Classicism(from lat. classicus– exemplary), like the Baroque, turned out to be a phenomenon on a pan-European scale. The poetics of classicism began to take shape during the late Renaissance in Italy. On the threshold of classicism stands the tragedy of the Italian playwright G. Trissino “Sofonisba” (1515), written in imitation of ancient tragedians. It outlined features that later became characteristic of classicist drama - a logically structured plot, reliance on the word rather than on stage action, rationality and the supra-individual character of the characters. Significant influence on the formation of classicism in European countries was provided by “Poetics” (1561) by the Italian J. Ts. Scaliger, who successfully anticipated the taste of the next century, the century of logic and reason. And yet, the formation of classicism lasted for a whole century, and as an integral artistic system, classicism initially developed in France to mid-17th century century.
The development of classicism in France is closely connected with the establishment and flourishing of centralized royal power (absolute monarchy). Single-power statehood limited the rights of the willful feudal aristocracy, sought to legislatively define and regulate the relationship between the individual and the state, and clearly distinguish between the spheres of private and personal life. The spirit of regulation and discipline extends to the sphere of literature and art, determining their content and formal characteristics. In order to control literary life, the French Academy was created on the initiative of the first minister, Cardinal Richelieu, and the cardinal himself repeatedly intervened in literary disputes in the 1630s.
The canons of classicism took shape in sharp polemics with precision literature, as well as with Spanish playwrights (Lope de Vega, Tirso de Molina). The latter ridiculed, in particular, the demand for the unity of time. (“As for your 24 hours, what could be more absurd, that love, starting in the middle of the day, would end in the evening with a wedding!”) Continuing certain traditions of the Renaissance (admiration for antiquity, faith in reason, the ideal of harmony and moderation), classicism was the Renaissance and a kind of antithesis, which made it similar, with all their deep differences, to the Baroque.
Renaissance humanists saw the highest value in the free expression of human nature. Their hero is a harmonious personality, freed from the power of the estate corporation and unrestrained in his individualism. The humanists of the 17th century - the founders of classicism - due to the historical European experience, passions seemed to be a destructive, anarchic force, generated by egoism. In assessing a person, moral standards (virtues) now receive priority. The main content of creativity in classicism is the contradictions between the natural nature of man and civic duty, between his passions and reason, which gave rise to tragic conflicts.
The classicists saw the purpose of art in the knowledge of truth, which acts for them as the ideal of beauty. The classicists put forward a method for achieving it, based on three central categories of their aesthetics: reason, model and taste (these same concepts became objective criteria of artistry). To create a great work, according to classicists, it is necessary to follow the dictates of reason, relying on “exemplary”, i.e. classical, works of antiquity (antiquity) and guided by the rules of good taste (“good taste” is the supreme judge of “beautiful”). Thus, classicists introduce artistic creativity elements scientific activity.
The principles of classicist poetics and aesthetics are determined by the system of philosophical views of the era, which are based on the rationalism of Descartes. For him, reason is the highest criterion of truth. Using a rational-analytical method, one can penetrate into the ideal essence and purpose of any object or phenomenon, comprehend the eternal and unchanging laws that underlie the world order, and therefore the basis of artistic creativity.
Rationalism helped overcome religious prejudices and medieval scholasticism, but it also had its own weak side. The world in this philosophical system was considered from a metaphysical position - as unchanging and motionless.
This concept convinced classicists that the aesthetic ideal is eternal and unchanged at all times, but it was embodied with the greatest completeness and perfection in the art of antiquity. In order to reproduce this ideal, it is necessary to turn to ancient art and thoroughly study its rules and laws. At the same time, in accordance with the political ideals of the 17th century, special attention was drawn to the art of imperial Rome (the era of concentration of power in the hands of one person - the emperor), and the poetry of the "golden age" - the work of Virgil, Ovid, Horace. In addition to Aristotle’s “Poetics,” N. Boileau relied on Horace’s “Epistle to the Piso” in his poetic treatise “Poetic Art” (1674), bringing together and generalizing the theoretical principles of classicism, summing up the artistic practice of his predecessors and contemporaries.
Trying to recreate the world of antiquity ("ennobled" and "corrected"), classicists borrow from it only "clothes." Although Boileau, addressing contemporary writers, writes:
And you need to study the customs of countries and years.
After all, the climate cannot but influence people.
But beware of being saturated in vulgar bad taste
With the French spirit of Rome... –
it is nothing more than a declaration. In the literary practice of classicism, people of the 17th–18th centuries are hidden under the names of ancient heroes, and ancient plots reveal the formulation, first of all, of the most pressing problems of our time. Classicism is fundamentally ahistorical, since it is guided by the “eternal and unchanging” laws of reason.
Classicists proclaim the principle of imitation of nature, but at the same time they do not at all strive to reproduce reality in its entirety. They are interested not in what is, but in what should be according to the ideas of their mind. Everything that does not correspond to the model and “good taste” is expelled from art and declared “indecent.” In cases where it is necessary to reproduce the ugly, it is aesthetically transformed:
Incarnated in art, both a monster and a reptile
We are still pleased with the wary look:
The artist's brush shows us transformation
Abominable objects into objects of admiration...
Another key problem of classicist poetics is the problem of truth and verisimilitude. Should a writer depict exceptional phenomena, incredible, out of the ordinary, but recorded by history (“truth”), or create images and situations that are fictitious, but consistent with the logic of things and the requirements of reason (i.e., “plausible”)? Boileau gives preference to the second group of phenomena:
Don’t torment us with the incredible, disturbing the mind:
And the truth sometimes doesn’t look like the truth.
I will not be delighted with wonderful nonsense:
The mind does not care about what it does not believe.
The concept of verisimilitude also underlies the classical character: the tragic hero cannot be “petty and insignificant”,
But still, without weaknesses, his character is false.
Achilles captivates us with his ardor,
But if he cries, I love him more.
After all, in these little things nature comes to life,
And truly, the picture amazes our minds.
(N. Boileau, "Poetic Art")
Boileau is close to the position of J. Racine, who, based on Aristotle’s “Poetics,” in the preface to the tragedy “Andromache,” wrote about his heroes that “they should be average people in their spiritual qualities, in other words, have virtue, but be subject to weaknesses , and misfortune must befall them as a result of some mistake capable of arousing pity for them, and not disgust."
Not all classicists shared this concept. The founder of French classic tragedy, P. Corneille, gravitated toward creating exceptional characters. His heroes do not bring tears to the audience's eyes, but evoke undeniable admiration for their resilience and heroism. In the preface to his tragedy “Nicomede,” Corneille declared: “Tenderness and passions, which should be the soul of tragedy, have no place here: only heroic greatness reigns here, casting a glance at one’s sorrows filled with such contempt that it does not allow them to be torn from the heart.” the hero does not have a single complaint. It faces treacherous politics and opposes it only with noble prudence, walking with an open visor, it foresees danger without a shudder and does not expect help from anyone except from its valor and love...” Corneille motivates the persuasiveness of those created. them images with the concept of vital truth and historical authenticity: “History, which gave me the opportunity to reveal highest degree this greatness, I took from Justin."
The cult of reason among the classicists also determines the principles of character creation - one of the central aesthetic categories of classicism. For classicists, character does not imply a set of individual traits of a particular person, but embodies a certain general and at the same time eternal structure of human nature and psychology. Only in the aspect of the eternal, unchanging and universal human character became the object of artistic study of classicist art.
Following the theorists of antiquity - Aristotle and Horace - Boileau believed that “art” should preserve “for everyone his special feelings.” These “special feelings” determine the psychological make-up of a person, making one a vulgar dandy, another a miser, a third a spendthrift, etc. Character was thus reduced to one dominant trait. Pushkin also noted that in Molière the hypocrite Tartuffe even “asks for a glass of water, the hypocrite,” and the miser Harpagon “is stingy and nothing more.” There is no point in looking for greater psychological content in them. When Harpagon explains himself to his beloved, he behaves like a miser, and with his children he behaves like a miser. “There is only one paint, but it is applied thicker and thicker and, finally, brings the image to everyday, psychological implausibility.” This principle of typification led to a sharp division of heroes into positive, virtuous and negative, vicious.
The characters in tragedies are also determined by one leading trait. The unilinearity of Corneille's heroes emphasizes their integrity, which substantiates the “core” of their character. It is more difficult for Racine: the passion that defines the character of his characters is itself contradictory (usually it is love). The exhaustion of the entire gamut of psychological shades of passion is the method of Racine’s characterization - a method, like Corneille’s, deeply rationalistic.
Embodying generic, “eternal” traits in his character, the classicist artist himself sought to speak not from his special, uniquely individual “I”, but from the position of a statesman. That is why “objective” genres predominate in classicism - primarily dramatic ones, and among lyrical genres, those predominate where an orientation towards the impersonal, universally significant (ode, satire, fable) is predominant.
The normativity and rationality of classicist aesthetics are also manifested in the strict hierarchy of genres. There are “high” genres – tragedy, epic, ode. Their sphere is public life, historical events, mythology; their heroes are monarchs, generals, historical and mythological characters. This choice of tragic heroes was determined not so much by the tastes and influence of the court, but by the measure of moral responsibility of those people who were entrusted with the fate of the state.
“High” genres are contrasted with “low” genres - comedy, satire, fable - addressed to the sphere of private everyday life of nobles and townspeople. An intermediate place is given to “middle” genres - elegy, idyll, epistle, sonnet, song. Depicting the inner world of an individual, these genres did not occupy any noticeable place in the literary process during the heyday of classic literature, imbued with high civic ideals. The time for these genres will come later: they will have a significant impact on the development of literature in the era of the crisis of classicism.
Prose, especially fiction, is valued by classicists much lower than poetry. “Love thought in verse,” Boileau exclaims at the beginning of his treatise and “raises to Parnassus” only poetic genres. Those who get distribution prose genres, which, first of all, are of an informational nature - sermons, memoirs, letters. At the same time, scientific, philosophical and epistolary prose, becoming in the public domain in the era of the cult of science, acquires the features of a truly literary work and already has value not only scientific or historical, but also aesthetic ("Letters of a Provincial" and "Thoughts" by B. Pascal, "Maxims, or Moral Reflections" by F. de La Rochefoucauld, "Characters" by J. de La Bruyère, etc.).
Each genre in classicism has strict boundaries and clear formal characteristics. No mixing of the sublime and the base, the tragic and the comic, the heroic and the ordinary is allowed: what is allowed in satire is excluded in tragedy, what is good in comedy is unacceptable in epic. A “peculiar law of style unity” reigns here (G. Gukovsky) - each genre unit has its own strict formal style canon. Mixed genres, for example, tragicomedy, which was very popular in the first half of the 17th century, are being pushed out of the boundaries of “real literature.” “From now on, only the entire system of genres is capable of expressing the diversity of life.”
