Tag: russia

Anna Rochegova

Anna Rochegova, “Pepsi-Cola”, 2017, Edition of 80. Lithograph,, 44 x 71 cm, Private Collecction

Anna Rochegova was born in Moscow into a family of artists. Anna’s mother, Maria Engelke, was a respected painter and her father, Alexander Rochegov, was a well known architect. She graduated with highest honors from the Surikov Moscow State Art Academy in 1978.

Anna Rochegova has presented her work in many solo and group exhibitions throughout the world. She is a member of the Moscow Society of Artists, the Svenska Konstnärernas Förening (Swedish Artists Association), and the Östra Skånes Konstnärsgille (Östra Skåne’s Artist Guild) in Sweden.

Viktor Popkov

Viktor Popkov, “The Builders of Bratsk”, 1960, Oil on Canvas

Bratsk was Hydropower Station. Its construction symbolized the power of Soviet economics and development of industrialization. The builders were considered to be new heroes of the Communist epoch. This painting is a representative of the so-called “severe style” of socialist realism.

Viktor Popkov was one of the most celebrated Soviet artists during Krushschev’s Thaw. Perhaps it is for this reason – that he was recognized and not considered an underground artist – that he is less well known, and less appreciated outside Russia than many of his peers.

Popkov’s diverse, stylistic periods had a wide range, from 1950s Socialist Realism, through the “Severe” or “Austere Style” which he helped create in the 1960s, to his late “Philosophical-Romantic” phase. There is a fascinating progression from the dynamism of his early works to more contemplative figures.

The “Builders of the Bratsk” (1960) is an icon of the severe style. The workers stand or crouch against an uncompromising, dark background, a group of individuals with their own emotions, but a common goal.The Tretyakov Gallery   bought the painting when Popkov was 28 years old.

Alexander Terebenev

Alexander Terebenev, “Atlantes”, Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia.

The New Hermitage was the first building in Russia constructed specially to house the museum collections. Emperor Nicholas I invited German architect Leo von Klenze, whose works largely formed the image of the museum architecture in Europe, to come to Russia and build the Imperial Hermitage. Architects Nikolay Yefimov and Vasily Stasov, commissioned to execute Klenze’s project, made some essential changes to it in order to fit the new construction to the existing architectural surroundings.

The entrance to the museum is accentuated with a magnificent portico supported by the Atlantes figures cut from grey granite in the workshop of Alexander Terebenev. Atlantes, also called Atlantean figures, are carved stone support pillars in the shape of fierce men. The building is also decorated with statues and bas-reliefs depicting famous artists, architects and sculptors of the past. Classical, Renaissance and Baroque ornaments enliven the massive surfaces of the building’s facades.

Konstantin Lupanov

Paintings by Konstantin Lupanov

Born in 1977, Konstantin Lupanov studied at the Krasnodar State University of Culture and Art. He lives and works in Krasnodar, Russia. This talented artist calls his paintings “fun and irresponsible garbage.” Konstantin Lupanov paints what he loves. The primary subjects of his paintings are his friends, acquaintances, relatives, and his beloved cat, Philip. “The simpler the subject”, says the artist, “the truer the painting”.

Russian Red Army Choir, “Song of the Volga Boatmen”

Russian Red Army Choir, “Song of the Volga Boatmen” with Leonid Kharitonov

The “Song of the Volga Boatmen” is a well-known traditional Russian song collected by Mily Balakirev, and published in his book of folk songs in 1866. It was sung by burlaks, or barge-haulers, on the Volga River. Balakirev published it with only one verse (the first). The other two verses were added at a later date. Ilya Repin’s famous painting, Barge Haulers on the Volga, depicts such burlaks in Tsarist Russia toiling along the Volga.

The song was popularised by Feodor Chaliapin, and has been a favourite concert piece of bass singers ever since. Glenn Miller’s jazz arrangement took the song to #1 in the US charts in 1941. Russian composer Alexander Glazunov based one of the themes of his symphonic poem “Stenka Razin” on the song.

Spanish composer Manuel De Falla wrote an arrangement of the song, which was published under the name Canto de los remeros del Volga (del cancionero musical ruso) in 1922. He did so at the behest of diplomat Ricardo Baeza, who was working with the League of Nations to provide financial relief for the more than two million Russian refugees who had been displaced and imprisoned during World War I. All proceeds from the song’s publication were donated to this effort. Igor Stravinsky made an arrangement for orchestra.

(Source: https://www.youtube.com/)

Vladimir Semensky 

Four Paintings by Vladimir Semensky

Born in 1968, Russian artist Vladimir Semensky creates paintings with a vibrant sense of spontaneous movement and naturalistic, individual gesture.  Dynamic poses and unguarded scenarios characterise his work.  Semensky’s paintings are large scale canvases and are born of the same spontaneous unique body movements he articulates in his compositions.  The movements of a person are almost eccentric in their singular relation to that person’s personality, surroundings and state of mind.

