Recently it has become fashionable to compare photos taken 10 years apart - it clearly allows you to see how some things or people have changed, to smile, to be horrified, if we are talking about your favorite artist in your youth, or just to learn something new, and at the same time to come to a simple conclusion: everything changes, and everyone decides for himself for better or worse. So we decided to compare how the life and work of famous artists has changed over 10 years, we hope it will be interesting.
Rembrandt. Self-portrait with open mouth, as if in a scream.
At the age of 24, Rembrandt was enjoying life, the good things were going as well as possible. His friend and patron Constantine Huygens helps to find wealthy customers, the artist lives in his native Leiden, spends his days painting, and evenings, having fun with fun girls and participating in friendly drinking. He prophesied a great future, and Rembrandt himself makes every effort to do so, diligently honing the skill of writing portraits. Therefore, in self-portraits he gesticulates and generally looks not too frivolous - this allows you to better understand how to depict facial expressions, so they are more like training sketches, rather than real paintings.
Rembrandt. Self-portrait at the age of 34. 1640
After 10 years, 34-year-old Rembrandt already has the status of a famous artist. He is rich, famous, knows no shortage of customers, lives in Amsterdam, buys houses and antiques, married a wealthy and noble lady Saskia van Eylenburg and now it is not to his face to curve, it is better to portray the noble dignity. But the picture has a trick - Rembrandt without false modesty painted himself in the same pose in which sat the great Durer, making it clear that the talent is not inferior to him.
Ivan Aivazovsky. Tatar wedding. 1833
In 1833, 16-year-old Hovhannes Gaivazovsky sent to the Academy of Arts a drawing “Tatar Wedding” and a request to enroll him as a student. The drawing is characterized by a complex and elaborate composition, which gave reason to some biographers to claim that the young man simply saw it in a book and painstakingly redrew it, adding something of his own. But the teachers at the Academy of Fine Arts to such plagiarism treated with understanding - the main thing that the talent is felt, and everything else will be attached. As it turned out, they were right.
Ivan Aivazovsky. Gondolier on the sea at night. 1843
After 10 years, Aivazovsky is already considered the most capable graduate of the Academy of Arts, visited Europe, where his paintings were admired, and decided on his main thing: the sea, waves, sailboats, moon paths on the surface of the water, that is, with what he loved more than anything else in the world and immensely bored in damp and dank St. Petersburg. Therefore, when the opportunity presented itself, he moved to Feodosia, only for the winter getting out of there back to St. Petersburg, where he was one of the most enviable grooms. However, his marriage caused widespread bewilderment.
Alexander Ivanov. The Appearance of Christ to the People
1830 Alexander Ivanov began the main business of his life - writing a grandiose canvas “The Appearance of Christ to the People”. He wrote endless sketches, trying to find the ideal composition, poses and facial expressions of the characters in his painting, and there are many of them, and each requires an individual and painstaking approach. And it is still necessary to correctly depict the desert, branches of olive - in general, a lot of artwork, and fast is only in rabbits.
Head of John the Baptist. Sketch for the painting “The Appearance of Christ to the People”. 1830-е
1840. Ivanov continues to work on the painting, writing sketches of stones, water, plants, people, showing in this case truly anecdotal meticulousness. For example, he wrote a thorough oil sketch of an ordinary branch, resembling more a separate painting.
Alexander Ivanov. A branch. Sketch for the painting “Appearance of Christ to the People”. 1840-е
At least he lives now not in St. Petersburg, but in Rome, where the climate is more pleasant and healthier, and the society is more interesting: in Rome there are many artists and creative people who were pleased to communicate “with Ivanov's weirdo.
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