The rationalistic approach also determined the attitude towards poetic form:
You learn to think, then write.
Speech follows the thought; clearer or darker
And the phrase is modeled after the idea;
What is clearly understood will be clearly heard,
And the exact word will come immediately.
(N. Boileau, "Poetic Art")
Each work must be strictly thought out, the composition must be logically structured, the individual parts must be proportionate and indissoluble, the style must be clear to the point of transparency, the language must be laconic and precise. The concept of measure, proportion, and symmetry is inherent not only in literature, but also in the entire artistic culture of classicism - architecture, painting, landscape art. Both scientific and artistic thinking of the era has a pronounced mathematical character.
In architecture, public buildings that express the idea of statehood are beginning to set the tone. The basis of planning schemes are regular geometric shapes (square, triangle, circle). Classicist architects mastered the construction of a huge complex consisting of a palace and a park. They become capable of detailed, mathematically verified compositions. In France, new trends were first fully embodied in the grandiose ensemble of Versailles (1661–1689, architects L. Levo, A. Le Nôtre, J. Hardouin-Mansart, etc.).
They are distinguished by clarity, logic, and compositional harmony. paintings classicists. N. Poussin, the creator and head of French classicism in painting, chose subjects that gave the mind food for thought, cultivated virtue in a person and taught him wisdom. He found these stories primarily in ancient mythology and legendary history Rome. His paintings “The Death of Germanicus” (1627), “The Capture of Jerusalem” (1628), and “The Rape of the Sabine Women” (1633) are devoted to the depiction of “heroic and unusual actions.” The composition of these paintings is strictly ordered; it resembles the composition of ancient bas-reliefs (the characters are located in a shallow space, divided into a number of plans). Poussin, almost sculpturally, clearly draws the volumes of the figures, carefully verifies their anatomical structure, and arranges their clothes in classic folds. The distribution of colors in the painting is also subject to the same strict harmony.
Strict laws also reigned in verbal art. These laws were established especially strictly for high genres, expressed in the obligatory poetic form. Thus, tragedy, like epic, had to be presented in majestic Alexandrian verse. The plot of the tragedy, historical or mythological, was taken from ancient times and was usually known to the viewer (later classicists began to draw material for their tragedies from eastern history, and Russian classicists preferred plots from their own national history). The familiarity of the plot tuned the viewer not to perceive a complex and intricate intrigue, but to analyze the emotional experiences and opposing aspirations of the characters. According to the definition of G. A. Gukovsky, “classical tragedy is not a drama of action, but a drama of conversation; the classical poet is not interested in facts, but in analysis directly formed in the word.”
The laws of formal logic determined the structure of dramatic genres, primarily tragedy, which was supposed to consist of five acts. Comedies could also be three-act (one-act comedies would appear in the 18th century), but in no case four or two acts. The classicists elevated the principle of three unities - place, action and time, formulated in the treatises of G. Trissino and Y. Scaliger, based on Aristotle's Poetics, into an indisputable law for dramatic genres. According to the rule of unity of place, the entire action of the play must take place in one place - a palace, a house, or even a room. The unity of time required that the entire action of the play fit into no more than a day, and the more it corresponded to the performance time - three hours - the better it was. Finally, unity of action implied that the events depicted in the play should have their own beginning, development and end. In addition, the play should not contain “extra” episodes or characters that are not directly related to the development of the main plot. Otherwise, the theorists of classicism believed, the diversity of impressions prevented the viewer from perceiving the “reasonable basis” of life.
The requirement of three unities radically changed the structure of drama, as it forced playwrights to depict not the entire system of events (as was the case, for example, in the medieval mystery play), but only the episode that completes this or that event. The events themselves were “taken off stage” and could cover a large period of time, but they were retrospective in nature, and the viewer learned about them from the monologues and dialogues of the characters.
At first, the three unities were not formal. The underlying principle of verisimilitude, the fundamental principle of classicism, was formed in the struggle with the traditions of medieval theater, with its plays, the action of which sometimes stretched over several days, involving hundreds of performers, and the plot was filled with all kinds of miracles and naive naturalistic effects. But, elevating the principle of three unities to an unshakable rule, the classicists did not take into account the peculiarities of the subjective perception of art, which allows for artistic illusion, the non-identity of the artistic image with the reproduced object. The romantics, who discovered the “subjectivity” of the viewer, will begin their assault on the classical theater by overthrowing the rule of three unities.
The genre aroused particular interest on the part of writers and theorists of classicism. epics, or heroic poem, which Boileau placed even above tragedy. Only in the epic, according to Boileau, did the poet “gain space/to captivate our mind and gaze with lofty invention.” Classical poets are attracted to the epic by a special heroic theme based on the most important events of the past, and by heroes exceptional in their qualities, and by the manner of narrating events, which Boileau formulated as follows:
Let your story be dynamic, clear, concise,
And in the descriptions it is both magnificent and rich.
As in tragedy, a moral and didactic attitude is important in epic. Depicting heroic times, the epic, according to V. Trediakovsky, gives “firm instruction to the human race, teaching this to love virtue” (“Prediction of the Heroic Poem”, 1766).
In the artistic structure of the epic, Boileau assigns a decisive role to fiction (“Putting myth as the basis, he lives by fiction...”). Boileau's attitude towards ancient and Christian mythology is consistently rationalistic - ancient myth attracts him with the transparency of the allegory, which does not contradict reason. Christian miracles cannot be the subject of aesthetic embodiment; moreover, according to Boileau, their use in poetry can compromise religious dogmas (“Christ’s sacraments are not used for fun”). In characterizing the epic, Boileau relies on ancient epic, primarily Virgil's Aeneid.
Criticizing the "Christian epic" of T. Tasso ("Jerusalem Liberated"), Boileau also opposes the national heroic epic based on material from the early Middle Ages ("Alaric" by J. Scuderi, "The Virgin" by J. Chaplin). The classicist Boileau does not accept the Middle Ages as an era of “barbarism,” which means that subjects taken from this era cannot have aesthetic and didactic value for him.
The principles of the epic formulated by Boileau, oriented towards Homer and Virgil, did not receive full and comprehensive implementation in literature XVII century. This genre has already outlived its usefulness, and I. G. Herder, the theorist of the literary movement in Germany “Storm and Drang” (70s of the 18th century), from the position of historicism explained the impossibility of its resurrection (he is talking about the ancient epic) : "The epic belongs to the childhood of mankind." In the 18th century, attempts to create a heroic epic based on national material within the framework of the classicist artistic system were all the more unsuccessful (Voltaire’s “Henriada”, 1728; “Rossiyada” by M. Kheraskov, 1779).
Ode, one of the main genres of classicism, also has a strict form. Its obligatory feature is “lyrical disorder,” which presupposes the free development of poetic thought:
Let Odes stormy style rush at random:
Her outfit is beautiful with its beautiful wrinkles.
Away from the timid rhymers, whose minds are phlegmatic
Dogmatic order is maintained in the passions themselves...
(N. Boileau, "Poetic Art")
And yet, this “dogmatic order” was strictly observed. The ode, like an oratorical speech, consisted of three parts: an “attack,” that is, an introduction to the topic, a discussion where this topic was developed, and an energetic, emotional conclusion. “Lyrical disorder” is purely external in nature: moving from one thought to another, introducing lyrical digressions, the poet subordinated the construction of the ode to the development of the main idea. The lyricism of the ode is not individual, but, so to speak, collective; it expresses “the aspirations and aspirations of the entire state organism” (G. Gukovsky).
Unlike "high" tragedy and epic, classic " low genres" – comedy and satire – turned into modern daily life. The purpose of comedy is to educate, ridiculing shortcomings, “to rule the temper with mockery;/To make people laugh and to use its direct rules” (A. Sumarokov). Classicism rejected the pamphlet (i.e., directed against specific individuals) satirical comedy of Aristophanes. The comedian is interested in universal human vices in their everyday manifestations - laziness, wastefulness, stinginess, etc. But this does not mean that classic comedy is devoid of social content. Classicism is characterized by a clear ideological and moral-didactic orientation, and therefore the appeal to socially significant issues gave many classic comedies a social and even topical sound ("Tartuffe", "Don Juan", "The Misanthrope" by Moliere; "The Brigadier", "The Minor" by D. Fonvizin; "Sneak" by V. Kapnist).
In his judgments about comedy, Boileau focuses on the “serious” moral comedy, presented in antiquity by Menander and Terence, and in modern times by Moliere. Boileau considers “The Misanthrope” and “Tartuffe” to be Moliere’s highest achievements, but criticizes the comedian for using the traditions of folk farce, considering them rude and vulgar (the comedy “The Tricks of Scapin”). Boileau advocates the creation of a comedy of characters as opposed to a comedy of intrigue. Later, this type of classic comedy, touching on problems of social or socio-political significance, would be assigned the definition of “high” comedy.
Satire has much in common with comedy and fable. All these genres have a common subject of depiction - human shortcomings and vices, a common emotional and artistic assessment - ridicule. The compositional structure of satire and fable is based on the combination of the author's and narrative principles. The author of satire and fable often uses dialogue. However, unlike comedy, in satire the dialogue is not connected with action, with a system of events, and the depiction of life phenomena, unlike a fable, in satire is based on a direct rather than an allegorical image.
Being a satirical poet by his talent, Boileau in theory deviates from ancient aesthetics, which classified satire as a “low” genre. He sees satire as a socially active genre. Giving a detailed description of satire, Boileau recalls the Roman satirists Lucilius, Horace, and Persius Flaccus, who boldly exposed the vices of the powerful. But he puts Juvenal above all. And although the French theorist notes the “area” origins of the Roman poet’s satire, his authority for Boileau is indisputable:
His poems live by the terrible truth,
And yet the beauty in them sparkles here and there.
The temperament of a satirist prevailed over theoretical postulates in Boileau and in his defense of the right to personal satire directed against specific, well-known people (“Discourse on Satire”; it is characteristic that Boileau did not recognize satire on faces in comedy). This technique brought topical, journalistic color to classic satire. The Russian classicist-satirist A. Kantemir also widely used the technique of satire on faces, giving his “supra-individualistic” characters, personifying some kind of human vice, a portrait resemblance to his enemies.
