubtedly saw in the Louvre. One of his contemporaries claimed that in this portrait “the roundness of the body and the light were done masterfully. And how symbolic is the lion grass losing its petals, standing in a glass of water!..” Before us is a romantic, contemplative nature, immersed in its hidden thoughts. A branch of delicate white flowers in a fragile glass on the window seems to resemble the appearance of the woman depicted.
OREST KIPRENSKY. Self-portrait.1828. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
This self-portrait was painted before the artist left for Italy. Before us is a famous master who has won rave reviews from his contemporaries, and at the same time a tired and disappointed man. According to the memoirs of contemporaries, “Kiprensky was handsome, with beautiful expressive eyes and naturally wavy curls.” Squinting his eyes slightly, he looks searchingly at the viewer, as if asking about something. The portrait is designed in a warm, rich color. The colors in the face echo the colors of the robe. The background, as in other works of the master, seems to be thickened darkness, from which the figure of the person depicted is softly highlighted.
OREST KIPRENSKY. Portrait of A. S. Pushkin.1827. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
The portrait was painted in St. Petersburg by order of A. Delvig immediately after the poet’s return from Mikhailovsky exile. Contemporaries who knew Pushkin closely argued that a more similar portrait of the poet did not exist. The image of Pushkin is devoid of everyday life, the characteristic “Arap” features of his appearance are softened. His gaze slides past the viewer - the poet seems to have been caught by the artist at the moment of creative insight. The highlighted background around the head resembles a kind of halo - a sign of being chosen. With an English checkered cloak thrown over his shoulder, Pushkin is likened to the great English romantic poet Byron. He expressed his attitude towards the portrait in a poetic message to Kiprensky “Favorite of light-winged fashion...” - “I see myself as in a mirror, / But this mirror flatters me.”
VASILY TROPININ. Portrait of A.V. Tropinin, the artist’s son.OK. 1818. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
The portrait depicts Arseny Tropinin (1809–1885), the artist’s only son. This portrait stands out among other works of the master with its special inner warmth and cordiality. Tropinin solves the most difficult problem - he finds pictorial means that express the special world of a child's soul. The portrait is devoid of static posing: the boy is depicted in a slight turn, his golden hair is spread out, a smile plays on his face, his shirt collar is casually open. The artist sculpts the form with long, moving strokes, and this dynamism of the stroke turns out to be in tune with the childish temperament and romantic expectation of discovery.
VASILY TROPININ. Portrait of P. A. Bulakhov.
The charm of this character lies in his liveliness and mental balance, in the harmony of simple and clear relationships with the world. His ruddy, shiny face is sculpted with moving strokes, his silver fur vest, the sleeve of a blue shirt are widely and freely painted, his neckerchief is “tied” with a few strokes of the brush... This manner of painting perfectly corresponds to the complacent and cheerful, very Moscow image of Bulakhov, who, according to A. Benoit, in the portrait, reminds us of “the cat who licked the sour cream.”
VASILY TROPININ. Portrait of K. G. Ravich.1823. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
The portrait of an official of the Moscow boundary office, Konstantin Georgievich Ravich, is very Moscow in spirit, far from official severity and self-absorbed isolation. Ravich seems to have been taken by surprise by the artist: he is in a dressing gown, his hair is in disarray, his tie is loose. The reflections of a bright red robe “flare up” with a blush on his sleek and good-natured face. Ravich expresses a common type of Moscow nobility - he was a lover of carousing and playing cards. He was subsequently charged with the death of one of the players who suffered a stroke after a big loss, spent seven years in prison and was exiled to Siberia “on suspicion.”
VASILY TROPININ. Portrait of A. S. Pushkin.1827. All-Russian Museum of A. S. Pushkin, St. Petersburg
The portrait was painted in the first months of 1827, shortly after the poet returned from Mikhailovsky exile. Pushkin’s friend, S. Sobolevsky, recalled that “Pushkin himself secretly ordered the portrait to Tropinin and presented it to me as a surprise with various farces (it cost him 350 rubles).” According to another version, the portrait was commissioned by Sobolevsky himself, who wanted to see the poet not “smoothed” and “pomaded,” but “disheveled, with a treasured mystical ring on his face.” thumb one hand." As a result, in the portrait, the intimacy of the image coexists with a romantic “elation”, perfectly conveyed by the life of the spirit of the great poet.
VASILY TROPININ. Portrait of K. P. Bryullov.
Tropinin met Karl Bryullov in 1836 in Moscow, where the author of “The Last Day of Pompeii” stopped on his way from Italy to St. Petersburg. The maestro is depicted with a pencil and an album against the background of the erupting Vesuvius. “Yes, he is the real Vesuvius himself!” - they talked about Bryullov, admiring the elemental power of his talent. The portrait expresses the public pathos of perception of Bryullov as a brilliant master, whose appearance resembled the “golden-haired” Apollo. Bryullov highly valued Tropinin, confessed in one of his letters to the artist: “I kiss your soul, which in its purity is more capable than anyone else of fully understanding the delight and joy that fill my heart...”
