The revolution of 1917 changed the lives of many people before and after. This event was too global, there was too radical a change in the state system and the attitude of society and the authorities to all people. It touched almost all artists without exception. Some of them perceived the revolution as a blessing and managed to achieve success under the Bolsheviks, someone went abroad, like Zinaida Serebryakova and Konstantin Korovin, someone like Ivan Myasoedov went the criminal way, someone begging and starving. We will talk about how the revolution changed the lives of some artists in this article.
Ilya Mashkov was an ardent adherent of a healthy lifestyle, in his opinion, frail and infirm people can not be artists, they do not have the strength to stand in front of the canvas for a long time and write pictures. And then there are decorative panels, mosaics and sculpture, so that when admitting students to his art workshops, the first condition was health and physical strength. He even made them do physical exercises, and his students lifted heavy weights every day.
Greetings to the XVII Congress of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks
Mashkov's work quite resembled his ideas about health and vitality. No misty landscapes and sadness, in the style of Levitan's paintings, only bright colors, only healthy and strong people, and even over the edge. He managed to paint flowers among the busts of communist leaders: Lenin, Karl Marx and Stalin, the collective farmer with pumpkins of his monumental article could compete with the characters of paintings by Alexander Deyneka, and in churches instead of iconostases wrote portraits of Stalin.
A collective farmer with pumpkins
For all those to whom such a manner of painting seemed excessive, he composed denunciations to the relevant authorities, thereby gaining additional loyalty and getting rid of enemies.
It is not known how sincere he was in his work, but talent can not be ruined even in such conditions. Subsequently, his paintings were eagerly bought at world auctions, and the canvas “Girl with Sunflowers” was even purchased by the bosses of the IBM Corporation.
Girl with sunflowers
was a nobleman, an intellectual and a very intelligent man. He did not want to rebel, and therefore the only thing he could afford to do, while still a student was, to throw his galoshes - through the window of the rector’s office at the Academy of Arts. So he expressed his dissatisfaction with the old dogmas, which were assiduously taught at the Academy - academism and the imposition to write paintings on mythological themes, as if there was no Impressionism - and numerous innovators in painting, who wrote in a completely different manner. And even then - there was an unfortunate mistake - the galoshes hit the window of Chistyakov’s beloved teacher,who out of the kindness of his heart, did not make a scandal, and Peter got off with a small fine.
Portrait of Hero of the Soviet Union pilot A.B. Yumashev
And in 1917, many of his friends were quite surprised - why the intellectual Konchalovsky stayed in Russia with the Bolsheviks and did not emigrate like many other creative people. However, he believed that an artist should find his way in painting, and the 1920s were a fertile time for various creative experiments even in the Soviet Union. He went through many associations of artists, which then arose like mushrooms after the rain, but then he still had to stop at the declared only correct socialist realism. But Konchalovsky did not change his principles and, unlike Mashkov, was honest and did not ingratiate himself with the Bolsheviks.
Murmansk. Tulomstroy. Spillway
When it was necessary to paint a dam, it was what it really was, not a majestic, embellished construction. When he was offered to work on a portrait of Stalin, the artist insisted on personal posing. Stalin, of course, refused - he had no time to spend time on each artist, let them work on a photograph or other portraits. Konchalovsky did not sign and denunciations, even if it could damage his career and he risked being labeled unreliable. However, the artist was really talented, otherwise he did not receive the Stalin Prize under all these conditions.
Wheat harvest
revolution of 1917 was generally perceived positively, by that time he had already painted his famous painting “Bathing of the Red Horse”, which foreshadowed the coming events.
Bathing a red horse
Indeed, here Petrov-Vodkin has got it 100 percent right, only the red color of the horse, as subsequent events and the Civil War showed, could symbolize the spilled blood of many people. Although according to Petrov-Vodkin, the red horse is a spontaneous and unbridled force that will change everything in Russia and the world.
Portrait of Lenin
However, to refuse his usual manner of painting, spherical perspective and similarity to icons Petrov-Vodkin after the revolution was not going to. Until 1930 all this he got away with it, then it was necessary to write in the traditions of socialist realism, without much creative experimentation. But even here Petrov-Vodkin was true to himself, he wrote paintings in which everything, at first glance, was correct, but at the same time and felt, according to some critics of those years and detractors of the artist, a little trick. Why in the portrait of Lenin the Soviet leader has such a sly look, why in the painting “The First Demonstration” the worker with his family, when he moved from the barracks to a new apartment, still stokes the fireplace, and the walls below are peeling - is there really no time to paint them, or it all goes to demonstrations?
The first demonstration
Why does the canvas “New Settlement” still show the same firebox and a window boarded up with cardboard? Couldn't everything have been shown in a rosier light, without these unsightly details?
New Settlement
But Petrov-Vodkin was honest with the audience and with himself, he was also much smarter than the usual opportunists. The spirit of the revolution was much closer to him than its results, he wanted to change everything for the better, not just the victory of the Bolsheviks. Although he generally sympathized with them, he could not see everything through “rose-colored glasses” and did not want to write in similar a manner.
Lenin in a coffin
However, it is unlikely that Petrov-Vodkin really wanted to see Lenin in a coffin, as in the famous painting of 1924, and the sorrow of the people depicted there is absolutely genuine, so even the strictest critic to this canvas will not be able to pick on. Kuzma-Vodkin always wrote in the Art Nouveau style and at some point, detractors and envious - and there are always enough of them at any major artist, just began to look askew at some of his artwork, such as the painting “Fantasy” in 1925.
Fantasy
“What are these flying red horses, why not write in a positive way ordinary Soviet reality?” - they questioned. He began to write in a similar vein, but towards the end of his life - in the 1930s. It is only a pity that Petrov-Vodkin died early - at the age of 61 from tuberculosis, and his art would attract more and more questions from the relevant departments, which in no way contributed to a calm life for the artist. One day a black funnel would arrive on another denunciation, and he would be taken to prison. It is good that nothing like that happened, but it was hardly much easier for the terminally ill Petrov-Vodkin.
Buy handmade goods or modern art you can on artAlebrio - is an international marketplace for people who want to create, sell, buy and collect unique items and art - buy the best with us artAlebrio.com.
By confirming your order you unconditionally accept these General Conditions of Sale