An important contribution of classicism to the further development of literature was the development of a clear and harmonious language of artistic works (“What is clearly understood will sound clearly”), freed from foreign vocabulary, capable of expressing various feelings and experiences (“Anger is proud, he needs arrogant words, / But the sorrows of the complaint are not so intense"), correlated with the characters and age of the characters ("So choose your language carefully: / An old man cannot speak like a young man").
The formation of classicism in both France and Russia begins with linguistic and poetic reforms. In France, this work was started by F. Malherbe, who was the first to put forward the concept of good taste as a criterion of artistic skill. Malherbe did a lot to cleanse the French language of numerous provincialisms, archaisms and the dominance of borrowed Latin and Greek words introduced into literary circulation by the poets of the Pleiades in the 16th century. Malherbe carried out a codification of the French literary language, eliminating everything random from it, focusing on the speech skills of the enlightened people of the capital, provided that the literary language should be understandable to all segments of the population. Malherbe's contribution to the field of French versification was also significant. The rules of metrics formulated by him (fixed place of caesura, prohibition of transfers from one poetic line to another, etc.) not only entered the poetics of French classicism, but were also adopted by the poetic theory and practice of other European countries.
In Russia, similar work was carried out a century later by M. Lomonosov. Lomonosov's theory of the "three calms" eliminated the diversity and disorder of literary forms of communication characteristic of Russian literature of the late 17th - first third of the 18th centuries, streamlined literary word usage within a particular genre, determining the development literary speech up to Pushkin. No less important is the poetic reform of Trediakovsky-Lomonosov. By reforming versification on the basis of the syllabic-tonic system, which is organic to the Russian language, Trediakovsky and Lomonosov thereby laid the foundation of a national poetic culture.
In the 18th century, classicism experienced its second heyday. The determining influence on it, as well as on other stylistic trends, is enlightenment- an ideological movement that emerged in conditions of an acute crisis of absolutism and directed against the feudal-absolutist system and the church that supports it. The ideas of the Enlightenment are based on the philosophical concept of the Englishman J. Locke, who proposed a new model of the process of cognition, based on feeling, sensation, as the only source of human knowledge about the world ("An Essay on the Human Mind", 1690). Locke decisively rejected the doctrine of “innate ideas” of R. Descartes, likening the soul of a born person to a blank slate (tabula rasa), where experience writes “its own writings” throughout life.
This view of human nature led to the idea of the determining influence on the formation of personality of the social and natural environment, which makes a person good or bad. Ignorance, superstition, and prejudices generated by the feudal social order determine, in the opinion of educators, social disorder and distort the initially moral nature of man. And only general education can eliminate the discrepancy between existing social relations and the requirements of reason and human nature. Literature and art began to be seen as one of the main tools for the transformation and re-education of society.
All this determined fundamentally new features in the classicism of the 18th century. While maintaining the basic principles of classicist aesthetics in the art and literature of educational classicism, the understanding of the purpose and objectives of a number of genres changes significantly. The transformation of classicism in the spirit of enlightenment principles is especially clearly visible in the tragedies of Voltaire. Remaining true to the basic aesthetic principles of classicism, Voltaire strives to influence not only the minds of the audience, but also their feelings. He is looking for new topics and new means of expression. Continuing to develop the ancient theme familiar to classicism, in his tragedies Voltaire also turns to medieval subjects (Tancred, 1760), oriental (Mahomet, 1742), and related to the conquest of the New World (Alzira, 1736). He gives a new justification for tragedy: “Tragedy is a moving painting, an animated picture, and the people depicted in it must act” (i.e., dramaturgy is thought of by Voltaire not only as the art of words, but also as the art of movement, gesture, facial expressions).
Voltaire fills the classic tragedy with acute philosophical and socio-political content associated with current problems modernity. The playwright's focus is on the fight against religious fanaticism, political tyranny and despotism. Thus, in one of his most famous tragedies, “Mohammed,” Voltaire proves that any deification of an individual personality ultimately leads to uncontrolled power over other people. Religious intolerance leads the heroes of the tragedy "Zaire" (1732) to a tragic denouement, and merciless gods and treacherous priests push weak mortals to crimes ("Oedipus", 1718). In the spirit of high social issues, Voltaire rethinks and transforms the heroic epic and ode.
During the period of the Great French Revolution (1789–1794), the classicist movement in literary life has special meaning. The classicism of this time not only generalized and assimilated the innovative features of Voltaire's tragedy, but also radically restructured the high genres. M. J. Chenier refuses to denounce despotism in general and that is why he takes as the subject of his images not only antiquity, but also Europe of modern times ("Charles IX", "Jean Calas"). The hero of Chenier's tragedies promotes the ideas of natural law, freedom and law, he is close to the people, and in the tragedy the people not only appear on stage, but also act along with the main character ("Cai Gracchus", 1792). The concept of the state as a positive category, opposed to the personal, individualistic, is replaced in the minds of the playwright by the category “nation”. It is no coincidence that Chenier called his play "Charles IX" a "national tragedy."
Within the framework of classicism of the era of the French Revolution, the new type odes. Preserving the classic principle of the priority of reason over reality, the revolutionary ode includes like-minded people of the lyrical hero into its world. The author himself no longer speaks on his own behalf, but on behalf of his fellow citizens, using the pronoun “we”. Rouget de Lisle in “La Marseillaise” pronounces revolutionary slogans as if together with his listeners, thereby encouraging them and himself to revolutionary changes.
The creator of a new type of classicism, corresponding to the spirit of the times, in painting was J. David. Together with his painting "The Oath of the Horatii" (1784) in French art a new theme comes - civil, journalistic in its straightforward expression, a new hero - a Roman republican, morally integral, putting duty to the homeland above all else, a new manner - stern and ascetic, contrasted with the exquisite chamber style of French painting of the second half of the 18th century.
Under the influence of French literature in the 18th century, national models of classicism took shape in other European countries: in England (A. Pope, J. Addison), in Italy (V. Alfieri), in Germany (I. K. Gottsched). In the 1770–1780s, such an original artistic phenomenon as “Weimar classicism” (J. W. Goethe, F. Schiller) arose in Germany. Turning to the artistic forms and traditions of antiquity, Goethe and Schiller set themselves the task of creating new literature high style as the main means of aesthetic education of a harmonious person.
The formation and flowering of Russian classicism fell on the years 1730–1750 and took place in conditions quite similar to the French ones in the formation of an absolutist state. But, despite a number of common points in the aesthetics of Russian and French classicism (rationalism, normativity and genre regulation, abstraction and convention as the leading features of the artistic image, recognition of the role of the enlightened monarch in establishing a fair social order based on the law), Russian classicism has its own unique national features.
The ideas of enlightenment have fueled Russian classicism from the very beginning. The affirmation of the natural equality of people leads Russian writers to the idea of the extra-class value of man. Already Cantemir, in his second satire “Filaret and Eugene” (1730), declares that “the same blood flows in both free and slaves,” and “noble” people “are shown by one virtue.” Forty years later, A. Sumarokov in his satire “On Nobility” will continue: “What is the difference between a gentleman and a peasant? Both of them are an animated lump of earth.” Fonvizinsky Starodum ("Minor", 1782) will determine the nobility of a person by the number of deeds performed for the fatherland ("without noble deeds, a noble state is nothing"), and the enlightenment of a person will be directly dependent on the cultivation of virtue in him ("The main goal of all human knowledge - good behavior").
Seeing in education “the guarantee of the well-being of the state” (D. Fonvizin) and believing in the usefulness of an enlightened monarchy, Russian classicists begin the long process of educating autocrats, reminding them of their responsibilities towards their subjects:
The gods did not make him king for his benefit;
He is a king, so that he may be a man to all people:
He must give his all to people all the time,
All your care, all your zeal for people...
(V. Trediakovsky, "Tilemakhida")
If the king does not fulfill his duties, if he is a tyrant, he must be overthrown from the throne. This can also happen through a popular uprising ("Dmitry the Pretender" by A. Sumarokov).
The main material for Russian classicists is not antiquity, but their own national history, from which they preferred to draw subjects for high genres. And instead of an abstract ideal ruler, a “philosopher on the throne”, characteristic of European classicism, Russian writers recognized a very specific historical figure - Peter I - as an exemplary sovereign, a “worker on the throne”.
The theoretician of Russian classicism Sumarokov, relying in his "Epistole on Poetry" (1748) on Boileau's "Poetic Art", introduces a number of new provisions into his theoretical treatise, pays tribute to recognition not only to the masters of classicism, but also to representatives of other movements. Thus, he elevates to Helicon, along with Malherbe and Racine, Camoes, Lope de Vega, Milton, Pope, the “unenlightened” Shakespeare, as well as contemporary writers - Detouches and Voltaire. Sumarokov speaks in sufficient detail about the heroic-comic poem and epistole, not mentioned by Boileau, explains in detail the features of the fable “storehouse” using the example of the fables of the bypassed Boileau Lafontaine, and dwells on the genre of song, which the French theorist mentions in passing. All this testifies not only to Sumarokov’s personal aesthetic preferences, but also to the changes that are ripening in European classicism of the 18th century.
These changes are associated primarily with the increasing interest of literature in inner life individual personality, which ultimately led to a significant restructuring of the genre structures of classicism. A typical example here is the work of G. Derzhavin. Remaining “primarily a classicist” (V. Belinsky), Derzhavin introduces a strong personal element into his poetry, thereby destroying the law of unity of style. In his poetry, formations that are complex in terms of genre appear - ode-satire ("Felitsa", 1782), anacreontic poems written on an odic plot ("Poems for the birth of a porphyry-born youth in the North", 1779), an elegy with the features of a message and an ode (" On the death of Prince Meshchersky", 1779), etc.
Giving way to new literary trends, classicism does not leave literature without a trace. The turn to sentimentalism occurs within the framework of the “average” classic genres - elegy, message, idyll. The poets of the early 19th century K. Batyushkov and N. Gnedich, while remaining fundamentally faithful to the classical ideal (partly to the canon of classicism), each went their own way to romanticism. Batyushkov – from “light poetry” to psychological and historical elegy, Gnedich – to the translation of the “Iliad” and genres associated with folk art. The strict forms of Racine's classic tragedy were chosen by P. Katenin for his Andromache (1809), although as a romantic he was interested in the very spirit of ancient culture. The high civic tradition of classicism was continued in the freedom-loving lyrics of the Radishchevite poets, the Decembrists and Pushkin.
The Propylaea of the Bavarian architect Leo von Klenze (1784-1864) is based on the Athens Parthenon. This is the entrance gate to Königsplatz Square, designed according to the ancient model. Königsplatz, Munich, Bavaria.