VASILY TROPININ. Lacemaker.1823. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
What we see here is not a portrait of a specific girl, but a collective poetic image of a craftswoman, the kind Tropinin could meet in the houses of noble Muscovites. The artist does not depict the hardness that was in her complex and painstaking work; he admires and admires the charm and beauty of youth. P. Svinin wrote about this picture that it “reveals the pure, innocent soul of the beauty and that look of curiosity that she cast at someone who entered at that moment: her arms, bare by the elbow, stopped along with her gaze, a sigh flew out of the virgin breast , covered with a muslin handkerchief."
The artist was often reproached for the constant smiling of his characters. “But I don’t invent, I don’t compose these smiles, I paint them from life,” answered Tropinin.
VASILY TROPININ. Self-portrait against the backdrop of a window overlooking the Kremlin.1846. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
In the self-portrait, Tropinin portrays himself as a hard-working artist who managed to “get into the public eye” with the help of craft, hard work and talent. He is dressed in a work coat, leans on a cane, and holds a palette and brushes in his left hand. The wide panorama of the Kremlin behind him is the personification of the artist’s thoughts about his hometown. “The calmness that breathed from Tropinin’s complacent old face did not come easily to him. Constantly struggling with obstacles and oppression, he acquired this calm under the shadow of faith and art,” wrote N. Ramazanov, who knew the artist. This self-portrait, kept in his house after Tropinin’s death, was bought by Muscovites from the artist’s son by subscription and presented as a gift to the Rumyantsev Museum as a sign of special respect and recognition of the master’s services to the ancient capital.
KARL BRYULLOV. Italian afternoon (Italian woman picking grapes).1827. State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
This painting was created as a pair for “Italian Morning” (1823, Kunsthalle, Kiel) and was sent to Russia as a report during the artist’s stay in Italy. Bryullov took advantage of the opportunity in Italy to study female models (at the St. Petersburg Academy, women did not pose for artists). He was interested in rendering the female figure in different lighting effects - early morning or in the bright light of the Italian afternoon. The genre scene is filled with the spirit of sweet sensuality. The mature beauty of the Italian echoes the ripeness of grapes filled with sweet juice, sparkling in the sun.
KARL BRYULLOV. Interrupted date (“Water is already running through...”).Watercolor. 1827–1830. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
In Italy, Bryullov was one of the founders of the “Italian” genre, which enjoyed great success among collectors and travelers. The artist’s paintings about the everyday life of Italians combine classical beauty and a romantic worldview of reality. In one of the best watercolors of the “Italian” genre, a charming genre scene, filled with good-natured humor, unfolds against the backdrop of sweetly beautiful Italian nature. Bryullov masterfully mastered the classical technique of watercolor, masterfully conveying on a sheet of paper the luminous air of a hot Italian day, the sparkling white shirts of the heroes, hot from the sun stone wall Houses.
KARL BRYULLOV. Bathsheba.
The plot is based on the legend of a young beauty bathing, who was seen by King David while walking along the roof of his palace.
Bryullov enthusiastically praises female beauty, which “only could crown the universe.” The tenderness of Bathsheba’s beautiful “antique” body, illuminated by the slanting rays of the setting sun, is set off by the lush folds of draperies, which the artist turned into a pedestal for the beauty. A transparent stream of water flowing into the pool sparkles with sunlight. The entire canvas is permeated with sensual charm and the joy of being.
KARL BRYULLOV. Rider.1832. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
This ceremonial portrait of the Italians Giovannina (horsewoman) and Amatsilia Paccini was commissioned from Bryullov by Countess Yulia Samoilova, a friend of the artist, who took in these orphan girls. The artist combines a traditional equestrian portrait with plot action. On the eve of a thunderstorm, a beautiful horsewoman hurries to return from a ride. Charming Amazilia ran out to meet her sister on the loggia. Giovannina's face, despite the rapid pace, remains calmly beautiful. Before us is a favorite technique of the era of romanticism: the collision of powerful natural elements and resilience human spirit. The artist admires the blooming beauty of youth, admires the cuteness of a child, the grace of a thoroughbred horse, the sparkle of silk and the shine of curls of hair... The portrait turns into an elegant enchanting spectacle, a hymn to the beauty of life.
KARL BRYULLOV. The last day of Pompeii.1833. State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
Bryullov came up with the plot of the picture after visiting the excavations of Pompeii, an ancient Roman city near Naples that died in the 1st century from the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. When working on the painting, the artist used descriptions of the historian Pliny the Younger, a witness to the death of the city. The main theme of the picture is “a people gripped by fear” of the power of all-conquering fate. The movement of people is directed from the depths of the picture towards the viewer diagonally.
The cold light of lightning highlights separate groups of people united by a single spiritual impulse. On the left, in the crowd, the artist depicted himself with a box of paints on his head. N. Gogol wrote that Bryullov’s beautiful figures drown out the horror of their situation with beauty. The artist combined the ardor of the romantic worldview with the traditional techniques of classicism. The picture was a resounding success in Europe, and in Russia Bryullov was greeted as a triumphant: “You brought the spoils of peace / With you to your father’s canopy. – / And it was the last day of Pompeii / For the Russian brush, the first day” (E. Baratynsky).
