We are writing an essay based on the painting “The Storm” (Aivazovsky). Aivazovsky - master of the sea elements In conclusion, you can

Novosibirsk Medical Institute. Department of Cultural Studies. 1997

COMPOSITION

based on the works of Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky

Performed by a third-year medical student of the ninth group, A. A. Gerasenko.

Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky is one of the largest Russian painters of the 19th century.

From childhood, he developed a passion for drawing. He grew up in Feodosia, and his most vivid impressions were associated with the sea; That’s why he devoted all his work to depicting the sea.

Aivazovsky studied at the Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg, and already his first seascapes stood out at academic exhibitions. At one of these exhibitions, the artist met with Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin, who expressed his approval to him. “Since then, my already beloved poet has become the subject of my thoughts and inspiration,” said Aivazovsky. Subsequently, the artist created a number of paintings related to the image of Pushkin, including the famous painting “Pushkin’s Farewell to the Sea” (the figure of the poet was painted by I. E. Repin). This work is surprisingly consonant with Pushkin’s lines:

Goodbye, free spirit.

For the last time before me

You're rolling blue waves

And you shine with proud beauty...

For his success in painting, Aivazovsky's course at the Academy was shortened by two years and in 1837 he was awarded the highest award - the Grand Gold Medal.

In the early 1840s, the young artist was sent abroad as a pensioner of the Academy. The seascapes he painted in Naples and Venice became widely known. In Amsterdam, Aivazovsky was awarded the honorary title of academician, and in Paris he received a gold medal. At the same time, the English landscape painter D. Turner, impressed by Aivazovsky’s painting depicting the Bay of Neopolitan on a moonlit night, composed a sonnet in honor of its author, in which he wrote: “Forgive me, great artist, if I was mistaken in mistaking the picture for reality, but your work enchanted me, and delight took possession of me. Your art is high and powerful, because you are inspired by Genius.” These lines are all the more valuable because they belong to a world-renowned marine painter, a man who is stingy with praise.

Upon returning to Russia, Aivazovsky received the title of academician and painter of the Main Naval Staff. In 1844 - 1845 he completed a large state order for a series of paintings showing Russian port-fortresses on the Baltic Sea. The paintings “Sveaborg” and “Revel” give an idea of ​​this series.

Despite the many lucrative orders offered in the capital, Aivazovsky leaves for his homeland, Crimea. There, in Feodosia, in the fall of 1846, he celebrated the tenth anniversary of his work. A squadron of ships of the Black Sea Fleet under the command of Admiral V. A. Kornilov arrived to congratulate the artist on his anniversary. It was no coincidence that the sailors showed high honors to the artist. Aivazovsky visited the squadron on military campaigns more than once. He participated in the Russian landing at Subashi and captured this event.

The painting “Peter I at Krasnaya Gorka” is also dedicated to the history of the Russian fleet. Aivazovsky depicted sailing ships with all their complex equipment: in the painting “Russian Squadron on the Sevastopol Roadstead,” the formation of warships ready for parade was conveyed with deep knowledge.

Sensitive to the events of our time, Aivazovsky immediately responded to them with his works. Thus, he created a number of works about the Crimean War of 1853 - 1856. The artist not only visited besieged Sevastopol, but also brought an exhibition of his paintings there. Among them was the “Battle of Sinop” (victory over the Turkish fleet on November 18, 1853). The canvas was created based on the stories of the participants in the battle. “This picture is so amazing that it is difficult to tear yourself away from it,” wrote one of the sailors who saw it in besieged Sevastopol. The words spoken then by Admiral P. S. Nakhimov are also known: “The picture was made extremely correctly.”

One of the artist’s most popular works is “The Ninth Wave”. Aivazovsky depicted a raging sea at sunrise. Huge waves foam, and the “ninth wave” swoops in with terrible force. The artist contrasted the fury of the elements with the courage and bravery of people fleeing on a piece of mast after a shipwreck. Aivazovsky constructed his picture in such a way and introduced the brightest and most sonorous colors into it that, despite the drama of what was happening, he made one admire the beauty of the raging sea. There is no sense of doom or tragedy in the film.

The artist's skill is amazing. With equal strength and persuasiveness, he was able to convey a furious storm and the quiet surface of the sea, the brilliance of the sun's rays sparkling on the water and the ripples of rain, the transparency of the sea depths and the snow-white foam of the waves. “The movement of living elements is elusive to the brush,” said Aivazovsky, “to paint lightning, a gust of wind, a splash of a wave is unthinkable from life. For this reason, the artist must remember them and furnish his picture with these accidents, as well as the effects of light and shadows.” He was convinced that “a person not gifted with memory, who retains the impressions of living nature, can be an excellent copyist, a living photographic apparatus, but never a true artist.”

Aivazovsky worked hard and with inspiration, freely improvising, putting all his feelings and wealth of observations into his work. “I can’t write quietly, I can’t pore over a painting for a whole month,” he confessed.

The master's creative path was difficult. Romantic features gradually gave way to realistic ones in his art. From the bright, colorful palette and lighting effects that dominated his early works, Aivazovsky moved to more restrained and truthful color relationships. This is especially noticeable in the painting “Black Sea” and one of the largest canvases - “Wave”. The artist created more than six thousand works and one of them is presented in the collection of the Novosibirsk Art Gallery - “Shipwreck”.

The painting depicts a ship that has run aground, a lifeboat on which the entire crew is swimming to the shore from the crash site. Fishermen are watching everything from the shore, clearly interested in what is happening. But looking at this picture you don’t see the tragedy of the crash, all the experiences seem to fade into the background. This effect is achieved thanks to a special depiction of the action. The colors chosen are light, bright, and saturated. In addition, the surrounding landscape is quite peaceful: the sky is clear, gently blue, the sea is completely calm, the surface of the sea is like a mirror, not a single wave is visible. In addition, the ship itself is located in the distance and looks somehow small, like a toy. All this creates a feeling of some kind of peace of mind, which allows you to simply admire the picture without thinking about the plot.

Aivazovsky reached enormous heights in depicting the sea, to which he devoted his entire life. He made a huge contribution to world culture and the culture of Russia.

"The Ninth Wave"

Galina Churak

Curator of the exhibition and head of the department of painting of the second half of the 19th - early 20th centuries

When we unpacked “The Ninth Wave” on the eve of the opening of the exhibition, everyone began to take pictures next to this painting. It seems that we all know both the work and the artist - whether we love him or not, this is still one of Aivazovsky’s hits. The viewer has always had a certain attitude towards him: there is a simple-minded viewer who likes everything. And there is a snobbish and critical viewer. It may seem that there was too much commerce in Aivazovsky, his work was focused on the public and on success - hence the long-established rejection of Aivazovsky.