Classicism begins its chronology in the 16th century during the Renaissance, partially returns to the 17th century, actively develops and gains positions in architecture in the 18th and early 19th centuries. Between early and late classicism, the dominant positions were occupied by the Baroque and Rococo styles. The return to ancient traditions, as an ideal model, occurred against the backdrop of a change in the philosophy of society, as well as technical capabilities. Despite the fact that the emergence of classicism is associated with archaeological finds that were made in Italy, and the monuments of antiquity were located mainly in Rome, the main political processes in the 18th century took place mainly in France and England. Here the influence of the bourgeoisie increased, the ideological basis of which was the philosophy of enlightenment, which led to the search for a style reflecting the ideals of the new class. Antique forms and organization of space corresponded to the ideas of the bourgeoisie about the order and correct structure of the world, which contributed to the emergence of features of classicism in architecture. The ideological mentor of the new style was Winckelmann, who wrote in the 1750s and 1760s. works “Thoughts on the imitation of Greek art” and “History of the arts of antiquity.” In them he spoke about Greek art, filled with noble simplicity, calm majesty, and his vision formed the basis of admiration for ancient beauty. The European enlightener Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (Lessing. 1729 -1781) strengthened the attitude towards classicism by writing the work “Laocoon” (1766). Enlighteners of the 18th century, representatives of progressive thought in France returned to the classics, as a direction directed against the decadent art of the aristocracy, which they considered Baroque and Rococo. They also opposed the academic classicism that ruled during the Renaissance. In their opinion, the architecture of the era of classicism, true to the spirit of antiquity, should not mean a simple repetition of ancient models, but be filled with new content, reflecting the spirit of the times. Thus, the features of classicism in the architecture of the 18th and 19th centuries. consisted in the use of ancient shaping systems in architecture, as a way of expressing the worldview of the new bourgeois class and, at the same time, supporting the absolutism of the monarchy. As a result, France of the Napoleonic period was at the forefront of the development of classical architecture. Then - Germany and England, as well as Russia. Rome became one of the main theoretical centers of classicism.
Residence of the kings in Munich. Residenz München. Architect Leo von Klenze.
The philosophy of architecture of the era of classicism was supported by archaeological research, discoveries in the field of development and culture of ancient civilizations. The results of the excavations, presented in scientific works, albums with images, laid the foundations of a style whose adherents considered antiquity to be the height of perfection, a model of beauty.
Features of classicism in architecture
In the history of art, the term “classic” means the culture of the ancient Greeks of the 4th-6th centuries. BC. In a broader sense, it is used to refer to the art of ancient Greece and ancient Rome. The features of classicism in architecture draw their motifs from the traditions of antiquity, personified by the façade of a Greek temple or a Roman building with a portico, colonnades, triangular pediment, division of walls with pilasters, cornices - elements of the order system. The facades are decorated with garlands, urns, rosettes, palmettes and meanders, beads and ionics. The plans and facades are symmetrical relative to the main entrance. The coloring of the facades is dominated by a light palette, while the white color serves to focus attention on architectural elements: columns, porticos, etc., which emphasize the tectonics of the building.
Tauride Palace. St. Petersburg. Architect I. Starov. 1780s
Characteristic features of classicism in architecture: harmony, orderliness and simplicity of forms, geometrically correct volumes; rhythm; balanced layout, clear and calm proportions; the use of elements of the order of ancient architecture: porticos, colonnades, statues and reliefs on the surface of the walls. A feature of classicism in the architecture of different countries was the combination of ancient and national traditions.
London's Osterley Mansion is a park in the classicist style. It combines the traditional order system of antiquity and echoes of Gothic, which the British considered a national style. Architect Robert Adam. Start of construction - 1761
The architecture of the era of classicism was based on norms brought into a strict system, which made it possible to build according to the drawings and descriptions of famous architects not only in the center, but also in the provinces, where local craftsmen acquired engraved copies of exemplary designs created by great masters and built houses according to them . Marina Kalabukhova
1. Introduction.Classicism as an artistic method...................................2
2. Aesthetics of classicism.
2.1. Basic principles of classicism.........................…………….….....5
2.2. Picture of the world, concept of personality in the art of classicism......5
2.3. The aesthetic nature of classicism.................................................... ........9
2.4. Classicism in painting......................................................... .........................15
2.5. Classicism in sculpture......................................................... .......................16
2.6. Classicism in architecture................................................................... .....................18
2.7. Classicism in literature................................................................... .......................20
2.8. Classicism in music......................................................... ...............................22
2.9. Classicism in the theater................................................................... ...............................22
2.10. The originality of Russian classicism.................................................... ....22
3. Conclusion……………………………………...…………………………...26
Bibliography..............................…….………………………………….28
Applications ........................................................................................................29
1. Classicism as an artistic method
Classicism is one of the artistic methods that actually existed in the history of art. Sometimes it is referred to by the terms “direction” and “style”. Classicism (French) classicisme, from lat. classicus- exemplary) - art style and aesthetic trends in European art of the 17th-19th centuries.
Classicism is based on the ideas of rationalism, which were formed simultaneously with the same ideas in the philosophy of Descartes. A work of art, from the point of view of classicism, should be built on the basis of strict canons, thereby revealing the harmony and logic of the universe itself. Of interest to classicism is only the eternal, the unchangeable - in each phenomenon it strives to recognize only essential, typological features, discarding random individual characteristics. The aesthetics of classicism attaches great importance to the social and educational function of art. Classicism takes many rules and canons from ancient art (Aristotle, Horace).
Classicism establishes a strict hierarchy of genres, which are divided into high (ode, tragedy, epic) and low (comedy, satire, fable). Each genre has strictly defined characteristics, the mixing of which is not allowed.
The concept of classicism as a creative method presupposes in its content a historically determined method of aesthetic perception and modeling of reality in artistic images: the picture of the world and the concept of personality, the most common for the mass aesthetic consciousness of a given historical era, are embodied in ideas about the essence of verbal art, its relationship with reality , its own internal laws.
Classicism arises and is formed in certain historical and cultural conditions. The most common research belief connects classicism with the historical conditions of the transition from feudal fragmentation to a unified national-territorial statehood, in the formation of which the centralizing role belongs to the absolute monarchy.
Classicism is an organic stage in the development of any national culture, despite the fact that different national cultures go through the classicist stage at different times, due to the individuality of the national version of the formation of a general social model of a centralized state.
The chronological framework of the existence of classicism in different European cultures is defined as the second half of the 17th - the first thirty years of the 18th century, despite the fact that early classicist trends were noticeable at the end of the Renaissance, at the turn of the 16th-17th centuries. Within these chronological limits, French classicism is considered the standard embodiment of the method. Closely connected with the heyday of French absolutism in the second half of the 17th century, it gave European culture not only great writers - Corneille, Racine, Moliere, La Fontaine, Voltaire, but also a great theorist of classicist art - Nicolas Boileau-Dépreau. Being himself a practicing writer who earned fame during his lifetime for his satires, Boileau was mainly famous for the creation of the aesthetic code of classicism - the didactic poem “Poetic Art” (1674), in which he gave a coherent theoretical concept of literary creativity, derived from the literary practice of his contemporaries. Thus, classicism in France became the most self-conscious embodiment of the method. Hence its reference value.
The historical prerequisites for the emergence of classicism connect the aesthetic problematics of the method with the era of aggravation of the relationship between the individual and society in the process of the formation of autocratic statehood, which, replacing the social permissiveness of feudalism, seeks to regulate by law and clearly delimit the spheres of public and private life and the relationship between the individual and the state. This determines the meaningful aspect of art. Its basic principles are motivated by the system of philosophical views of the era. They form a picture of the world and a concept of personality, and these categories are embodied together artistic techniques literary creativity.
The most general philosophical concepts present in all philosophical movements of the second half of the 17th - late 18th centuries. and directly related to the aesthetics and poetics of classicism are the concepts of “rationalism” and “metaphysics”, relevant for both idealistic and materialistic philosophical teachings of this time. The founder of the philosophical doctrine of rationalism is the French mathematician and philosopher René Descartes (1596-1650). The fundamental thesis of his doctrine: “I think, therefore I exist” - was realized in many philosophical movements of that time, united common name“Cartesianism” (from the Latin version of the name Descartes - Cartesius), In essence, this is an idealistic thesis, since it derives material existence from the idea. However, rationalism, as the interpretation of reason as the primary and highest spiritual ability of man, is equally characteristic of the materialist philosophical movements of the era - such, for example, as the metaphysical materialism of the English philosophical school of Bacon-Locke, which recognized experience as a source of knowledge, but put it below the generalizing and analytical activity of the mind, extracting from the multitude of facts obtained by experience the highest idea, a means of modeling the cosmos - supreme reality- from the chaos of individual material objects.
The concept of “metaphysics” is equally applicable to both varieties of rationalism - idealistic and materialistic. Genetically, it goes back to Aristotle, and in his philosophical teaching it denoted a branch of knowledge that explores the highest and unchangeable principles of all things, inaccessible to the senses and only rationally and speculatively comprehended. Both Descartes and Bacon used the term in the Aristotelian sense. In modern times, the concept of “metaphysics” has acquired additional meaning and has come to mean an anti-dialectical way of thinking that perceives phenomena and objects without their interrelation and development. Historically, this very accurately characterizes the peculiarities of thinking of the analytical era of the 17th-18th centuries, the period of differentiation of scientific knowledge and art, when each branch of science, standing out from the syncretic complex, acquired its own separate subject, but at the same time lost connection with other branches of knowledge.
2. Aesthetics of classicism
2.1. Basic principles of classicism
1. Cult of reason 2. Cult of civic duty 3. Appeal to medieval subjects 4. Abstraction from the depiction of everyday life, from historical national identity 5. Imitation of ancient models 6. Compositional harmony, symmetry, unity of a work of art 7. Heroes are bearers of one main feature, given without development 8. Antithesis as the main technique for creating a work of art
2.2. Picture of the world, concept of personality
in the art of classicism
The picture of the world generated by the rationalistic type of consciousness clearly divides reality into two levels: empirical and ideological. The external, visible and tangible material-empirical world consists of many separate material objects and phenomena that are in no way connected with each other - it is a chaos of individual private entities. However, above this chaotic multitude of individual objects, there is their ideal hypostasis - a harmonious and harmonious whole, a universal idea of the universe, which includes the ideal image of any material object in its highest, purified from particulars, eternal and unchanging form: in the way it should be according to the original plan of the Creator. This universal idea can only be comprehended rationally and analytically by gradually purifying an object or phenomenon from its specific forms and appearance and penetrating into its ideal essence and purpose.