KARL BRYULLOV. Portrait of I. A. Krylov.1839. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
The portrait of Ivan Andreevich Krylov (1768/1769–1844) was painted by the artist in one session, and was not completed. Krylov's hand was completed by student F. Goretsky from a plaster cast of the now deceased fabulist. Krylov in the portrait is about 70 years old, his appearance is marked by strict nobility and lively, active energy. The picturesque maestry of the portrait, Bryullov’s favorite romantic and sonorous combination of black, fiery red and golden yellow colors, is captivating.
KARL BRYULLOV. Portrait of N.V. Kukolnik.1836. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
In St. Petersburg, Bryullov was a regular participant in the evenings where the literary bohemia of that time gathered. Their indispensable participant was Nestor Vasilyevich Kukolnik (1809–1868), a famous playwright, journalist, editor of the Khudozhestvennaya Gazeta magazine. According to contemporaries, the Puppeteer had an awkward appearance - very tall, narrow shoulders, a long face with irregular features, huge ears, small eyes. In the portrait, Bryullov aestheticizes his appearance, giving him the mystery of a romantic wanderer. The ears are hidden under a cap of long hair, and a sly smile plays on the pale face. The romantic atmosphere is complemented by the deepening darkness of the passing day, a dilapidated wall reminiscent of the inexorable passage of time, and the expanse of the sea in the distance.
KARL BRYULLOV. Portrait of A. N. Strugovshchikov.1840. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
Alexander Nikolaevich Strugovshchikov (1808–1878) was a friend of Bryullov, a translator from German, and publisher of the Khudozhestvennaya Gazeta. The portrait was painted in St. Petersburg, in Bryullov’s studio on Palace Square. Strugovshchikov poses in a chair upholstered in red leather (in the same chair we see Bryullov in the famous “Self-Portrait” of 1848). In the appearance of the slightly tired Strugovshchikov, the artist emphasized some nervousness and detachment. Nihilism and melancholy were the favorite mask of the generation of this time, when, according to Strugovshchikov, “the pogrom of December 14 took away... the desire of progressive people of society to interfere in the internal politics of our life, and the very paths to this were blocked.”
KARL BRYULLOV. Portrait of Countess Yu. P. Samoilova leaving the ball with her adopted daughter Amazilia Pacini.No later than 1842. State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
The portrait was painted in St. Petersburg, where the eccentric and independent countess came to receive a huge inheritance. In the picture she is depicted together with her adopted daughter, who, with her fragility, sets off and complements Samoilova’s luxurious, mature beauty. The movement of the countess's figure is balanced by the powerful spread of the heavy velvet curtain, which seems to continue in her dazzlingly luxurious dress. In this best ceremonial portrait of the master, an extraordinary enthusiastic fire is felt - a consequence of the artist’s special attitude towards the model.
KARL BRYULLOV. Self-portrait.1848. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
According to the recollections of Bryullov’s student, this self-portrait was painted by the master during a serious illness in just two hours. The work amazes with the ingenious virtuosity of its execution: the hair is “combed” with a few movements of the brush, an exhausted, pale, emaciated face with transparent shadows, a limply hanging hand is drawn with inspiration, with small strokes... At the same time, the image is not devoid of narcissism and elegant artistry. The difficult physical condition of the master only emphasizes the creative fire, which, despite a serious illness, did not go out in Bryullov until the end of his life.
KARL BRYULLOV. Portrait of the archaeologist M. Lanci.1851. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
This portrait of Bryullov’s old friend, the Italian archaeologist Michelangelo Lanci (1779–1867), amazes with its vivid representation of the individual’s individuality, foreshadowing the realistic method in the art of portraiture. The archaeologist seemed caught in the middle of a lively conversation: he took off his pince-nez and fixed an attentive and intelligent gaze on his interlocutor. The bright, sonorous coloring, based on a combination of a bright scarlet robe and silver fur, emphasizes the model’s love of life.
This “energetic” sonority of the portrait is all the more remarkable since Bryullov’s own physical strength was already running out. The portrait became the last significant work of the seriously ill artist.
ALEXANDER BRYULLOV. Portrait of N. N. Pushkina.1831–1832. Paper, watercolor. All-Russian Museum of A. S. Pushkin, St. Petersburg
Watercolor portraits of Alexander Bryullov, the brother of Karl Bryullov, were extremely popular among his contemporaries. Among the best and most precious for posterity is the portrait of Natalya Nikolaevna Pushkina, the wife of the great poet. The artist not only captures her individual features, he elevates the depicted beauty above the “prose of life,” affirming the feminine ideal of “pure beauty” that we find in Pushkin’s poems: “My desires came true. The Creator / sent you down to me, you, my Madonna, / the purest example of purest beauty.”