Art developed in its own complex and often contradictory way, but Aivazovsky was, as it were, born a romantic and remained one throughout his life. He had an interest in the freedom of the elements, and with this is connected the romantic state that many of us experience in our youth.

I love Aivazovsky for his dedication to the subject and the enormous skill of the artist, which did not betray him until his old age. “The Wave,” for example, was painted at the age of 70, and he still stood in front of the huge canvas without fear, his hand and eye unerringly determining the correct stroke. The work forces us to come closer and closer, we are captivated by the pattern of the waves, the shape and depth of the abyss. In such works, the dramas of humanity and the world are played out - almost reaching the point of cosmism.

Researchers of his writing always say that the artist’s techniques are clear; he does not use so many colors, but he knows how to lay them out in layers with such skill that he creates a bottomlessness and variety of shades, light and color. His paintings convey a sense of the power of light flows - the illumination of the crest of a wave, the boiling and rush of water, and notice how, in the midst of all this, he can incredibly precisely set a counterpoint, a color stroke that collects a different energy.

"Black Sea"

The familiar picture from the Tretyakov Gallery “The Black Sea” at one time struck Kramskoy with the fact that there was nothing in it except the sky and waves, but there was an ocean, immense and boundless, forever moving, forever swaying, like the breath of the world and a symbol of human destiny. It is no coincidence that in Kramskoy’s painting “Inconsolable Grief” a woman who has lost a child appears against the background of this very picture - as a symbol of fate and human destiny, a symbol of perseverance. Kramskoy said that among the 3000–4000 paintings by Aivazovsky, there are several dozen that are absolutely ideal in their execution.

“Inconsolable Grief”, Ivan Nikolaevich Kramskoy

I had different attitudes towards Aivazovsky, but now I understand that he is much richer than just a painter of the sea. In each painting, his skill is combined with deep feelings and serious thoughts - and all this creates that image of the world.

Aivazovsky is not the first Russian artist to turn to depicting the sea - but no one has painted it the way he began to depict it. Shchedrin, a remarkable artist of the beginning of the century, was older - and for Aivazovsky he became an idol. He also painted the sea, but more coastal scenes - he did not like the open sea, he considered the movement of the waves too sloppy. Aivazovsky's main merit is that he put the image of the sea on a par with serious historical painting. Landscape has always been underestimated in our country, but Aivazovsky equalized it and brought it to the same level of significance as large historical canvases.

"View of Venice. San Giorgio"

If I could take any work home, I would choose “View of Venice. San Giorgio." The seascape is painted on a board, and the base itself gives the artist the opportunity for absolute smooth painting. This painting is remarkable because it has absolute clarity, purity and peace: the location is so well chosen and the foreground is wonderfully related to the calm water, the expanse of the sky and the calm clouds. By the way, in addition to the sea, we will also show several portraits at the exhibition - this is uncharacteristic for Aivazovsky, he did not paint them very often. Among them there is an absolutely wonderful portrait of the traveler Platon Chikhachev, painted in Italy. An absolutely romantic image: a dreamy pose, a red cap on the head, the deck of a sailboat, the sea and a fading perspective.

We are not trying to rehabilitate Aivazovsky, but with this exhibition we want to show his diversity and depth. Yes, during his lifetime he was a commercial artist, he thought through where and how to organize exhibitions, but most of them were held for charitable purposes - he gave admission money to poor students and young artists, peasants who suffered from crop failure. He was a worthy man - and our first artist to receive the Order of the French Legion - twice. Having incredible fame in Europe, he lived all his life in Feodosia, where he was born. For the residents of this then small provincial town, he installed a water supply system, which supplied him with 50,000 buckets of water per day. He opened a library and built an archaeological museum. He donated money to Armenian schools and churches, and gave paintings to decorate Armenian churches.

Of course, a person cannot be perfect in every way. In the memories of him you can find such a funny moment: Aivazovsky loved it when he was awarded orders. He has such a large portrait that we couldn’t even get it: in it he depicts himself in a full admiral’s uniform with all the orders that he ever had.

Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation

World Art

Essay
on the topic: Aivazovsky Ivan Konstantinovich

Completed by: 9th grade student
Checked:

I. Introduction... 4

II. Creativity of I. Aivazovsky... 5

1. Marinism... 5

A. Romantic landscape… 5

b. Aivazovsky I.K. – founder of Marinism... 5

2. Patriotism of I.K. Aivazovsky’s creativity... 7

A. The attractive power of the sea... 7

b. Patriotism... 7

V. The Aivazovsky phenomenon... 8

3. List of some paintings by the artist... 9

A. Brig "Mercury", attacked by two Turkish ships... 9

b. Volga near the Zhiguli Mountains... 9

V. Italian landscape. Evening… 10

Caucasus Mountains from the sea... 10

d. Sea battle in the Chios Strait... 10

e. Niagara Falls... 11

and. Fishermen on the seashore... 11

h. Calm sea... 12

And. Chesme fight… 13

III. Analysis of some of the artist’s paintings... 14

1. “Battle of Chesme” (1848)… 14

2. “The Ninth Wave” (1850)… 15

3. “Rainbow” (1873)… 16

4. “Among the Waves” (1898)… 17

IV. Biography of the artist... 19

V. Conclusion... 25

VI. Literature… 26

VII. Application… 27

1. Photos of attractions… 27

A. Aivazovsky Fountain… 27

b. Monument to Aivazovsky... 28

2. Photos of some paintings... 28

A. Battle in the Chios Strait... 28

b. Storm on the North Sea... 28

V. Italian landscape. Evening… 29

3. Portraits of the artist... 29

. Introduction

Painting has many genres. I decided to focus on the landscape, and the main thing for me was to see the beautiful world of nature through the eyes of a famous artist. I wanted to see the sea in the picture. And, following my goal, I came across the painting “The Sea”, the author of which was I.K. Aivazovsky... I also came across an article: “The first monument to Aivazovsky in Russia was opened.” It turns out that on September 15, 2007, in the suburb of St. Petersburg, Kronstadt, a bust of the artist was installed on Makarovskaya Embankment. The artist’s great-great-granddaughter Irina Kasatskaya took part in the opening ceremony of the monument. The author of the monument is Honored Artist of Russia Vladimir Gorevoy. He is also the author of the bust of Peter the Great in Priozersk, Leningrad region, monuments to Semenov-Tien-Shansky in Kyrgyzstan, high reliefs of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow and other famous works. The opening of the monument in the fortified city of Kronstadt was timed to coincide with the 190th anniversary of the painter. At one time he served at the Main Naval Staff, and his bust was erected on the initiative of the Kronstadt Naval Assembly. In addition to the monument, the artist’s celebrity is evidenced by the fact that there is an Aivazovsky fountain and an Aivazovsky Art Gallery. I have included photographs of these attractions (the fountain and the monument) in the appendix.