And since design precedes creation, and thinking is an indispensable condition and source of existence, this ideal reality has the highest primary character. It is easy to notice that the main patterns of such a two-level picture of reality are very easily projected onto the main sociological problem of the period of transition from feudal fragmentation to autocratic statehood - the problem of the relationship between the individual and the state. The world of people is a world of individual private human beings, chaotic and disorderly, the state is a comprehensive harmonious idea that creates a harmonious and harmonious ideal world order out of chaos. It is this philosophical picture of the world of the 17th-18th centuries. determined such substantive aspects of the aesthetics of classicism as the concept of personality and the typology of conflict, universally characteristic (with the necessary historical and cultural variations) for classicism in any European literature.
In the field of human relations with the outside world, classicism sees two types of connections and positions - the same two levels from which the philosophical picture of the world is formed. The first level is the so-called “natural man,” a biological being who stands alongside all objects of the material world. This is a private entity, possessed by selfish passions, disorderly and unrestricted in its desire to ensure its personal existence. At this level of human connections with the world, the leading category that determines the spiritual appearance of a person is passion - blind and unrestrained in its desire for realization in the name of achieving individual good.
The second level of the concept of personality is the so-called “social person”, harmoniously included in society in his highest, ideal image, aware that his good is an integral part of the good of the general. A “social man” is guided in his worldview and actions not by passions, but by reason, since reason is the highest spiritual ability of a person, giving him the opportunity for positive self-determination in the conditions of human community, based on the ethical norms of consistent community life. Thus, the concept of human personality in the ideology of classicism turns out to be complex and contradictory: a natural (passionate) and a social (reasonable) person is one and the same character, torn by internal contradictions and in a situation of choice.
Hence the typological conflict of the art of classicism, which directly follows from such a concept of personality. It is quite obvious that the source of a conflict situation is precisely the character of a person. Character is one of the central aesthetic categories of classicism, and its interpretation differs significantly from the meaning that modern consciousness and literary criticism puts into the term “character”. In the understanding of the aesthetics of classicism, character is precisely the ideal hypostasis of a person - that is, not the individual makeup of a specific human personality, but a certain universal view of human nature and psychology, timeless in its essence. Only in this form of an eternal, unchanging, universal attribute could character be an object of classicist art, unambiguously attributed to the highest, ideal level of reality.
The main components of character are passions: love, hypocrisy, courage, stinginess, sense of duty, envy, patriotism, etc. It is by the predominance of one passion that a character is determined: “lover”, “miserly”, “envious”, “patriot”. All these definitions are precisely “characters” in the understanding of classicist aesthetic consciousness.
However, these passions are unequal to each other, although according to the philosophical concepts of the 17th-18th centuries. all passions are equal, since they are all from human nature, they are all natural, and no passion on its own can decide which passion is consistent with the ethical dignity of a person and which is not. These decisions are made only by reason. Despite the fact that all passions are equally categories of emotional spiritual life, some of them (such as love, stinginess, envy, hypocrisy, etc.) are less and more difficult to agree with the dictates of reason and are more associated with the concept of selfish good. Others (courage, sense of duty, honor, patriotism) are more subject to rational control and do not contradict the idea of the common good, the ethics of social relations.
So it turns out that rational and unreasonable passions, altruistic and selfish, personal and social, collide in conflict. And reason is the highest spiritual ability of a person, a logical and analytical tool that allows one to control passions and distinguish good from evil, truth from lies. The most common type of classic conflict is a conflict situation between personal inclination (love) and a sense of duty to society and the state, which for some reason excludes the possibility of realizing love passion. It is quite obvious that by its nature this conflict is psychological, although a necessary condition for its implementation is a situation in which the interests of man and society collide. These most important ideological aspects of the aesthetic thinking of the era found their expression in the system of ideas about the laws of artistic creativity.
2.3. The aesthetic nature of classicism
The aesthetic principles of classicism have undergone significant changes during its existence. A characteristic feature of this trend is admiration for antiquity. The art of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome was considered by classicists as an ideal model of artistic creativity. “Poetics” of Aristotle and “The Art of Poetry” of Horace had a huge influence on the formation of the aesthetic principles of classicism. Here we find a tendency to create sublimely heroic, ideal, rationalistically clear and plastically completed images. As a rule, in the art of classicism, modern political, moral and aesthetic ideals are embodied in characters, conflicts, situations borrowed from the arsenal ancient history, mythology or directly from ancient art.
The aesthetics of classicism guided poets, artists, and composers to create works of art distinguished by clarity, logic, strict balance and harmony. All this, according to classicists, was fully reflected in ancient artistic culture. For them, reason and antiquity are synonymous. The rationalistic nature of the aesthetics of classicism manifested itself in the abstract typification of images, strict regulation of genres, forms, in the interpretation of ancient artistic heritage, in the appeal of art to the mind rather than to feelings, in the desire to subordinate the creative process to unshakable norms, rules and canons (norm - from the Latin. norma – guiding principle, rule, pattern; generally accepted rule, pattern of behavior or action).
Just as the aesthetic principles of the Renaissance found their most typical expression in Italy, so in France XVII V. – aesthetic principles of classicism. By the 17th century Italian artistic culture has largely lost its former influence. But the innovative spirit of French art clearly emerged. At this time, an absolutist state was formed in France, which united society and centralized power.
The strengthening of absolutism meant the victory of the principle of universal regulation in all spheres of life, from economics to spiritual life. Debt is the main regulator of human behavior. The state personifies this duty and acts as a kind of entity alienated from the individual. Submission to the state, fulfillment of public duty is the highest virtue of an individual. Man is no longer thought of as free, as was typical of the Renaissance worldview, but as subject to norms and rules alien to him, limited by forces beyond his control. The regulating and limiting force appears in the form of the impersonal mind, to which the individual must submit and act according to its commands and instructions.
The high rise in production contributed to the development of the exact sciences: mathematics, astronomy, physics, and this, in turn, led to the victory of rationalism (from the Latin ratio - reason) - a philosophical trend that recognizes reason as the basis of human cognition and behavior.
Ideas about the laws of creativity and the structure of a work of art are determined to the same extent by the epochal type of worldview as the picture of the world and the concept of personality. Reason, as the highest spiritual ability of man, is conceived not only as an instrument of knowledge, but also as an organ of creativity and a source of aesthetic pleasure. One of the most striking leitmotifs of Boileau’s “Poetic Art” is the rational nature of aesthetic activity:
French classicism affirmed the personality of man as the highest value of existence, freeing him from religious and church influence.
Interest in the art of ancient Greece and Rome appeared back in the Renaissance, which, after centuries of the Middle Ages, turned to the forms, motifs and subjects of antiquity. The greatest theorist of the Renaissance, Leon Batista Alberti, back in the 15th century. expressed ideas that foreshadowed certain principles of classicism and were fully manifested in Raphael’s fresco “The School of Athens” (1511).
The systematization and consolidation of the achievements of the great artists of the Renaissance, especially the Florentine ones led by Raphael and his student Giulio Romano, formed the program of the Bolognese school of the late 16th century, the most typical representatives of which were the Carracci brothers. In their influential Academy of Arts, the Bolognese preached that the path to the heights of art lay through a scrupulous study of the heritage of Raphael and Michelangelo, imitation of their mastery of line and composition.
Following Aristotle, classicism considered art to be an imitation of nature:
However, nature was by no means understood as a visual picture of the physical and moral world, presented to the senses, but rather as the highest intelligible essence of the world and man: not a specific character, but its idea, not a real historical or modern plot, but a universal human conflict situation, not given landscape, but the idea of a harmonious combination of natural realities in an ideally beautiful unity. Classicism found such an ideally beautiful unity in ancient literature - it was precisely this that was perceived by classicism as the already achieved pinnacle of aesthetic activity, the eternal and unchanging standard of art, which recreated in its genre models that very highest ideal nature, physical and moral, which art should imitate. It so happened that the thesis about imitation of nature turned into a prescription to imitate ancient art, where the term “classicism” itself came from (from the Latin classicus - exemplary, studied in class):
Thus, nature in classic art appears not so much reproduced as modeled on a high model - “decorated” with the generalizing analytical activity of the mind. By analogy, we can recall the so-called “regular” (i.e., “correct”) park, where the trees are trimmed in the form of geometric shapes and symmetrically planted, the paths have the correct shape, sprinkled with multi-colored pebbles, and the water is enclosed in marble pools and fountains. This style of gardening art reached its peak precisely in the era of classicism. From the desire to present nature as “decorated” also follows the absolute predominance in literature of classicism of poetry over prose: if prose is identical to simple material nature, then poetry, as a literary form, is certainly an ideal “decorated” nature.”
In all these ideas about art, namely as a rational, ordered, standardized, spiritual activity, the hierarchical principle of thinking of the 17th-18th centuries was realized. Within itself, literature also turned out to be divided into two hierarchical series, low and high, each of which was thematically and stylistically associated with one - material or ideal - level of reality. Low genres included satire, comedy, and fable; to the highest - ode, tragedy, epic. In low genres, everyday material reality is depicted, and a private person appears in social connections (while, of course, both the person and reality are still the same ideal conceptual categories). IN high genres man is presented as a spiritual and social being, in the existential aspect of his existence, alone and along with the eternal fundamentals of questions of existence. Therefore, for high and low genres, not only thematic, but also class differentiation turned out to be relevant based on the character’s belonging to one or another social stratum. The hero of low genres is a middle-class person; high hero - a historical figure, a mythological hero or a fictional high-ranking character - usually a ruler.
In low genres, human characters are formed by base everyday passions (stinginess, hypocrisy, hypocrisy, envy, etc.); in high genres, passions acquire a spiritual character (love, ambition, vindictiveness, a sense of duty, patriotism, etc.). And if everyday passions are clearly unreasonable and vicious, then existential passions are divided into reasonable - social and unreasonable - personal, and the ethical status of the hero depends on his choice. He is unambiguously positive if he prefers a reasonable passion, and unambiguously negative if he chooses an unreasonable one. Classicism did not allow halftones in ethical assessment - and this also reflected the rationalistic nature of the method, which excluded any confusion of high and low, tragic and comic.
Since the genre theory of classicism legitimized as the main those genres that reached the greatest flowering in ancient literature, and literary creativity was thought of as a reasonable imitation of high models, the aesthetic code of classicism acquired a normative character. This means that the model of each genre was established once and for all in a clear set of rules, from which it was unacceptable to deviate, and each specific text was aesthetically assessed according to the degree of compliance with this ideal genre model.