ALEXANDER BRYULLOV. Portrait of E. P. Bakunina.No later than 1832. Cardboard, watercolor. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
Ekaterina Pavlovna Bakunina (1795–1869) was the sister of Alexander Bakunin, Pushkin's lyceum friend. The poet could meet young Bakunina at lyceum balls, which were attended by invited relatives of lyceum students and acquaintances. “How sweet she was! How the black dress stuck to dear Bakunina! But I haven’t seen her for eighteen hours—ah! What a situation and what torment... But I was happy for 5 minutes” (from Pushkin’s diary of 1815). In the intimate, miniature portrait we see Bakunina already in adulthood, however, the musicality of the lines and the delicate transparent colors of the watercolor are in tune with the enthusiastic feeling of the young poet.
PETER SOKOLOV. Portrait of A. S. Pushkin.1836. Paper, watercolor. All-Russian Museum of A. S. Pushkin, St. Petersburg
Sokolov was an excellent master of intimate watercolor portraits of the Pushkin era. The artist's brushes include three lifetime portraits of Pushkin, portraits of his contemporaries, friends and enemies. This portrait represents the poet at the end of his life - slightly tired, having experienced many disappointments and anxieties. His son, watercolorist Academician A. Sokolov, spoke about Sokolov’s method of work:
“With remarkable boldness, the truthful tone of a face, dress, lace accessory or background lay down immediately, almost in full force and was detailed in mixed, mainly grayish tones, with remarkable charm and taste, so that the stroke of the brush, its strokes, the descent of paint to nothing, remained on view, without interfering with the complete completion of all parts. Because of this, no torture or labor was ever noticeable in his work; everything came out fresh, easy, and at the same time bold and impressive in color.”
ALEXEY VENETSIANOV. Self-portrait.1811. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
In the self-portrait, Venetsianov is 31 years old, but he looks like a tired, world-wise man. At this time, he was already a well-known master portrait painter, having achieved success through his own work and perseverance. The self-portrait amazes with its seriousness, truthfulness and simplicity. The artist, holding a palette and brush in his hands, carefully peers at the work. Lively, warm light softly models the shape. Venetsianov presented this portrait to the Academy of Arts and received the title of “appointed academician” for it.
ALEXEY VENETSIANOV. Sleeping shepherdess.Between 1823 and 1826. State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
The landscape of the Russian village, amazing in its soulful charm, is filled with quiet, radiant peace: the smooth surface of the river, and green vegetable gardens, and distant arable land, and wooded hills... The colors of the landscape are bright, full-bodied, as if permeated with light. “The Sleeping Shepherd” is one of Venetsianov’s best paintings in terms of its lyrical and sincere mood, in conveying the intimate connection between man and nature. Venetsianov appears here as a pioneer of the subtle charm of modest Russian nature.
ALEXEY VENETSIANOV. On the arable land. Spring.First half of the 1820s. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
The painting presents an allegory of Spring. A peasant woman in a smart sundress, likened to the goddess of flowering and spring, Flora, majestically steps across the arable land. On the left in the background, another peasant woman with horses seems to continue a circular motion main character, which closes to the right on the horizon line with another female figure, reminiscent of a translucent phantom. Next to the mature beauty of Flora we see an allegory of the beginning of life - baby Cupid surrounded by wreaths of cornflowers. On the right side of the picture, next to a dry stump, thin young trees stretch towards the sun.
The picture shows the eternal cycle of life: the change of seasons, birth and withering... Researchers noted that this painting by Venetsianov, with its idyllic mood and allegorical enlightenment, combined with Russian motifs, met the tastes of Emperor Alexander I.
ALEXEY VENETSIANOV. At the harvest. Summer.Mid 1820s. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
This painting was conceived by Venetsianov as a pairing for the work “On arable land. Spring" and was part of a kind of cycle about the seasons. The world of peasant life here is devoid of the prosaic hardships of rural labor. This is an idyll seen by the artist from the windows of a “romantic” noble estate. But at the heart of this idyll is the artist’s smart and honest thought about the beauty and sublime significance of everyday peasant worries, about the special charm of Russian nature. “Who in all of Russian painting managed to convey such a truly summer mood as the one put into his painting “Summer”, where behind a somewhat angularly planted woman, with a slightly straightened profile, purely Russian nature, no longer straightened at all, spreads out: distant, yellow a field ripening in the hot, sun-saturated air!” - exclaimed A. Benois.
ALEXEY VENETSIANOV. Girl in a headscarf.
The young beautiful peasant woman was painted by Venetsianov with extraordinary warmth and sincerity. She fixed her large eyes on the viewer with a lively gaze, a slight smile playing on her plump lips. A blue striped scarf and dark, shiny, smoothly combed hair highlight the tenderness of her girlish face. The space of the picture is filled with soft light, the color is based on a noble combination of soft green, blue and light beige tones.