I was interested in this artist because in his paintings, first of all, you can see the sea. His fame amazed me. And the opening of the monument left no doubt at all about the choice of topic for the essay.

Aivazovsky I.K. is a marine painter, and therefore I decided to start the essay with an explanation of the term marineism.

. Creativity of I. Aivazovsky

1. Marinism

A. Romantic landscape

A significant contribution to the development of the romantic landscape was made by I.K. Aivazovsky. A painting depicting the sea is called a marina, and an artist who paints the sea element is called a marine painter. The most famous marine painter is Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky. Wise people said that a person will never get tired of looking at water and fire. The ever-changing sea, sometimes calm, sometimes agitated, its changing color, unbridled elements - all this became the main theme in Aivazovsky’s work. The name of Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky is one of the most popular in Russian art. The famous marine painter left a truly enormous legacy. Most of Aivazovsky’s paintings are dedicated to the sea, sometimes calm and quiet in the bright rays of the setting sun or in the radiance of moonlight, sometimes stormy and furious.

In the painting “Seashore” the image of the sea appears in its lyrical and romantic interpretation. The landscape clearly demonstrates the artist’s creative method. “The Seashore” was clearly composed and written without life, but the artist’s imagination accurately recreated the typical character of the seashore, the state of nature before an approaching thunderstorm.

b. Aivazovsky I.K. - founder of Marinism

By the end of the first half of the 19th century, another movement emerged within the Russian romantic landscape - Marinism. The founder of this genre in Russian painting was Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky. In the 19th century, the sea element attracted artists from many countries. In marine species, the tradition of romanticism lived the longest.

Aivazovsky’s own painting style was already taking shape by the 40s of the 19th century. He departs from the strict classical rules of painting, skillfully uses the experience of Maxim Vorobyov, Claude Lorrain and creates colorful paintings in which various effects of water and foam, warm golden tones of the coast are skillfully conveyed.

In several large paintings - “The Ninth Wave”, “The Black Sea”, “Among the Waves” - majestic images of the sea were created using the shipwreck theme typical of a romantic painting.

Aivazovsky influenced Russian landscape painters, primarily Alexei Petrovich Bogolyubov. But Bogolyubov, who once began as an imitator of Aivazovsky, at the end of the 60s was already critical of the famous master. In his notes, excerpts from which are given in Yagodovskaya’s work, he wrote: “Although he (Aivazovsky) and I pursued the same direction, he never interfered with me, because I was always a naturalist, and he was an idealist - I always wrote sketches, without which writing a picture would be unthinkable for me, but he declared in print that this was nonsense and that one should paint with the impression of looking at nature.”

Bogolyubov was known as a “Russian Frenchman”; he mastered the techniques of plein air painting. His painting, which seemed to bridge the gap between Russian and French landscapes, remained little known, but Aivazovsky’s art, which is more in line with the people’s need for spectacular, impressive paintings of nature, is still extremely popular.

Thus, in the first quarter of the 19th century, the romantic direction of landscape painting actively developed, freeing itself from the features of the speculative “heroic landscape” of classicism, painted in the studio and burdened with the burden of purely cognitive tasks and historical associations. The landscape during this period is understood as a portrait of a given area. Painted from life, it expresses the artist’s worldview through a directly depicted view, a real-life landscape motif, albeit with some idealization, the use of romantic motifs and themes.

2. Patriotism of creativity of Aivazovsky I.K.

A. The attractive power of the sea

The name of the great artist Ivan (Hovhannes) Konstantinovich Aivazovsky (1817-1900) enjoyed wide popularity during his lifetime. His brilliant works have taken pride of place not only in Russian and Armenian painting, but also in the treasury of world art.

Devoting his brilliant talent to marine painting, he created unforgettable poetic images of the sea in its most diverse manifestations. Aivazovsky's deeply meaningful and humanistic art placed him on a par with the best masters of realistic art of the 19th century.

The sea has always had a huge attractive force for artists. There is not a single Russian painter who, having visited the sea, would not try to depict it. For some, these were episodic sketches that were not related to the main course of development of their art, while others returned to this topic from time to time, devoting significant space to the depiction of the sea in their paintings. Among the artists of the Russian school, only Aivazovsky devoted his great talent entirely to marine painting. By nature he was endowed with a brilliant talent, which quickly developed thanks to fortunate circumstances and thanks to the environment in which his childhood and youth passed.

b. Patriotism

Aivazovsky survived two generations of artists, and his art covers a huge period of time - sixty years of creativity. Starting with works full of bright romantic images, Aivazovsky came to a soulful, deeply realistic and heroic image of the sea element, creating the painting “Among the Waves.”

Until his last day, he happily retained not only his undulled vigilance, but also his deep faith in his art. He walked his path without the slightest hesitation or doubt, maintaining clarity of feelings and thinking into old age.

Aivazovsky's work was deeply patriotic. His merits in art were noted all over the world. He was elected a member of five Academies of Arts, and his Admiralty uniform was strewn with honorary orders from many countries.

V. The Aivazovsky phenomenon

The artist’s creative biography is quite clear and transparent. I. Aivazovsky did not know ups and downs. He was not haunted by failures, was not upset by the disfavor of the authorities, was not disturbed by the attacks of criticism and the indifference of the public.

The works he created were bought by Nicholas II, Alexander III and other European monarchs. I. Aivazovsky traveled all over Europe, visited America and Africa. His 55 lifetime personal exhibitions were an unprecedented phenomenon. Some of them went on a pan-European tour.

The essence of the phenomenon of I. Aivazovsky is in the clearly expressed role and features of the creative method. I. Aivazovsky developed stable signs of an individual manner literally in the first years of his professional studies and followed them all his life.

This feature makes it difficult to judge the evolution of his pictorial language and makes any periodization of the artist’s work imperfect. Once proven stories appear again and again, sometimes decades later. However, this constancy does not cause addiction, irritation, or boredom. The subject area, within the boundaries of which the artist’s creative imagination exists, requires turning to irrational, extreme situations: the sea, sun, fire, clouds are neither ordinary nor unchangeable.

3. List of some paintings by the artist

A. Brig Mercury attacked by two Turkish ships

The feat of the Mercury crew dates back to the Russian-Turkish War of 1828-29. A Russian brig, on patrol duty, met with two Turkish battleships. At the enemy’s offer to surrender, the commander of the brig, captain-lieutenant A.I. Kazarsky ordered to respond with artillery fire. The Russian ship had 18 guns against 184 enemy ones. After a difficult battle, the Mercury forced the Turkish ships to retreat.