The source of the rules were ancient examples: the epic of Homer and Virgil, the tragedy of Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides and Seneca, the comedy of Aristophanes, Menander, Terence and Plautus, the ode of Pindar, the fable of Aesop and Phaedrus, the satire of Horace and Juvenal. The most typical and illustrative case of such genre regulation is, of course, the rules for the leading classic genre, tragedy, drawn both from the texts of ancient tragedians and from Aristotle’s Poetics.
For the tragedy, a poetic form was canonized (“Alexandrian verse” - iambic hexameter with paired rhyme), a mandatory five-act structure, three unities - time, place and action, high style, a historical or mythological plot and a conflict, suggesting a mandatory situation of choice between reasonable and unreasonable passion, and the process of choice itself was supposed to constitute the action of the tragedy. It was in the dramatic section of the aesthetics of classicism that the rationalism, hierarchy and normativity of the method were expressed with the greatest completeness and obviousness:
Everything that was said above about the aesthetics of classicism and the poetics of classicist literature in France applies equally to almost any European variety of the method, since French classicism was historically the earliest and aesthetically most authoritative embodiment of the method. But for Russian classicism, these general theoretical principles found a unique refraction in artistic practice, since they were determined by the historical and national characteristics of the formation of the new Russian culture of the 18th century.
2.4. Classicism in painting
At the beginning of the 17th century, young foreigners flocked to Rome to get acquainted with the heritage of antiquity and the Renaissance. The most prominent place among them was occupied by the Frenchman Nicolas Poussin, in his paintings, mainly on the themes of ancient antiquity and mythology, who provided unsurpassed examples of geometrically precise composition and thoughtful relationships between color groups. Another Frenchman, Claude Lorrain, in his antique landscapes of the environs of the “eternal city”, organized the pictures of nature by harmonizing them with the light of the setting sun and introducing peculiar architectural scenes.
Poussin's coldly rational normativism won the approval of the Versailles court and was continued by court artists like Le Brun, who saw in classicist painting the ideal artistic language for praising the absolutist state of the "sun king." Although private clients favored various variants of Baroque and Rococo, the French monarchy kept classicism afloat by funding academic institutions such as the École des Beaux-Arts. The Rome Prize provided the most talented students with the opportunity to visit Rome for direct acquaintance with the great works of antiquity.
The discovery of “genuine” ancient painting during the excavations of Pompeii, the deification of antiquity by the German art critic Winckelmann and the cult of Raphael, preached by the artist Mengs, who was close to him in views, breathed new breath into classicism in the second half of the 18th century (in Western literature this stage is called neoclassicism). The largest representative of the “new classicism” was Jacques-Louis David; his extremely laconic and dramatic artistic language served with equal success to promote the ideals of the French Revolution (“The Death of Marat”) and the First Empire (“The Dedication of Emperor Napoleon I”).
In the 19th century, the painting of classicism entered a period of crisis and became a force restraining development of art, and not only in France, but also in other countries. David’s artistic line was successfully continued by Ingres, who, while maintaining the language of classicism in his works, often turned to romantic subjects with an oriental flavor (“Turkish Baths”); his portrait works are marked by a subtle idealization of the model. Artists in other countries (like, for example, Karl Bryullov) also filled works that were classic in form with the spirit of romanticism; this combination was called academicism. Numerous art academies served as its breeding grounds. In the middle of the 19th century, the young generation, gravitating towards realism, represented in France by the Courbet circle, and in Russia by the Itinerants, rebelled against the conservatism of the academic establishment.
2.5. Classicism in sculpture
The impetus for the development of classicist sculpture in the mid-18th century was the writings of Winckelmann and archaeological excavations of ancient cities, which expanded the knowledge of contemporaries about ancient sculpture. In France, such sculptors as Pigalle and Houdon vacillated on the verge of Baroque and Classicism. Classicism reached its highest embodiment in the field of plastic art in the heroic and idyllic works of Antonio Canova, who drew inspiration mainly from the statues of the Hellenistic era (Praxiteles). In Russia, Fedot Shubin, Mikhail Kozlovsky, Boris Orlovsky, and Ivan Martos gravitated towards the aesthetics of classicism.
Public monuments, which became widespread in the era of classicism, gave sculptors the opportunity to idealize military valor and the wisdom of statesmen. Fidelity to the ancient model required sculptors to depict models naked, which conflicted with accepted moral norms. To resolve this contradiction, modern figures were initially depicted by classicist sculptors in the form of naked ancient gods: Suvorov as Mars, and Polina Borghese as Venus. Under Napoleon, the issue was resolved by moving to the depiction of modern figures in ancient togas (these are the figures of Kutuzov and Barclay de Tolly in front of the Kazan Cathedral).
Private customers of the Classical era preferred to immortalize their names in tombstones. The popularity of this sculptural form was facilitated by the arrangement of public cemeteries in the main cities of Europe. In accordance with the classic ideal of the figure on tombstones, as a rule, are in a state of deep rest. The sculpture of classicism is generally alien to sudden movements and external manifestations of emotions such as anger.
Late, Empire classicism, represented primarily by the prolific Danish sculptor Thorvaldsen, is imbued with a dryish pathos. Purity of lines, restraint of gestures, and dispassionate expressions are especially valued. In choosing role models, the emphasis shifts from Hellenism to the archaic period. Religious images are coming into fashion, which, in Thorvaldsen’s interpretation, produce a somewhat chilling impression on the viewer. Tombstone sculpture of late classicism often bears a slight touch of sentimentality.
2.6. Classicism in architecture
The main feature of the architecture of classicism was the appeal to the forms of ancient architecture as a standard of harmony, simplicity, rigor, logical clarity and monumentality. The architecture of classicism as a whole is characterized by regularity of layout and clarity of volumetric form. The basis of the architectural language of classicism was the order, in proportions and forms close to antiquity. Classicism is characterized by symmetrical axial compositions, restraint of decorative decoration, and a regular city planning system.
The architectural language of classicism was formulated at the end of the Renaissance by the great Venetian master Palladio and his follower Scamozzi. The Venetians absolutized the principles of ancient temple architecture to such an extent that they even applied them in the construction of such private mansions as Villa Capra. Inigo Jones brought Palladianism north to England, where local Palladian architects followed Palladian principles with varying degrees of fidelity until the mid-18th century.
By that time, satiety with the “whipped cream” of the late Baroque and Rococo began to accumulate among the intellectuals of continental Europe. Born of the Roman architects Bernini and Borromini, Baroque thinned out into Rococo, a predominantly chamber style with an emphasis on interior decoration and decorative arts. This aesthetics was of little use for solving large urban planning problems. Already under Louis XV (1715-74), urban planning ensembles were built in Paris in the “ancient Roman” style, such as Place de la Concorde (architect Jacques-Ange Gabriel) and the Church of Saint-Sulpice, and under Louis XVI (1774-92) a similar “noble Laconism" is already becoming the main architectural direction.
The most significant interiors in the classicist style were designed by the Scot Robert Adam, who returned to his homeland from Rome in 1758. He was greatly impressed by both the archaeological research of Italian scientists and the architectural fantasies of Piranesi. In Adam’s interpretation, classicism was a style hardly inferior to rococo in the sophistication of its interiors, which gained it popularity not only among democratically minded circles of society, but also among the aristocracy. Like his French colleagues, Adam preached a complete rejection of details devoid of constructive function.
The Frenchman Jacques-Germain Soufflot, during the construction of the Church of Sainte-Geneviève in Paris, demonstrated the ability of classicism to organize vast urban spaces. The massive grandeur of his designs foreshadowed the megalomania of the Napoleonic Empire style and late classicism. In Russia, Bazhenov moved in the same direction as Soufflot. The French Claude-Nicolas Ledoux and Etienne-Louis Boullé went even further towards developing a radical visionary style with an emphasis on abstract geometrization of forms. In revolutionary France, the ascetic civic pathos of their projects was of little demand; Ledoux's innovation was fully appreciated only by the modernists of the 20th century.
The architects of Napoleonic France drew inspiration from majestic images military glory left behind by imperial Rome, such as the triumphal arch of Septimius Severus and Trajan's Column. By order of Napoleon, these images were transferred to Paris in the form of the triumphal arch of Carrousel and the Vendôme Column. In relation to monuments of military greatness from the era of the Napoleonic wars, the term “imperial style” is used - Empire style. In Russia, Carl Rossi, Andrei Voronikhin and Andreyan Zakharov proved themselves to be outstanding masters of the Empire style. In Britain, the empire style corresponds to the so-called. “Regency style” (the largest representative is John Nash).
The aesthetics of classicism favored large-scale urban planning projects and led to the streamlining of urban development on the scale of entire cities. In Russia, almost all provincial and many district cities were replanned in accordance with the principles of classicist rationalism. Cities such as St. Petersburg, Helsinki, Warsaw, Dublin, Edinburgh and a number of others have turned into genuine open-air museums of classicism. A single architectural language, dating back to Palladio, dominated throughout the entire space from Minusinsk to Philadelphia. Ordinary development was carried out in accordance with albums of standard projects.
In the period following the Napoleonic Wars, classicism had to coexist with romantically colored eclecticism, in particular with the return of interest in the Middle Ages and the fashion for architectural neo-Gothic. In connection with Champollion's discoveries, Egyptian motifs are gaining popularity. Interest in ancient Roman architecture is replaced by reverence for everything ancient Greek (“neo-Greek”), which was especially clearly manifested in Germany and the USA. German architects Leo von Klenze and Karl Friedrich Schinkel built up, respectively, Munich and Berlin with grandiose museum and other public buildings in the spirit of the Parthenon. In France, the purity of classicism is diluted with free borrowings from the architectural repertoire of the Renaissance and Baroque (see Beaux Arts).
2.7. Classicism in literature
The founder of the poetics of classicism is the Frenchman Francois Malherbe (1555-1628), who carried out a reform of the French language and verse and developed poetic canons. The leading representatives of classicism in drama were the tragedians Corneille and Racine (1639-1699), whose main subject of creativity was the conflict between public duty and personal passions. “Low” genres also achieved high development - fable (J. Lafontaine), satire (Boileau), comedy (Molière 1622-1673).
Boileau became famous throughout Europe as the “legislator of Parnassus”, the largest theorist of classicism, who expressed his views in the poetic treatise “Poetic Art”. Under his influence in Great Britain were the poets John Dryden and Alexander Pope, who made alexandrines the main form of English poetry. English prose of the classical era (Addison, Swift) is also characterized by a Latinized syntax.