ALEXEY VENETSIANOV. Reapers.Late 1820s. State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
In this picture we see the peasant boy Zakharka, the hero of several paintings by Venetsianov, and his mother Anna Stepanova. The boy, flushed from hard work and the midday heat, leaned against his mother’s shoulder, fascinated by the bright butterflies perched on her hand. The form is sculpted with thick, full-voiced color. Smooth, rounded lines fill the composition with balance and peace. Venetsianov turns an unpretentious everyday story from the life of peasants into a poetic narrative about the bewitching beauty of the world and the joy of unity with nature.
ALEXEY VENETSIANOV. Peasant woman with cornflowers.1830s State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
The young peasant woman is devoid of romantic elation; her image is simple and filled with quiet, sincere poetry. Lost in her thoughts, she sadly and detachedly sorts through the bright blue cornflowers. The coloring of the picture is based on subtle harmonies of cold smoky white, silver, light ocher tones, reflecting the girl’s pensive minor mood.
GREGORY SOROKA. View of the Spasskoye estate, Tambov province.1840s Regional Art Gallery, Tver
Serf P.I. Milyukova, Grigory Soroka studied intermittently with Venetsianov on his Safonkovo estate. The artist A. Mokritsky wrote that Venetsianov instructed his students: “All these objects, the material difference of which the painter must tangibly feel and convey... For this... you need extraordinary vigilance of the eye, concentration, analysis, complete trust in nature and the constant pursuit of its changes at different degrees and positions of light; we need clarity of understanding and love for the work.”
Soroka talentedly brought to life the behests of his mentor. He perfectly solves complex pictorial problems, filling the landscape with classical peace and bright sincerity. Following Venetsianov, he discovers beauty in the quiet motifs of native nature.
1840s State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
The calm water surface of Lake Moldinskoye reigns in the picture, defining its idyllic, bright mood. There is a sense of slowness and silence in everything: a boy is fishing on the shore, his friend is quietly gliding in a boat along the shore. The buildings of the estate on the opposite bank are buried in the majestic thickets of “eternally beautiful” nature. The conveyance of the special poetic beauty of Russian nature and the mood of an amazing, enlightened peace filled with grace make this landscape similar to best works A. Venetsianova.
GREGORY SOROKA. Fishermen. View of the Spasskoye estate, Tambov province.Fragment
KAPITON ZELENTSOV. In the rooms.Late 1820s. State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
In the late 20s of the 19th century, the interior genre became popular among artists, which reflected the interest of clients from the nobility in the “poetry of domestic life.” Zelentsov’s painting is close in spirit to the best works of his mentor A. Venetsianov. A suite of three spacious, tastefully decorated rooms, flooded with light, unfolds before the viewer. There are paintings and medallions by F. Tolstoy on the walls, a statue of Venus in the corner by the window, elegant mahogany furniture is placed along the walls. The rooms are brought to life by two young men training a dog. When looking at this interior, you are overcome with a feeling of clear peace and bright harmony, which corresponded to the ideas about the ideal of private life.
FEDOR SLAVYANSKY. Office of A. G. Venetsianov.1839–1840. State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
Slavyansky continued the line of his teacher A. Venetsianov both in portrait painting and in the interior genre. It will be imbued with a bright, harmonious mood best interior, depicting rooms in the mentor's house. The superbly written suite of rooms recalls brilliant advances in the study of perspective. In the back of the room, in the soft diffused light, a young man lay down on the sofa - perhaps the artist himself or one of the students of the owner of the house. Everything in this space is reminiscent of serving art and artistic interests: copies from antique statues, a mannequin of a peasant girl in a kokoshnik by the window, as if brought to life by the bright rays of the sun, paintings on the walls, a stove lining made in the “antique” style.
Painting of the second half of the 19th century * * *In the second half of the 19th century, Russian fine art found itself at the mercy of socio-political ideas. Not in any European country there was no such long existence in painting of critical realism - historical
Lyagina Yana
This work introduces us to the art of the 19th century. Art of any time, like a sponge, absorbs the main problems, ideas and views of its time. For Russian art, this circumstance is the most significant, since it has always been, if not politicized, then, in any case, closely connected with the ideology of the ruling part of society, its reactionary circles or revolutionary-minded radicals.
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Municipal competition of students' essays
Municipal state educational institution
secondary school with. Sweetie.
Full address: Saratov region, Ekaterinovsky district, village. Sweetie,
st. Rabochaya 1
Abstract work:
"Russian art in the 19th century"
Grade 10
Supervisor : Sazonova Yulia Andreevna,
Art teacher.
2013-2014 academic year
Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………...………3
1.Culture Russia XIX century: general characteristics……………………….….4
2.Russian art in the 19th century…………………………………………………………….6
2.1 Russian art in the first half of the 19th century - “Golden Age of Culture”……………………………………………………………………………….…………6
2.2 Russian art in the second half of the 19th century………………………....11
Conclusion………………………………………………………………………………….15
List of references………………………………………………………...……16
Introduction
Art of any time, like a sponge, absorbs the main problems, ideas and views of its time. For Russian art, this circumstance is the most significant, since it has always been, if not politicized, then, in any case, closely connected with the ideology of the ruling part of society, its reactionary circles or revolutionary-minded radicals.