Genre: Battle genre

Era: 19th century painting

Year of original creation: 1892

Original dimensions, cm: 212x339

b. Volga near the Zhiguli Mountains

Aivazovsky sailed along the Russian Volga River, capturing places that made a pleasant impression or simply liked. This is the picture “Volga near the Zhiguli Mountains”, where every person will see with a new look long-familiar and at the same time unknown beautiful places practically from a bird’s eye view.

Original technique: Oil on canvas

Genre: River landscape

Era: 19th century painting

Year of original creation: 1887

Original dimensions, cm: 129x219.5

V. Italian landscape. Evening

For life I.K. Aivazovsky retained an enthusiastic attitude towards the nature of Italy, where he first visited in the 1840-1844s... The technical techniques for performing this work attract attention. In the 40-60s, the painter gave preference to such careful finishing of details and varnishing the surface of the paint layer.

Original technique: Oil on canvas

Genre: Seascape

Era: 19th century painting

Year of original creation: 1858

Original dimensions, cm: 108x160

Caucasus Mountains from the sea

One of the best paintings of the last years of I.K.’s life. Aivazovsky.

The color scheme is based on subtle gradations of blue and gray colors in different shades. The picture amazes with its richness of tonal and color transitions. The dark blue, snow-covered Caucasus Mountains served as the backdrop for the image of the agitated sea, painted with a thin layer of highly liquefied paints, which formed transparent smudges in some places. They organically entered into the picturesque structure of the picture, enhancing the impression of the transparency of sea water.

Original technique: Oil on canvas

Genre: Seascape

Era: 19th century painting

Year of original creation: 1899

Original dimensions, cm: 57x92

d. Sea battle in the Chios Strait

June 24, 1770. The ships of the opposing squadrons converged on the “pistol shot”, white clouds of cannon smoke rose to the tops of the masts. The foreground shows an artillery duel between Russian and two Turkish ships.

Original technique: Oil on canvas

Genre: Battle genre

Era: 19th century painting

Year of original creation: 1848

Original dimensions, cm: 195x185

e. Niagara Falls

In 1892 I.K. Aivazovsky traveled to North America, where an exhibition of his works was held with great success.

The painting, painted shortly after returning from overseas, pleases with the freshness of its color and the perfectly conveyed feeling of moist air. Despite the sky covered with gray clouds, the landscape is permeated with the light of the sun's rays, transforming the water and the shore. A remarkable decoration of the canvas is a rainbow, which Aivazovsky, judging by the drawings in his American travel album, actually observed above the waterfall. The matte surface of the canvas and light painting style are common for the artist’s works of those years.

Original technique: Oil on canvas

Genre: River landscape

Era: 19th century painting

Year of original creation: 1893

Original dimensions, cm: 126x164

and. Fishermen on the seashore

Aivazovsky began to paint a picture, depicting the sky, or as he called it, following his teacher at the Academy of Arts M.N. Vorobyov - air. No matter the size of the canvas, Aivazovsky painted “air” in one session, even if it lasted up to 12 hours in a row. It was with such a titanic effort that the conveyance of the airiness and integrity of the color scheme of the sky was achieved. The desire to complete the picture as quickly as possible was dictated by the desire not to lose the unity of the mood of the motive, to convey to the viewer a frozen moment in the life of a moving sea element. The water in his paintings is a boundless ocean, not stormy, but swaying, harsh, endless. And the sky, if possible, is even more endless. The plot of the picture, the artist said, is formed in my memory, like the plot of a poem by a poet; Having made a sketch on a piece of paper, I begin to work and do not leave the canvas until I express myself on it with my brush.” Speaking about his paintings, Aivazovsky noted: “Those paintings in which the main force is the light of the sun... should be considered the best.”

Original technique: Oil on canvas

Genre: Ships

Era: 19th century painting

Year of original creation: 1852

Original dimensions, cm: 93.5x143

h. Calm sea

The sea...No one depicted its boundless distance and radiant sunrises, the magic of moonlit nights and the fury of storms as poetically and inspiredly as I.K. Aivazovsky. The artist loved the sea very much, and he connected his work with it. In his works he created the image of a free and poetic sea element. Aivazovsky painted the sea at different times of the day and in different weather, depicting it as both raging and calm. He knew the sea and the secrets of its movements very well. The artist made annual trips to the seas, studying the effects of lighting and the nature of the sea.

Original technique: Oil on canvas

Genre: Seascape

Era: 19th century painting

Year of original creation: 1863

Original dimensions, cm: 45x58.5

And. Chesme fight

This battle took place during the Russian-Turkish War of 1768-1774. On the night of June 26, 1770, the Russian fleet entered Chesme Bay, where the Turkish fleet was stationed. The Russian squadron consisted of 7 ships and four fire ships. After an artillery duel between the squadrons, the fireships went on the attack... The Russian detachment did not lose a single ship. The enemy burned 15 battleships, 6 frigates and over 30 ships of other classes, captured 1 battleship and 5 galleys. In the report on the results of the battle, Admiral G.A. Spiridov wrote: “The fleet was attacked, smashed, broken, burned, sent into the sky, sunk and reduced to ashes.” These words of the official report convey to us the pride of the sailors who won the unequal battle. A. conveys the drama and tension of the night battle at Chesma in the 1848 painting by juxtaposing two opposing elements - water and fire. Enemy ships are burning with huge fires, and the flames, breaking the darkness of the Mediterranean night, are reflected in the dark water of the bay. Russian ships stand out in clear silhouettes against the background of flames. In the foreground you can see the boat returning to the squadron with the crew of Lieutenant Ilyin’s fireship (which particularly distinguished itself in battle).

Original technique: Oil on canvas

Genre: Battle genre

Era: 19th century painting

Year of original creation: 1848

Original dimensions, cm: 193x183

III. Analysis of some of the artist's paintings

1. “Chesme Battle” (1848)

Aivazovsky's painting of the forties and fifties is marked by the strong influence of the romantic traditions of K.P. Bryullov, which affected not only the painting skill, but also the very understanding of art and Aivazovsky’s worldview. Like Bryullov, he strives to create grandiose colorful canvases that can glorify Russian art. Aivazovsky has in common with Bryullov his brilliant painting skills, virtuosic technique, speed and courage of execution. This was very clearly reflected in one of the early battle paintings, “The Battle of Chesme,” written by him in 1848, dedicated to an outstanding naval battle.