Classicism of the 18th century developed under the influence of the ideas of the Enlightenment. The work of Voltaire (1694-1778) is directed against religious fanaticism, absolutist oppression, and is filled with the pathos of freedom. The goal of creativity is to change the world in better side, construction in accordance with the laws of classicism of society itself. From the standpoint of classicism, the Englishman Samuel Johnson reviewed contemporary literature, around whom a brilliant circle of like-minded people formed, including the essayist Boswell, the historian Gibbon and the actor Garrick. For dramatic works three unities are characteristic: unity of time (the action takes place on one day), unity of place (in one place) and unity of action (one storyline).
In Russia, classicism originated in the 18th century, after the reforms of Peter I. Lomonosov carried out a reform of Russian verse, developed the theory of “three calms,” which was essentially an adaptation of French classical rules to the Russian language. The images in classicism are devoid of individual features, since they are designed primarily to capture stable generic characteristics that do not pass over time, acting as the embodiment of any social or spiritual forces.
Classicism in Russia developed under the great influence of the Enlightenment - the ideas of equality and justice have always been the focus of attention of Russian classic writers. Therefore, in Russian classicism, genres that require the author’s obligatory assessment of historical reality have received great development: comedy (D. I. Fonvizin), satire (A. D. Kantemir), fable (A. P. Sumarokov, I. I. Khemnitser), ode (Lomonosov, G. R. Derzhavin).
In connection with Rousseau’s proclaimed call for closeness to nature and naturalness, crisis phenomena were growing in classicism at the end of the 18th century; The absolutization of reason is replaced by the cult of tender feelings - sentimentalism. The transition from classicism to pre-romanticism was most clearly reflected in German literature of the era of Sturm and Drang, represented by the names of J. W. Goethe (1749-1832) and F. Schiller (1759-1805), who, following Rousseau, saw art as the main force of education person.
2.8. Classicism in music
The concept of classicism in music is steadily associated with the works of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, called Viennese classics and determined the direction of further development of musical composition.
The concept of "classical music" should not be confused with the concept of "classical music", which has a more general meaning as the music of the past that has stood the test of time.
The music of the Classical era glorifies the actions and deeds of man, the emotions and feelings he experiences, and the attentive and holistic human mind.
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The theatrical art of classicism is characterized by a solemn, static structure of performances and measured reading of poetry. The 18th century is often called the “golden age” of theater. The founder of European classical comedy is the French comedian, actor and theater figure, reformer of stage art Moliere (name: Jean-Baptiste Poquelin) (1622-1673). For a long time, Moliere traveled with a theater troupe around the province, where he became acquainted with stage technology and the tastes of the public. In 1658, he received permission from the king to play with his troupe at the court theater in Paris. Based on the traditions of folk theater and the achievements of classicism, he created the genre of social comedy, in which slapstick and plebeian humor were combined with grace and artistry. Overcoming the schematism of the Italian comedies dell'arte (Italian commedia dell'arte - comedy of masks; the main masks are Harlequin, Pulcinella, the old merchant Pantalone, etc.), Moliere created life-like images. He ridiculed the class prejudices of the aristocrats, the narrow-mindedness of the bourgeoisie, the hypocrisy of the nobles ( "The Tradesman in the Nobility", 1670). With particular intransigence, Moliere exposed hypocrisy, hiding behind piety and ostentatious virtue: “Tartuffe, or the Deceiver” (1664), “Don Juan” (1665), “The Misanthrope” (1666). Moliere's artistic heritage had a profound influence on the development of world drama and theater. The most mature embodiment of the comedy of manners is recognized as " Barber of Seville"(1775) and "The Marriage of Figaro" (1784) by the great French playwright Pierre Augustin Beaumarchais (1732-1799). They depict the conflict between the third estate and the nobility. Operas by V.A. were written based on the plots of the plays. Mozart (1786) and G. Rossini (1816). |
2.10. The originality of Russian classicism
Russian classicism arose in similar historical conditions - its prerequisite was the strengthening of autocratic statehood and national self-determination of Russia starting from the era of Peter I. The Europeanism of the ideology of Peter's reforms aimed Russian culture at mastering the achievements of European cultures. But at the same time, Russian classicism arose almost a century later than French: by the middle of the 18th century, when Russian classicism was just beginning to gain strength, in France it had reached the second stage of its existence. The so-called “Enlightenment classicism” - a combination of classicist creative principles with the pre-revolutionary ideology of the Enlightenment - in French literature flourished in the work of Voltaire and acquired an anti-clerical, socially critical pathos: several decades before the Great French Revolution, the times of apology for absolutism were already distant history. Russian classicism, due to its strong connection with secular cultural reform, firstly, initially set itself educational tasks, trying to educate its readers and instruct monarchs on the path of public good, and secondly, acquired the status of a leading direction in Russian literature towards that time when Peter I was no longer alive, and the fate of his cultural reforms was jeopardized in the second half of the 1720s - 1730s.
Therefore, Russian classicism begins “not with the fruit of spring - ode, but with the fruit of autumn - satire,” and social-critical pathos is inherent in it from the very beginning.
Russian classicism also reflected a completely different type of conflict than Western European classicism. If in French classicism the socio-political principle is only the ground on which the psychological conflict of rational and unreasonable passion develops and the process of free and conscious choice between their dictates is carried out, then in Russia, with its traditionally anti-democratic conciliarity and the absolute power of society over the individual, the situation was completely different. otherwise. For Russian mentality, who had just begun to comprehend the ideology of personalism, the need for humility of the individual before society, the individual before power was not at all such a tragedy as for the Western worldview. The choice, relevant for the European consciousness as an opportunity to prefer one thing, in Russian conditions turned out to be imaginary, its outcome was predetermined in favor of society. Therefore, the situation of choice itself in Russian classicism lost its conflict-forming function, and was replaced by another.
The central problem of Russian life in the 18th century. There was a problem of power and its succession: not a single Russian emperor after the death of Peter I and before the accession of Paul I in 1796 came to power by legal means. XVIII century - this is an age of intrigue and palace coups, which too often led to absolute and uncontrolled power of people who did not at all correspond not only to the ideal of an enlightened monarch, but also to ideas about the role of the monarch in the state. Therefore, Russian classic literature immediately took a political-didactic direction and reflected precisely this problem as the main tragic dilemma of the era - the inconsistency of the ruler with the duties of the autocrat, the conflict of the experience of power as an egoistic personal passion with the idea of power exercised for the benefit of his subjects.
Thus, the Russian classic conflict, having preserved the situation of choice between reasonable and unreasonable passion as an external plot pattern, was entirely realized as socio-political in nature. Positive hero Russian classicism does not humble its individual passion in the name of the common good, but insists on its natural rights, defending its personalism from tyrannical attacks. And the most important thing is that this national specificity of the method was well understood by the writers themselves: if the plots of French classic tragedies are drawn mainly from ancient mythology and history, then Sumarokov wrote his tragedies based on plots from Russian chronicles and even on plots from not so distant Russian history.
Finally, another specific feature of Russian classicism was that it did not rely on such a rich and continuous tradition of national literature as any other national European variety of method. What any European literature had at the time of the emergence of the theory of classicism - namely, a literary language with an ordered stylistic system, principles of versification, a defined system of literary genres - all this had to be created in Russian. Therefore, in Russian classicism, literary theory was ahead of literary practice. The normative acts of Russian classicism - reform of versification, reform of style and regulation of the genre system - were carried out between the mid-1730s and the end of the 1740s. - that is, mainly before a full-fledged literary process in line with classicist aesthetics unfolded in Russia.
3. Conclusion
For the ideological premises of classicism, it is essential that the individual’s desire for freedom is considered here to be as legitimate as the need of society to bind this freedom by laws.
The personal principle continues to retain that immediate social significance, that independent value with which the Renaissance first endowed it. However, in contrast, now this principle belongs to the individual, along with the role that society now receives as a social organization. And this implies that any attempt by an individual to defend his freedom in spite of society threatens him with the loss of the fullness of life connections and the transformation of freedom into an empty subjectivity devoid of any support.
The category of measure is a fundamental category in the poetics of classicism. It is unusually multifaceted in content, has both a spiritual and plastic nature, is in contact with, but does not coincide with, another typical concept of classicism - the concept of norm - and is closely connected with all aspects of the ideal affirmed here.
Classical reason, as the source and guarantor of balance in nature and the life of people, bears the stamp of poetic faith in the original harmony of all things, trust in the natural course of things, confidence in the presence of an all-encompassing correspondence between the movement of the world and the formation of society, in the humanistic, human-oriented nature of this communications.
I am close to the period of classicism, its principles, poetry, art, creativity in general. The conclusions that classicism makes regarding people, society, and the world seem to me to be the only true and rational ones. Measure, as the middle line between opposites, order of things, systems, and not chaos; a strong relationship between man and society against their rupture and enmity, excessive genius and selfishness; harmony against extremes - in this I see the ideal principles of existence, the foundations of which are reflected in the canons of classicism.
List of sources
A work of art, from the point of view of classicism, should be built on the basis of strict canons, thereby revealing the harmony and logic of the universe itself.
Of interest to classicism is only the eternal, the unchangeable - in each phenomenon it strives to recognize only essential, typological features, discarding random individual characteristics. The aesthetics of classicism attaches great importance to the social and educational function of art. Classicism takes many rules and canons from ancient art (Aristotle, Horace).
| Predominant and fashionable colors | Rich colors; green, pink, purple with gold accent, sky blue |
| Classicism style lines | Strict repeating vertical and horizontal lines; bas-relief in a round medallion; smooth generalized drawing; symmetry |
| Form | Clarity and geometric shapes; statues on the roof, rotunda; for the Empire style - expressive pompous monumental forms |
| Characteristic interior elements | Discreet decor; round and ribbed columns, pilasters, statues, antique ornaments, coffered vault; for the Empire style, military decor (emblems); symbols of power |
| Constructions | Massive, stable, monumental, rectangular, arched |
| Window | Rectangular, elongated upward, with a modest design |
| Classic style doors | Rectangular, paneled; with a massive gable portal on round and ribbed columns; with lions, sphinxes and statues |
Directions of classicism in architecture: Palladianism, Empire style, neo-Greek, “Regency style”.
The main feature of the architecture of classicism was the appeal to the forms of ancient architecture as a standard of harmony, simplicity, rigor, logical clarity and monumentality. The architecture of classicism as a whole is characterized by regularity of layout and clarity of volumetric form. The basis of the architectural language of classicism was the order, in proportions and forms close to antiquity. Classicism is characterized by symmetrical axial compositions, restraint of decorative decoration, and a regular city planning system.