Goal of the work - analyze Russian art of the 19th century.
Tasks:
1.Give general characteristics of a given era;
2. Briefly describe Russian art of the 19th century in its types.
- Culture of Russia in the 19th century: general characteristics
Russian history art of the 19th century centuries are usually divided into stages.
The first half is called the Golden Age of Russian culture. Its beginning coincided with the era of classicism in Russian literature and art. After the defeat of the Decembrists, a new rise in the social movement began. This gave hope that Russia would gradually overcome its difficulties. The country achieved the most impressive successes in these years in the field of science and especially culture. The 1st half of the century gave Russia and the world Pushkin and Lermontov, Griboyedov and Gogol, Belinsky and Herzen, Glinka and Dargomyzhsky, Bryullov, Ivanov and Fedotov.
The fine art of the first half of the 19th century has an internal community and unity, a unique charm of bright and humane ideals. Classicism is enriched with new features; its strengths are most clearly manifested in architecture, historical painting, and partly in sculpture. The perception of the culture of the ancient world became more historical than in the 18th century, and more democratic. Along with classicism, the romantic direction received intensive development and a new realistic method began to take shape.
The romantic direction of Russian art was the first thirds of the XIX century was prepared by the development of realism in the following decades, because to a certain extent it brought romantic artists closer to reality, to simple real life. This was the inner essence of the complex artistic movement of the entire first half of the 19th century. In general, the art of this stage - architecture, painting, graphics, sculpture, applied and folk art- an outstanding phenomenon full of originality in the history of Russian artistic culture. Developing the progressive traditions of the previous century, it created many magnificent works of great aesthetic and social value, making a contribution to the world's heritage.
The second half is the time of final approval and consolidation of national forms and traditions in Russian art. IN mid-19th century, Russia experienced severe upheavals: the Crimean War of 1853-1856 ended in defeat. Emperor Nicholas I died, Alexander II, who ascended the throne, carried out the long-awaited abolition of serfdom and other reforms. The “Russian theme” became popular in art. Russian culture was not confined to a national framework and was not separated from the culture of the rest of the world.
- Russian art in the 19th century
The beginning of the 19th century was a time of cultural and spiritual upsurge in Russia. The development of Russian culture in the 19th century was based on the transformations of the previous time. The penetration of elements of capitalist relations into the economy has increased the need for literate and educated people.Public libraries and museums played a positive role in the cultural life of the country (the first public library was opened in St. Petersburg in 1814). The culture of Russia developed against the background of the ever-increasing national self-awareness of the Russian people and, in connection with this, had a pronounced national character.
2.1 Russian art in the first half of the 19th century - “Golden Age of Culture”
The first third of the 19th century is called the “golden age” of Russian culture. Interest in Russian history became the reason for the appearance of numerous novels, short stories, ballads, stories on different historical topics. The most famous novels were M.N. Zagoskina (1789--1852) “Yuri Miloslavsky, or Russians in 1612”, “Roslavlev, or Russians in 1812”, “Kuzma Roshchin”, I.I. Lazhechnikova (1792-- 1869) “The Ice House”, “The Last Newcomer”, “Basurman”. Even from the titles it is clear that these and other works of historical prose examined crisis periods of Russian history: the internecine struggle of Russian princes, Russian liberation wars, political intrigues and events that, from the point of view of their authors, were of significant significance. At the same time, the political preferences of the authors always came to the fore. For example, M. N. Zagoskin was an obvious supporter of the monarchy, and these views of his are manifested not in the author’s political declarations, but in his characters, in descriptions of elements of everyday life, and in the dependence of the characters’ personal relationships on the outcome of many historical events. And yet, at the center of all the stories there was one general idea, which took shape most strongly after the War of 1812 and was briefly expressed by I.I. Lazhechnikov in the preface to the novel “The Last Novik”: “The feeling that dominates my novel is love for the fatherland.” .
History in its extreme moments forms the content of the brilliant “Taras Bulba” by Gogol, “The Captain’s Daughter” and “Arap Peter the Great” by Pushkin, his drama “Boris Godunov”, the poem “Poltava” and so many works that it is impossible to list them. A.S. Pushkin became a symbol of his era, when there was a rapid rise in the cultural development of Russia. Pushkin is the creator of the Russian literary language. His work has become an enduring value in the development of not only Russian, but also world culture. He was a singer of freedom and a convinced patriot. The poet bequeathed to his descendants: “It is not only possible, but also necessary to be proud of the glory of your ancestors... Respect for the past is the feature that distinguishes education from savagery...”