After the Battle of Chesma took place in 1770, Orlov, in his report to the Admiralty Board, wrote: “...Honor to the All-Russian Fleet. From June 25 to 26, the enemy fleet (we) attacked, smashed, broke, burned, let into the sky, into ashes converted... and they themselves began to dominate the entire archipelago..." The pathos of this report, pride in the outstanding feat of the Russian sailors, the joy of the victory achieved was perfectly conveyed by Aivazovsky in his film. At the first glance at the picture, we are overcome with a feeling of joyful excitement, as if from a festive spectacle - brilliant fireworks. And only with a detailed examination of the picture does the plot side become clear. The battle is depicted at night. In the depths of the bay, burning ships of the Turkish fleet are visible, one of them at the moment of the explosion. Covered in fire and smoke, the wreckage of the ship flies into the air, turning into a huge blazing fire. And on the side, in the foreground, the flagship of the Russian fleet rises in a dark silhouette, to which, saluting, a boat with the crew of Lieutenant Ilyin, who blew up his fire-ship among the Turkish flotilla, approaches. And if we come closer to the picture, we will discern the wreckage of Turkish ships on the water with groups of sailors calling for help, and other details.

Aivazovsky was the last and most prominent representative of the romantic movement in Russian painting, and these features of his art were especially evident when he painted sea battles full of heroic pathos; in them one could hear that “music of battle”, without which the battle picture is devoid of emotional impact.

2. “The Ninth Wave” (1850)

The romantic features of Aivazovsky’s work were especially pronounced in the painting “The Ninth Wave,” painted in 1850. Aivazovsky depicted the early morning after a stormy night. The first rays of the sun illuminate the raging ocean and the huge “ninth wave”, ready to fall on a group of people seeking salvation on the wreckage of the masts.

The viewer can immediately imagine what a terrible thunderstorm passed at night, what disaster the ship’s crew suffered and how the sailors died. Aivazovsky found the exact means to depict the greatness, power and beauty of the sea element. Despite the dramatic nature of the plot, the picture does not leave a gloomy impression; on the contrary, it is full of light and air and is completely permeated with the rays of the sun, giving it an optimistic character. This is greatly facilitated by the color scheme of the picture. It is painted with the brightest colors of the palette. Its color includes a wide range of shades of yellow, orange, pink and purple in the sky in combination with green, blue and violet in the water. The bright, major color palette of the picture sounds like a joyful hymn to the courage of people defeating the blind forces of a terrible, but beautiful in its formidable greatness, element.

This painting found a wide response at the time of its appearance and remains to this day one of the most popular in Russian painting.

The image of a raging sea element excited the imagination of many Russian poets. This is clearly reflected in Baratynsky’s poems. Willingness to fight and faith in final victory are heard in his poems:

So now, ocean, I thirst for your storms -

Worry, rise to the stone edges,

It makes me happy, your menacing, wild roar,

Like the call of a long-desired battle,

As a powerful enemy, I feel somewhat flattered anger...

This is how the sea entered the formed consciousness of young Aivazovsky. The artist managed to embody in marine painting the feelings and thoughts that worried the leading people of his time, and to give deep meaning and significance to his art.

3. "Rainbow" (1873)

In 1873, Aivazovsky created the outstanding painting “Rainbow”. The plot of this picture - a storm at sea and a ship dying off a rocky shore - is nothing unusual for Aivazovsky’s work. But its colorful range and painterly execution were a completely new phenomenon in Russian painting of the seventies. Depicting this storm, Aivazovsky showed it as if he himself was among the raging waves. A hurricane wind blows water dust off their crests. As if through a rushing whirlwind, the silhouette of a sinking ship and the vague outlines of a rocky shore are barely visible. The clouds in the sky dissolved into a transparent, damp veil. A stream of sunlight broke through this chaos, lay like a rainbow on the water, giving the painting a multicolored coloring. The whole picture is painted in the finest shades of blue, green, pink and purple colors. The same tones, slightly enhanced in color, convey the rainbow itself. It flickers with a subtle mirage. From this, the rainbow acquired that transparency, softness and purity of color that always delights and enchants us in nature. The painting “Rainbow” was a new, higher level in Aivazovsky’s work.

Regarding one of these paintings by Aivazovsky F.M. Dostoevsky wrote: “The storm... of Mr. Aivazovsky... is amazingly good, like all his storms, and here he is a master - without rivals... In his storm there is rapture, there is that eternal beauty that amazes the viewer in a living, real storm...”

4. "Among the Waves" (1898)

In 1898, Aivazovsky painted the painting “Among the Waves,” which became the pinnacle of his work.

The artist depicted a raging element - a stormy sky and a stormy sea, covered with waves, as if boiling in a collision with one another. He abandoned the usual details in his paintings in the form of fragments of masts and dying ships, lost in the vast expanse of the sea. He knew many ways to dramatize the subjects of his paintings, but did not resort to any of them while working on this work. “Among the Waves” seems to continue to reveal the content of the painting “Black Sea” in time: if in one case the agitated sea is depicted, in the other it is already raging, at the moment of the highest formidable state of the sea element. The mastery of the painting “Among the Waves” is the fruit of the artist’s long and hard work throughout his life. His work on it proceeded quickly and easily. The brush, obedient to the artist’s hand, sculpted exactly the shape that the artist wanted, and laid paint on the canvas in the way that the experience of skill and the instinct of a great artist, who did not correct the stroke once laid, told him. Apparently, Aivazovsky himself was aware that the painting “Among the Waves” was significantly superior in execution to all previous works of recent years. Despite the fact that after its creation he worked for another two years, organizing exhibitions of his works in Moscow, London and St. Petersburg, he did not take this painting out of Feodosia; he bequeathed it, along with other works that were in his art gallery, to his hometown of Feodosia.

But the painting “Among the Waves” did not exhaust Aivazovsky’s creative possibilities. Subsequently, he created several more paintings, beautiful in execution and content.

. Biography of the artist

... My sincere desire is that the building of my art gallery in the city of Feodosia, with all the paintings, statues and other works of art in this gallery, be the full property of the city of Feodosia, and in memory of me, Aivazovsky, I bequeath the gallery to the city of Feodosia, my hometown.

From the will of I.K. Aivazovsky

Aivazovsky Ivan Konstantinovich (1817-1900) - Russian painter of Armenian origin, unrivaled marine painter. In 1837 he graduated from the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, class of landscape painter M. N. Vorobyov. In 1840 he went to Italy, then visited France, Spain, Portugal, Holland, and England. In 1844 he returned to St. Petersburg as a renowned European artist, a member of the Rome, Paris and Amsterdam academies. At home, he was also awarded the title of academician, and then was appointed artist at the Main Naval Staff. In 1845 he left St. Petersburg and finally settled in his native Feodosia, choosing the most favorable conditions for creativity. In 1847 he was recognized as a professor at the Academy of Arts. During his lifetime, more than 120 personal exhibitions took place in cities in Europe and America. Created about six thousand paintings...