The emergence of the classicism style
In 1755, Johann Joachim Winckelmann wrote in Dresden: “The only way for us to become great, and if possible inimitable, is to imitate the ancients.” This call to renew modern art, taking advantage of the beauty of antiquity, perceived as an ideal, found active support in European society. The progressive public saw in classicism a necessary contrast to court baroque. But the enlightened feudal lords did not reject imitation of ancient forms. The era of classicism coincided in time with the era of bourgeois revolutions - the English one in 1688, the French one 101 years later.
The architectural language of classicism was formulated at the end of the Renaissance by the great Venetian master Palladio and his follower Scamozzi.
The Venetians absolutized the principles of ancient temple architecture to such an extent that they even applied them in the construction of such private mansions as Villa Capra. Inigo Jones brought Palladianism north to England, where local Palladian architects followed Palladian principles with varying degrees of fidelity until the mid-18th century.
Historical characteristics of the classicism style
By that time, satiety with the “whipped cream” of the late Baroque and Rococo began to accumulate among the intellectuals of continental Europe.
Born of the Roman architects Bernini and Borromini, Baroque thinned out into Rococo, a predominantly chamber style with an emphasis on interior decoration and decorative arts. This aesthetics was of little use for solving large urban planning problems. Already under Louis XV (1715-74), urban planning ensembles were built in Paris in the “ancient Roman” style, such as the Place de la Concorde (architect Jacques-Ange Gabriel) and the Church of Saint-Sulpice, and under Louis XVI (1774-92) a similar “noble Laconism" is already becoming the main architectural direction.
From Rococo forms, initially marked by Roman influence, after the completion of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin in 1791, a sharp turn was made towards Greek forms. After the liberation wars against Napoleon, this “Hellenism” found its masters in K.F. Schinkel and L. von Klenze. Facades, columns and triangular pediments became the architectural alphabet.
The desire to transform into modern construction the noble simplicity and calm grandeur of ancient art led to the desire to completely copy the ancient building. What F. Gilly left as a project for a monument to Frederick II, by order of Ludwig I of Bavaria, was carried out on the slopes of the Danube in Regensburg and received the name Walhalla (Walhalla “Chamber of the Dead”).
The most significant interiors in the classicist style were designed by the Scot Robert Adam, who returned to his homeland from Rome in 1758. He was greatly impressed by both the archaeological research of Italian scientists and the architectural fantasies of Piranesi. In Adam’s interpretation, classicism was a style hardly inferior to rococo in the sophistication of its interiors, which gained it popularity not only among democratically minded circles of society, but also among the aristocracy. Like his French colleagues, Adam preached a complete rejection of details devoid of constructive function.
The Frenchman Jacques-Germain Soufflot, during the construction of the Church of Sainte-Geneviève in Paris, demonstrated the ability of classicism to organize vast urban spaces. The massive grandeur of his designs foreshadowed the megalomania of the Napoleonic Empire style and late classicism. In Russia, Bazhenov moved in the same direction as Soufflot. The French Claude-Nicolas Ledoux and Etienne-Louis Boullé went even further towards developing a radical visionary style with an emphasis on abstract geometrization of forms. In revolutionary France, the ascetic civic pathos of their projects was of little demand; Ledoux's innovation was fully appreciated only by the modernists of the 20th century.
Architects Napoleonic France took inspiration from the majestic images of military glory left behind by imperial Rome, such as the triumphal arch of Septimius Severus and Trajan's Column. By order of Napoleon, these images were transferred to Paris in the form of the triumphal arch of Carrousel and the Vendôme Column. In relation to monuments of military greatness from the era of the Napoleonic wars, the term “imperial style” is used - Empire. In Russia, Carl Rossi, Andrei Voronikhin and Andreyan Zakharov proved themselves to be outstanding masters of the Empire style.
In Britain, the empire style corresponds to the so-called. “Regency style” (the largest representative is John Nash).
The aesthetics of classicism favored large-scale urban planning projects and led to the streamlining of urban development on the scale of entire cities.
In Russia, almost all provincial and many district cities were replanned in accordance with the principles of classicist rationalism. Cities such as St. Petersburg, Helsinki, Warsaw, Dublin, Edinburgh and a number of others have turned into genuine open-air museums of classicism. A single architectural language, dating back to Palladio, dominated throughout the entire space from Minusinsk to Philadelphia. Ordinary development was carried out in accordance with albums of standard projects.
In the period following the Napoleonic Wars, classicism had to coexist with romantically tinged eclecticism, in particular with the return of interest in the Middle Ages and the fashion for architectural neo-Gothic. In connection with Champollion's discoveries, Egyptian motifs are gaining popularity. Interest in ancient Roman architecture is replaced by reverence for everything ancient Greek (“neo-Greek”), especially clearly manifested in Germany and the USA. German architects Leo von Klenze and Karl Friedrich Schinkel built up, respectively, Munich and Berlin with grandiose museum and other public buildings in the spirit of the Parthenon.
In France, the purity of classicism is diluted with free borrowings from the architectural repertoire of the Renaissance and Baroque (see Beaux Arts).
Princely palaces and residences became the centers of construction in the classicist style; Marktplatz (marketplace) in Karlsruhe, Maximilianstadt and Ludwigstrasse in Munich, as well as construction in Darmstadt, became especially famous. The Prussian kings in Berlin and Potsdam built primarily in the classical style.
But palaces were no longer the main object of construction. Villas and country houses could no longer be distinguished from them. The scope of state construction included public buildings - theaters, museums, universities and libraries. To these were added buildings for social purposes - hospitals, homes for the blind and deaf-mute, as well as prisons and barracks. The picture was complemented by country estates of the aristocracy and bourgeoisie, town halls and residential buildings in cities and villages.
The construction of churches no longer played a primary role, but remarkable buildings were created in Karlsruhe, Darmstadt and Potsdam, although there was a debate about whether pagan architectural forms were suitable for a Christian monastery.
Construction features of the classicism style
After the collapse of the great historical styles that had survived centuries, in the 19th century. There is a clear acceleration in the process of architecture development. This becomes especially obvious if we compare the last century with the entire previous thousand-year development. If early medieval architecture and Gothic spanned about five centuries, the Renaissance and Baroque together covered only half of this period, then classicism took less than a century to take over Europe and penetrate overseas.
Characteristic features of the classicism style
With a change in the point of view on architecture, with the development of construction technology, and the emergence of new types of structures in the 19th century. There was also a significant shift in the center of world development of architecture. In the foreground are countries that did not experience the highest stage of Baroque development. Classicism reaches its peak in France, Germany, England and Russia.
Classicism was an expression of philosophical rationalism. The concept of classicism was the use of ancient form-formation systems in architecture, which, however, were filled with new content. The aesthetics of simple ancient forms and a strict order were put in contrast to the randomness and laxity of architectural and artistic manifestations of the worldview.
Classicism stimulated archaeological research, which led to discoveries about advanced ancient civilizations. The results of the archaeological expeditions, summarized in extensive scientific research, laid the theoretical foundations of the movement, whose participants considered ancient culture to be the pinnacle of perfection in the art of construction, an example of absolute and eternal beauty. The popularization of ancient forms was facilitated by numerous albums containing images of architectural monuments.
Types of classicism style buildings
The character of architecture in most cases remained dependent on the tectonics of the load-bearing wall and the vault, which became flatter. The portico becomes an important plastic element, while the walls outside and inside are divided by small pilasters and cornices. In the composition of the whole and details, volumes and plans, symmetry prevails.
The color scheme is characterized by light pastel tones. White color, as a rule, serves to identify architectural elements that are a symbol of active tectonics. The interior becomes lighter, more restrained, the furniture is simple and light, while the designers used Egyptian, Greek or Roman motifs.
The most significant urban planning concepts and their implementation in nature at the end of the 18th and first half of the 19th centuries are associated with classicism. During this period, new cities, parks, and resorts were founded.
Classicism became the first full-fledged literary movement, and its influence practically did not affect prose: all theories of classicism were partly devoted to poetry, but mainly to drama. This trend emerged in France in the 16th century and flourished about a century later.
The history of classicism
The emergence of classicism was due to the era of absolutism in Europe, when a person was considered just a servant of his state. The main idea of classicism is civil service; the key concept of classicism is the concept of duty. Accordingly, the key conflict of all classic works is the conflict of passion and reason, feelings and duty: negative heroes live obeying their emotions, and positive ones live only by reason, and therefore always turn out to be winners. This triumph of reason was due to the philosophical theory of rationalism, which was proposed by Rene Descartes: I think, therefore I exist. He wrote that not only man is reasonable, but also all living things in general: reason was given to us from God.
Features of classicism in literature
The founders of classicism carefully studied the history of world literature and decided for themselves that the literary process was most intelligently organized in Ancient Greece. It was the ancient rules that they decided to imitate. In particular, it was borrowed from the ancient theater rule of three unities: unity of time (more than a day cannot pass from the beginning to the end of the play), unity of place (everything happens in one place) and unity of action (there should be only one storyline).
Another technique borrowed from the ancient tradition was the use masked heroes- stable roles that move from play to play. In typical classic comedies, we are always talking about giving away a girl, so the masks there are as follows: the mistress (the bride herself), the soubrette (her maid-friend, confidante), a stupid father, at least three suitors (one of them is necessarily positive, i.e. e. hero-lover) and hero-reasoner (the main positive character, usually appears at the end). At the end of the comedy, some kind of intrigue is required, as a result of which the girl will marry a positive groom.
Composition of a comedy of classicism must be very clear must contain five acts: exposition, plot, plot development, climax and denouement.
There was a reception unexpected ending(or deus ex machina) - the appearance of a god from the machine who puts everything in its place. In the Russian tradition, such heroes often turned out to be the state. Also used taking catharsis- cleansing through compassion, when, sympathizing with negative characters who found themselves in a difficult situation, the reader had to cleanse himself spiritually.
Classicism in Russian literature
The principles of classicism were brought to Russia by A.P. Sumarokov. In 1747, he published two treatises - Epistola on poetry and Epistola on the Russian language, where he sets out his views on poetry. In fact, these epistles were translated from French, prephrasing for Russia Nicolas Boileau's treatise on Poetic Art. Sumarokov predetermines that main theme Russian classicism will become a social theme, dedicated to the interaction of people with society.
Later, a circle of aspiring playwrights appeared, led by I. Elagin and theater theorist V. Lukin, who proposed a new literary idea - the so-called. declination theory. Its meaning is that you just need to clearly translate a Western comedy into Russian, replacing all the names there. Many similar plays appeared, but in general the idea was not very implemented. The main significance of Elagin’s circle was that it was there that D.I.’s dramatic talent first manifested itself. Fonvizin, who wrote the comedy