Semensky describes this with disarming frankness and allows a strangely intimate view that would never be afforded by a photorealistic painting.  This results in a chaotic and exciting sense that is usually absent in static imagery or posed, formal painting.  He captures the transience of things, private fleeting moments that we are usually only sensitive to in those we are closest to.

Boris Olshanskiy

Artwork of Boris Olshanskiy

Boris Olshanskiy is a lesser-known painter from the turn of the 21st century who drew fantastic scenes from Slavic mythology. He has produce only several hundred works during his career as a painter.

Born on February 25, 1956 in the city of Tambov, Olshanskiy attended the Penza Art College and the Moscow State Institute of Painting of V.I. Surikov. Following his graduation, Olshanskiy began to work in graphics and illustration in Moscow, his talents as an artist were soon noticed and in 1989, he was inducted as a member of the Union of Artists of Russia.

During the beginning of the Perestroika, Olshanskiy began to take an interest in painting and soon applied his interest of the ancient Slavs and their mythology to his work. In 1993, Olshanskiy organized his first personal exhibition, displaying over 300 works, in his time, he would take part in many more exhibitions both locally and abroad.

In recent times, Olshanskiy and his works have faded into obscurity; his most recent painting being from 2006. The artist himself is very rarely heard of nowadays. Despite this, Olshanskiy’s works have shaped the way many view Slavic myths, possibly as much as artists such as Ivan Bilibin or Viktor Korolkov.

Costa Dvorezky

The Artwork of Costa Dvorezky

Costa has drawn inspiration for his prolific works of art from board travels and his abundant life experiences as both a visitor and resident of numerous countries around the world. Born in Russia in 1968, Costa developed his unique brand of art through his extensive schooling at the Art College and the Academy of Arts in Moscow. His passion and talent for art was recognized by Russia’s Union of Young Artists when he received the Development of The Year Award in 1997.

Through his paintings Costa goes beyond the obvious to uncover the symbolism within the human aspect of daily life. His creativity and style come alive through his works depicting dark and surreal imagery. As a viewer of Costa’s images, one is transported to a world of fictional proportions that exists in the recesses of the artist’s mind.

Metamorphosed human and animal figures shrouded in darkness, suggest the existence of a distorted world-order. These images evoke one to closely examine and question the reality of what one sees. Through his artwork, Costa challenges the observer to not only understand the scope of the actual image, but to also comprehend the feelings that the image provokes. His paintings are as bold as the statements that they make, and it is up to each individual to decipher what the meaning behind the image really is.

Nikolai Bogdanov-Belsky

 

Five Paintings by Nikolai Bogdanov-Belsky

Nikolai Bogdanov-Belsky was born in the village of Shitiki in Smolensk Governorate in 1868. He studied art at the Semyon Rachinsky Fine Art School, icon-painting at the Troitse-Sergiyeva Lavra in 1883, modern painting at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture in 1884 to 1889, and at the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg from 1894 to 1895.

Bogdanov-Belsky worked and studied in private studios in Paris in the late 1890s, traveling to and painting in St. Petersburg. After 1921, he worked exclusively in Riga, Latvia. He became a member of several prominent societies in including the Peredvizhniki from 1895, and the Arkhip Kuindzhi Society from 1909 (of which he was a founding member and chairman from 1913 to 1918).

Bogdanov-Belsky painted mostly genre paintings, especially of the education of peasant children, portraits, and impressionistic landscapes studies. He became pedagogue and academician in 1903. He was an active Member of the Academy of Arts in 1914. He lived in Riga from 1921 until his death in Berlin in 1945.

Mikhail Vrubel

Mikhail Vrubel, “Demon Seated”, 1890, The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow

The Demon, as presented in art, has become a theme often employed to represent a madness that has developed within the artist. This demon can serve as both a muse and a destructive force for the artist who cannot find a means to control it. Mikhail Vrubel looked to the Demon throughout his life; adapting him to his constantly changing world. The development of Vrubel’s Demon is best seen in two works that almost bookend his career: “Demon Seated” of 1890 and “Demon Downcast” painted in 1902.

The figure of the Demon is sitting atop a mountain. There is tension in his muscles and interlocked fingers which sharply contrasts with the slumped over body and melancholy expression of his face. He appears passive and introverted yet proud, solitary, and sensitive. He is the antithesis of the feminine, yet possesses feminine attributes in the long hair, soft face, and pouty mouth. His eyes are filled with a longing for love in a cold and alienated world. Vrubel described this Demon as “a spirit uniting in itself masculine and feminine qualities…a spirit, not so much evil as suffering and sorrowing, but in all that a powerful spirit…a majestic spirit”.