The outstanding painter Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky entered the history of world art as a romantic marine painter, a master of Russian classical landscape, conveying on canvas the beauty and power of the sea element.

1817

Aivazovsky was born on July 29, 1817 in Feodosia in the family of a bankrupt Armenian merchant. There are still legends in the city about a boy who drew with samovar coal on the whitewashed walls of the houses of the Armenian settlement.

1831-1833

With the assistance of the Governor of Tavrida A.I. Kaznacheev (until 1830 he was the mayor of Feodosia and in every possible way encouraged the boy’s first steps in drawing), the talented teenager was admitted to the Taurida Gymnasium in 1831, and in 1833 he was enrolled in the Imperial Academy of Arts of St. Petersburg, which He graduated with a big gold medal and the right to travel to Crimea and then to Europe.

Already in the academic period, the work of the young artist was noticed by his great contemporaries A. S. Pushkin, V. A. Zhukovsky, I. A. Krylov, M. I. Glinka, K. P. Bryullov, personal acquaintance with whom could not but have an impact on the development and character of his art.

Two years of work in Crimea were unusually fruitful and useful for the young artist. Finding himself again on the shores of the Black Sea, in his native Feodosia, Aivazovsky works enthusiastically, closely studies nature, paints views of Yalta, Gurzuf, Sevastopol, Feodosia, and Kerch from life.

1840

In 1840, Aivazovsky, along with other boarders at the Academy of Arts, went to Rome to continue his education and improve his skills in landscape painting. He went to Italy as an already established master, having absorbed all the best traditions of Russian art. The years spent abroad were marked by tireless work. He gets acquainted with classical art in the museums of Rome, Venice, Florence, Naples, and visits Germany, Switzerland, Holland, France, England, Spain, and Portugal.

In a short time, Aivazovsky became the most famous artist in Europe. His paintings arouse unprecedented interest among viewers. He is greeted by the writer N.V. Gogol, artist A.A. Ivanov, professor of the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts F.I. Jordan, and the famous English marine painter J. Turner, who were living in Italy at that time.

By this time, the painter’s creative method had also developed, to which he was faithful throughout his life. He writes from memory and imagination, explaining it as follows: “... the movements of living elements are elusive to the brush: painting lightning, a gust of wind, a splash of a wave is unthinkable from nature...”.

1844

In 1844, after four years abroad, Aivazovsky returned to his homeland as a recognized master, academician of the Rome, Paris and Amsterdam academies of arts. Upon returning to Russia, he was elevated to the rank of academician of the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts and was subsequently assigned by royal decree to the Main Naval Staff with the title of painter and the right to wear the uniform of the Naval Ministry. At this time, the artist was barely 27 years old, but already had a brilliant school of painting, enormous creative success, and world fame as a landscape painter behind him.

1845

In 1845, Aivazovsky begins construction of his house in Feodosia. He was always drawn to his homeland, to the Black Sea. The house is being built according to the marine painter’s own design in the style of Italian Renaissance villas, and is decorated with casts from antique sculptures. Adjacent to the living rooms is a spacious studio, in which he would later create most of the six thousand paintings he painted. Among them are the landmark works “The Ninth Wave”, “The Black Sea”, “Among the Waves”. Talented artists A. Fessler, L. Lagorio, A. Ganzen, M. Latri, K. Bogaevsky will emerge from the walls of his workshop.

1847

Living permanently in Feodosia, the painter works a lot, but does not confine himself within the walls of his studio. He conducts extensive public activities, is engaged in archaeological excavations, often travels to St. Petersburg and Moscow, constantly opens exhibitions of his works in major cities of Russia and abroad, and takes part in international exhibitions. In 1847, he was awarded the title of professor at the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, and later he became an academician of two more European art academies, Stuttgart and Florence.

His house and workshop are visited by artists I. E. Repin, I. I. Shishkin, G. I. Semiradsky, a famous collector. M. Tretyakov, Polish violin virtuoso Heinrich Wieniawski, writer A.P. Chekhov and others.

1871

In Feodosia, Aivazovsky lived a long life full of creative fire and indomitable energy. At the main facade of the artist’s house there is a bronze monument, on the pedestal of which there is a laconic inscription: “Feodosia to Aivazovsky.” In this short phrase, grateful descendants included a great feeling of admiration, pride and deep respect for their famous fellow countryman, the first Honorary Citizen of Feodosia, who did a lot for the economic and cultural development of the city. In addition to opening an art gallery in Feodosia in 1871, Aivazovsky built an archaeological museum building according to his own design and at his own expense, and became one of the organizers of the first public library. He constantly cares about the architectural appearance of his native city. With his participation, the buildings of the concert hall and the dacha of the famous publicist and editor of the newspaper “Novoye Vremya” A.S. Suvorin were designed and built. According to the artist's design and thanks to his energy, a sea trade port and a railway were built.

1887-1888

The Aivazovsky Fountain is a kind of visiting card of Feodosia. The city has long experienced difficulties with water supply; there was a catastrophic shortage of fresh water. In July 1888, the writer A.P. Chekhov, who was visiting Feodosia, wrote: “There are no trees or grass in Feodosia.” The problem was solved in 1887, when, to improve the city’s water supply, I.K. Aivazovsky donated 50 thousand buckets of water to the city daily from the Su-Bash estate (now the village of Aivazovskoye, Kirov district).

The construction of the water pipeline was carried out in the spring and summer of 1888; the city spent 231,689 rubles on its construction, a very large amount for those times. Water arrived in the city already in September, and on October 1 (September 18, old style) 1888, the day of the official opening of the water supply system, a fountain was launched on Novo-Bazarnaya Square.

In its shape, the fountain is a rectangular oriental-style structure with large canopies from the roof, built from local shell rock, and the stone cladding has been partially preserved. The fountain was built with funds and according to the design of I.K. Aivazovsky. Its laying took place on September 12, 1887 after a service in the Feodosia Alexander Nevsky Cathedral.

The City Duma was going to name the fountain after Alexander III, and the relevant documents were prepared and sent to the authorities. Without waiting for a decision to be made, the city authorities prepared a foundation slab on which the words “Emperor Alexander” were engraved. However, taking into account the merits of I.K. Aivazovsky, the Highest Decree that followed in September 1888 ordered to give the fountain the name of the great artist. In this regard, on the foundation slab of the fountain, instead of the words “Emperor Alexander”, “I. K. Aivazovsky,” apparently there was no money for a new slab, so it was decided to cut out its center with the inscription and insert a block with new text. If you look closely at the foundation slab, then before the first letter in the name of I.K. Aivazovsky you can clearly see the details of the letter “I” of a larger size, from the word “Emperor”, and after the end of the name the details of the letter “A” from the word “Alexandra”.