The humanistic ideals of Russian society were reflected in the highly civilized examples of architecture of this time and monumental and decorative sculpture, in the synthesis of which he acts decorative painting and applied art, which often ends up in the hands of the architects themselves. In the architecture of the 19th century. Classicism reigned. Buildings built in this style are distinguished by a clear and calm rhythm and correct proportions. There were significant differences in the architecture of St. Petersburg and Moscow. Back in the middle of the 18th century. St. Petersburg was a city of architectural masterpieces, surrounded by green estates and was in many ways similar to Moscow. Then the regular development of the city began along the avenues that cut through it, rays radiating from the Admiralty. St. Petersburg classicism is the architecture not of individual buildings, but of entire ensembles, striking in their unity and harmony. . An important role in shaping the architectural appearance of St. Petersburg is played by the Admiralty building, erected according to the project A.D. Zakharova (1761-1811). Admiralty facadestretches for 406 m. In its center there is a triumphal arch with a high gilded spire, which has become one of the symbols of the city.
The greatest architect of this timeAndrey Nikiforovich Voronikhin(1759–1814). Voronikhin’s main creation is the Kazan Cathedral, the majestic colonnade of which formed a square in the center of Nevsky Prospect, turning the cathedral and the surrounding buildings into the most important urban planning hub of the center of St. Petersburg. In 1813, M.I. Kutuzov was buried in the cathedral and the cathedral became a kind of monument to the victories of Russian weapons in the war of 1812. Later, statues of Kutuzov and Barclay de Tolly, made by the sculptor, were installed on the square in front of the cathedral B.I. Orlovsky. Russian sculpture of the 30s–40s of the 19th century. is becoming more and more democratic. In mid-century sculpture there are two main directions: one, coming from the classics, but coming to dry academicism; the other reveals a desire for a more direct and multifaceted reflection of reality, it becomes widespread in the second half of the century, but there is also no doubt that both directions are gradually losing the features of the monumental style.
The sculptor who, during the years of decline of monumental forms, managed to achieve significant success in this area, as well as in “small forms”, wasPyotr Karlovich Klodt(1805–1867), author of horses for the Narva Triumphal Gate in St. Petersburg (architect V. Stasov), “Horse Tamers” for the Anichkov Bridge (1833–1850), the monument to Nicholas I on St. Isaac’s Square (1850–1859), I.A. . Krylov in the Summer Garden (1848–1855), as well as a large number of animal sculptures. The leading direction of architecture and sculpture in the first third of the 19th century was classicism. In painting it was developed primarily by academic artists in the historical genre (A.E. Egorov – “The Torment of the Savior”, 1814, Russian Russian Museum; V.K. Shebuev – “The Feat of the Merchant Igolkin”, 1839, Russian Russian Museum; F.A. Bruni – “ The Death of Camilla, Horace’s Sister,” 1824, Russian Museum; “The Copper Serpent,” 1826–1841, Russian Museum). But the true successes of painting lay, however, in a different direction - romanticism. The best aspirations of the human soul, the ups and downs of the spirit were expressed by the romantic painting of that time, and above all by portraiture. In the portrait genre, the leading place should be given to Orest Kiprensky (1782–1836). An invaluable part of Kiprensky’s work is graphic portraits, made mainly in soft Italian pencil with coloring in pastels, watercolors, and colored pencils. He portrays General E.I. Chaplitsa (Tretyakov Gallery), A.R. Tomilova (GRM), P.A. Venison (GTG). The appearance of quick pencil portraits-sketches is significant in itself, characteristic of the new time: they easily record any fleeting change in the face, any emotional movement. But in Kiprensky’s graphics there is also a certain evolution: in his later works there is no spontaneity and warmth, but they are more masterly and more refined in execution (portrait of S.S. Shcherbatova, Italian art., Tretyakov Gallery).
A Pole can be called a consistent romantic A.O. Orlovsky (1777–1832), He quickly assimilated on Russian soil, which is especially noticeable in his graphic portraits. In them, through all the external attributes of European romanticism with its rebellion and tension, something deeply personal, hidden, intimate is visible (Self-portrait, 1809, Tretyakov Gallery). Orlovsky also played a certain role in “blazing” the path to realism thanks to his genre sketches, drawings and lithographs depicting St. Petersburg street scenes and types, which brought to life the famous quatrain of P.A. Vyazemsky:
Former Rus', remote
You will pass it on to your offspring
You caught her alive
Under the people's pencil.
Also, the first half of the 19th century. marked by the flourishing of Russian music, associated primarily with the nameMikhail Ivanovich Glinka(1804–1857), who went down in history as the first Russian composer of world significance. M.I.Glinka is considered the founder of Russian classical music. His operas “A Life for the Tsar” and “Ruslan and Lyudmila” largely determined the further development of Russian opera music for many decades to come. Distinctive feature The composer's creative approach was to use motifs from Russian folklore and folk music. Glinka also wrote romances. Glinka's contemporaries made a significant contribution to the development of Russian musical cultureA.A. Alyabyev, A.E. Varlamov, A.L. Gurilev, known today mainly as authors of romances.
A.A Alyabyev. A.L.Gurilev A.E.Varlamov
2.2 Russian art in the second half of the 19th century
Conditions for the development of culture in the second half of the 19th century.