A fee was charged for using the Feodosia-Subash water supply system, but they drank water from the fountain for free. In the center of the fountain, above the tap, there was a silver mug with the inscription: “Drink to the health of Ivan Konstantinovich and his family.” After some time, an oriental-style pavilion appeared near the fountain (the building has not survived): on the left there was a cheburek shop, on the right they prepared kebabs, the cafe was called “Fontanchik”. In the warm season, tables were placed behind a light fence directly in the open air. At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, this corner of the city was very popular among the townspeople.

1900

On April 19, 1900, there was a canvas on the easel with the begun painting “The Lost of the Ship” - it remained unfinished.

The whole city said goodbye to the artist. The road to the Church of St. Sergius was strewn with flowers. The military garrison of Feodosia paid their last respects to their artist.

In his declining years, as if summing up his life, Aivazovsky said to his interlocutor: “Happiness smiled on me.” His great life, which covered almost the entire 19th century, from its beginning to the very end, was lived calmly and with dignity. There were no storms and cataclysms in it, so frequent in the master’s paintings. He never once doubted the correctness of his chosen path, and until the end of the century he carried on the legacy of romantic art, with which his creative path began, striving to combine heightened emotionality with a realistic depiction of nature.

. Conclusion

Aivazovsky taught many generations of people to see the sea correctly and enjoy its amazing beauty. He created about 6,000 works. Aivazovsky painted the sea sometimes as joyful, shining with countless reflections of the sun, sometimes as stern and gloomy, sometimes as solemnly calm, but most often he depicted it as raging, with a roar, bringing down gigantic foam shafts onto the coastal rocks and throwing ships like shells. Wonderful paintings by I.K. Aivazovsky adorn many museums around the world. But truly the art gallery in Feodosia was and remains a treasury of his creations: more than 400 paintings by the artist are exhibited there.

Aivazovsky in painting
equal to Pushkin in poetry

The sea roared... The gray shaft
It crashed noisily on the rocks,
And his howl merged with the wind,
Threatening misfortune and misfortune.
The sea calmed down... The distance beckoned
Space, bliss, silence...
But even under the subsided wave
There was a dormant power lurking...

Ninth wave

.

Farewell, free elements!
For the last time before me
You're rolling blue waves
And you shine with proud beauty !

A.S. Pushkin

Statements of great people about the work of I. Aivazovsky.

• Stasov highly appreciated his work: “ Marine painter Aivazovsky by birth and by nature was an absolutely exceptional artist, with a keen sense of feeling, who independently conveyed, perhaps like no one else in Europe, water with its extraordinary beauties...”
• I. N. Kramskoy argued that Aivazovsky “there is a star of the first magnitude, in any case, and not only here, but in the history of art in general” .
• P. M. Tretyakov, wanting to buy a painting for his gallery, wrote to the artist: “...Give me your magic water, such that it would fully convey your incomparable talent.”
• The famous English marine painter Turner, who lived in Rome in 1842, dedicated admiring verses about the painting to Aivazovsky and his painting “The Bay of Naples on a Moonlit Night”::

In your picture I see the moon with its gold and silver,
Standing above the sea, reflected in it.
The surface of the sea, onto which a light breeze blows
A tremulous swell that seems like a field of sparks...
Forgive me, great artist, if I was wrong,
Taking the picture for reality,
But your work fascinated me
And delight took possession of me.
Your art is eternal and powerful,
Because you are inspired by genius .

Forgive me, artist,
If I made a mistake in accepting the picture
for reality -
But your work fascinated me
and delight took possession of me.

In the power of his canvas
We will be content with little, -
And a marvelous range of colors,
And the clarity of the strokes...
Until the ocean
Will cover us with the ninth wave,
And we will feel it ourselves,
How harsh is his temper!

Vadim Konstantinov

For many, Aivazovsky’s sea paintings are an indispensable part of the mosaic picture of the world that everyone has collected for themselves since childhood. Like a dream of a holiday and travel to distant lands and like a scary fairy tale - creepy, but impossible to tear yourself away. Or like a romance - maybe naive and slightly cloying, but still exciting and subduing.

Already during his lifetime, the fame of the famous artist Ivan Aivazovsky rapidly and widely surrounded him with real world fame. Since 1846, one hundred and twenty (!) of his personal exhibitions have been held abroad and in Russia. Aivazovsky Ivan Konstantinovich was an honorary member of European art academies: Rome, Amsterdam, Paris, Florence and others. The Florence Academy invited him to paint a self-portrait (previously, only Kiprensky had received such an honor among Russian artists). The Pope expressed a desire to purchase his painting "" for the Vatican,

and the famous artist from England William Turner, admiring the work of Aivazovsky, dedicated to the canvas “ Moonlight night» poems in Italian.

The list of successes can be continued indefinitely, because, according to one of Aivazovsky’s biographers, his life was “one of the happiest human lives,” “a real fairy tale, rich in events and beautiful, like a wonderful, captivating dream.” Indeed, the fate of the artist, who was born in 1817 in coastal Feodosia, was extremely successful, although it began in a rather peculiar way. His childhood drawings on the fences of the historical port city of Feodosia attracted the attention and interest of the Tauride governor A.I. Kaznacheev, who helped to enroll Aivazovsky to the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, where very soon Nicholas I himself became his admirer and patron.

Nevertheless, the artist bore little resemblance to a fairy-tale magician with a magic wand. One of the most important components of Aivazovsky’s success was exceptional performance and productivity. Over the course of his entire life, Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky created approximately six thousand paintings. Anticipating the practice of modern masters from “high fashion houses”, artist Aivazovsky acted as a large company that has an exclusive for the rich, has mass production, and also something for those who want to have a piece of a famous name, but do not have a lot of money for this. In addition to his large and medium-sized canvases, there was also a so-called “gift” version, which was a photographic card of the maestro at his easel, where instead of a picture, a canvas the size of a postage stamp was inserted or pasted into the frame, but with the same initial “A” in the corner.

Such a huge number of paintings could be painted if only one had the skills of fast writing techniques. This speed was legendary. It is known, for example, that the huge canvas “ moment of creation" (1864), a variant of the repetition of "", was written in one day. Aivazovsky himself somewhat flaunted his capabilities and even occasionally showed his admirers the creative process as a kind of trick: he began to paint a picture from a blank canvas and, in front of the astonished spectators, completed it in an hour or two. So, in the presence of General A.P. Ermolov was created within about two hours " View of the Caucasian rocks off the coast of the Black Sea».

The speed of work was facilitated by Aivazovsky’s amazing memory. It is known that at the beginning of his creative career, Ivan Aivazovsky tried to paint landscapes from life: it turned out to be both long and boring, while the views painted from memory turned out to be fresh and emotional. Therefore, the artist very quickly abandoned working on full-scale studies and sketches, making only cursory sketches in the album. Such a system required extreme concentration and concentration.

The need to write from memory came from Aivazovsky theoretical justification. Aivazovsky was often copied and forged. The antique market is flooded with fake Aivazovs. And although the plot and external features of the artist’s manner are easily accessible to copyists, the secrets of his rather sophisticated technology remain hidden from them, and his confident skill is inaccessible. Aivazovsky's imitators are especially far from his professional accuracy in depicting ship equipment. In the summer of 1838, young Ivan Konstantinovich Ivan Konstantinovich took part in naval maneuvers off the coast of the former possession of the Dadians - Mingrelia. At that time, he met the vice admiral of the Russian fleet, the hero of the Crimean War V.A. Kornilov, the Russian naval commander and navigator Admiral M.P. Lazarev and an excellent sailor who considered serving in the navy the only meaning and purpose of his life - Admiral P.S. Nakhimov. They eagerly explained to the painter how the ships worked. His knowledge of how a ship heels in the wind, sinks or burns was precise, not approximate. Even the secret details of the designs of Russian warships of that time were familiar to him. Aivazovsky’s house in Feodosia had a rich collection of sailing ship models, and the artist experienced the death of the Russian fleet during the unsuccessful Crimean campaign as a personal grief.

As an extensive legacy, Aivazovsky gave portraits, genre painting, plain landscapes, and compositions on biblical themes to all humanity. However, his work remained highly specialized. “Land” Aivazovsky, as a rule, was much inferior to his seascapes. Aivazovsky’s main merit can be considered as laying the foundation for the development of a motif that had not received much attention from Russian artists before and had been thoroughly forgotten by Western European masters - the sea as a self-sufficient element, the sea as a theme. In the 19th century, artists mainly painted the sea off the coast. “Aivazovsky... works quickly, but well: he deals exclusively with marine views, and since there is no artist of this kind here (in Italy - A.S.), he was glorified and praised,” - this is how Alexander Ivanov explained the reason for the grandiose Aivazovsky's success.

The brilliant artist did not change the theme he found throughout his life, developing it with unflagging passion. For him, the sea acquired the meaning of a symbol, a comprehensive metaphor. It is the scene of both recent historical dramas and events from biblical history. As a metaphor for poetic inspiration (it’s not without reason that Pushkin, Dante, and Sappho appear in paintings against the backdrop of the sea), its sea is associated with quotes from school anthologies: from “The lonely sail is turning white...” to “Farewell, free elements...”, and Russian masterpieces. poetry seems to reinforce and support the landscapes of the marine painter. Sea Aivazovsky- this is also a metaphor for human life, the vicissitudes of fate (analogous to the medieval wheel of fortune). It is not for nothing that Kramskoy introduces the image of one of Aivazovsky’s best works - “” - into his painting “ Inconsolable grief" - as a sign of fate with its ups and downs.

As a true romantic, Ivan Konstantinovich needed a huge scale; he was attracted by nature itself with its sensations: floods, waterfalls, storms, wrecks. The artist forever retained in his soul the shock he received from “The Last Day of Pompeii” by Karl Bryullov. The secret of the impact of Aivazovsky’s paintings is in the direct emotional connection of the viewer. In his best works - "", "", "", " Among the waves"- the sea is surprisingly real.

I remember the horror of the first cinema viewers, who were frightened by the sight of a train rushing towards them, forcing them to duck their heads. The hearts of contemporaries also sank in front of Aivazovsky’s paintings: what if it hits you, what if you choke, what if you drown? General A.P. perfectly described the feelings of simple-minded spectators in his letter to the artist. Ermolov. From the words of this letter it is clear that Aivazovsky’s paintings lead the viewer’s feelings into a panicked fear of the elements of nature, from storms and waves, without finding salvation from death. But, at the same time, his other masterpieces force the amazed viewer to spend an unforgettable, fabulous and delightful night on the shore, enjoying the tranquility of the sea under the light of a fantastic moon.

Indeed, Aivazovsky loved to work in contrast: a menacing storm, a cold wind and the gentle peace of the hour before sunset or the silence of the night. He often made paired paintings of the same size with opposite moods, for example, from the collection of the Feodosia Art Gallery, which bears his name, “” and “”.

When depicting the water element, Aivazovsky by no means limited himself to his beloved and familiar Black Sea from childhood. After Vereshchagin, he is the second tireless traveler in Russian art. The geography of his travels is very striking, which he reflects in his works on a landscape theme. Aivazovsky quickly responded to various outstanding events of his century: in 1869, he attended the opening ceremony of the Suez Canal (then a painting would be painted on this subject); The canvas “” is a response to the events that excited the Christian world related to the struggle of the population of the island of Crete with the Turks in 1866.

The artist’s social temperament is also striking. He was a true benefactor of his region: with his own funds he built an archaeological museum and a concert hall in his beloved seaside Feodosia, financed archaeological excavations, founded the Feodosia art gallery and library, and organized an art school called “ General workshop».

There are paradoxes in the creative life of the brilliant Aivazovsky. He was a Russian artist, although he was an Armenian by upbringing and a Turk by origin. All his life he painted “free elements”, was considered the greatest master of late romanticism - and was the most beloved brilliant artist of Nicholas I. He wore a uniform as a “painter of the Main Naval Staff”. He communicated with Bryullov and his “brothers,” but did not like to participate in their revelry and generally did not accept the bohemian lifestyle. The romanticism of Aivazovsky’s work coexisted without conflict with pragmatism and practicality in life. As a result, his personality became overgrown with real and imagined jokes with farcical elements. The case of the flock of sheep belonging to Aivazovsky is very indicative. Frightened by the storm, the sheep rushed into the sea from a cliff and died. Then Aivazovsky painted a picture based on this plot, successfully sold it and purchased a new herd with the proceeds. . Before his eyes, the political situation changed, aesthetic movements were born and died. But they didn’t seem to touch him. His sea is stormy and agitated, his sailboats are torn by the wind and broken into pieces by storms, but he himself is as unshakable as a rock. Incredibly popular during his lifetime, Aivazovsky evokes genuine delight among viewers even for modern viewers of our time; museums, auctions and private collectors are “hunting” for his works. On the international art market, Aivazovsky is one of the most valued and expensive Russian painters.