Second half of the 19th century. - the time of the final approval and consolidation of national forms and traditions in Russian art. In the middle of the 19th century. Russia experienced severe upheavals: the Crimean War of 1853-1856 ended in defeat, Emperor Nicholas I died, Alexander II, who ascended the throne, carried out the long-awaited abolition of serfdom and other reforms. The “Russian theme” became popular in art. Russian culture was not confined to a national framework and was not separated from the culture of the rest of the world. Achievements foreign art found a response in Russia. In turn, Russian culture received worldwide recognition. Russian culture has taken pride of place in the family of European cultures.
Fine art could not remain aloof from the processes taking place in the public consciousness. The State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow is one of the largest collections of Russian fine art, a world-famous national cultural center. The museum bears the name of its founder, Moscow merchant P.M. Tretyakov (1832-1898), who donated his art gallery to the city in 1892, as well as a small collection of his brother and a house, which opened to visitors in 1881.
At this time, Russian artists reached a level of skill that put their works on a par with the best examples of European art. A movement was formed, based on the ideas of critical realism. One of the first masters of this direction was Vasily Grigorievich Perov (1833–1882). His genre works (“Rural religious procession at Easter” 1861, “Seeing off the dead man” 1865, “Troika” 1868) are sad stories of the life of ordinary people expressed in the language of painting.
The landscape has reached unprecedented prosperity. Landscape painting has become one of the leading areas of artistic development; this genre has been raised to new heights. Expressive means were improved and technology developed. The landscape of the second half of the 19th century is no longer just an image of “types of landscapes”, but a painting that conveys the subtlest movements of the human soul through images of nature. The greatest masters of landscape in Russia were A.K. Savrasov (“The Rooks Have Arrived” 1871), I.I. Shishkin (“Pine Forest” 1873, “Rye” 1878), A.I. Kuinzhi (“ Birch Grove"1879, "Moonlit Night on the Dnieper" 1880), V.D. Polenov ("Moscow Courtyard" 1878), I.I. Levitan (" evening call, evening Bell"1892, "Spring. Big Water" 1897), K.A. Korovin ("In Winter" 1894, "Paris. Boulevard of the Capuchins" 1906).
Peaks of realistic art of the second half of the 19th century. achieved in creativityI.E. Repin and V.I. Surikov. Historical painting found its highest expression in the work of Vasily Ivanovich Surikov (1848–1916). In history, the artist was most interested in people: the masses and strong, bright personalities.
The first work that brought V.I. Surikov fame was “The Morning of the Streltsy Execution” (1881). The composition is built on contrast: grief, hatred, suffering, embodied in the figures of the archers going to their death and their loved ones, are contrasted with Peter sitting on a horse, frozen in stone in the distance.
In addition to V.I. Surikov, V.M. Vasnetsov also wrote paintings on historical themes. The image of history in his works has a tangible epic, fairy-tale connotation: “After the massacre of Igor Svyatoslavich with the Polovtsians” (1880), “Alyonushka” (1881), the combination of epic and history was especially clearly manifested in the grandiose canvas “Bogatyrs” (1898 G.).
In 1898, a new artistic association was founded in St. Petersburg, called"World of Art" . The resulting circle was headed by an artistA.N. Benois and philanthropist S.P. Diaghilev.The main core of the association wasL.S. Bakst, E.E. Lansere, K.A. Somov. "World of Art" organized exhibitions and published a magazine under the same name. The association included many artists:M.A.Vrubel, V.A.Serov, I.I.Levitan, M.V.Nesterov, A.P.Ryabushkin, N.K.Roerich, B.M.Kustodiev, Z.E.Serebryakova, K. S. Petrov-Vodkin.Miriskusniki defended the freedom of individual creativity. Beauty was recognized as the main source of inspiration. The modern world, in their opinion, is devoid of beauty and therefore unworthy of attention. In search of beauty, the artists of the World of Art often turn to monuments of the past in their works.
Also the second half of the 19th century. - This is a period of outstanding achievements of science and technology. Chemistry, physics, geography, biology are developing...
The development of natural sciences and wide connections between Russian scientists and Western ones testified to Russia’s sufficient place in the world community.
Conclusion.
Russian art your painting architecture
The art of the 19th century can be compared to a multi-colored mosaic, where each stone has its own place and has its own meaning. So it is impossible to remove even one, even the smallest one, without disturbing the harmony of the whole. However, in this mosaic there are stones that are the most valuable, emitting especially strong light.
Over the course of centuries of history, Russian art has experienced significant, sometimes radical changes: it has become enriched, complicated, improved, but has always remained original.
Russian architecture, fine, folk and applied arts testify to the invaluable contribution that our people have made to the treasury of domestic and world artistic culture.
The 19th century is perhaps the most complex and interesting period in the history of Russian art. This era gave birth to the brilliant creativity of A.S. Pushkin, folk and universal, full of dreams of freedom. This is the heyday of spiritual culture: literature, philosophy, music, theater and fine arts.
Bibliography.
1. Ilyina T.V. History of art: Russian art. Textbook / T.V. Ilyina. - M.: Higher School, 2007. – 407 p.
2. The newest complete reference book for schoolchildren in grades 5-11 (volume 2). E.V. Simonova.