"Nun" by Ilya Repin

Ilya Repin. Nun. 1878. State Tretyakov Gallery / Portrait under X-ray

A young girl in austere monastic clothes looks at the viewer from the portrait. The image is classic and familiar - it probably would not have aroused interest among art critics if it were not for the memoirs of Lyudmila Alekseevna Shevtsova-Spore, the niece of Repin's wife. An interesting story was revealed in them.

Sophia Repina, nee Shevtsova, posed for "The Nun" Ilya Repina. The girl was the artist's sister-in-law - and at one time Repin himself was seriously fascinated by her, but married her younger sister Vera. Sophia became the wife of Repin's brother, Vasily, an orchestra student of the Mariinsky Theater.

This did not prevent the artist from repeatedly painting portraits of Sophia. For one of them, the girl posed in a formal ballroom dress: a light elegant dress, lace sleeves, updo... While working on the painting, Repin had a serious quarrel with the model. As you know, anyone can offend an artist, but few can take revenge as ingeniously as Repin did. The offended artist “dressed up” Sophia in the portrait in monastic clothes.

The story, similar to an anecdote, was confirmed by an X-ray. The researchers were in luck: Repin did not clean off the original paint layer, which made it possible to examine in detail the heroine's original outfit.

"Park Alley" by Isaac Brodsky

Isaac Brodsky. Alley of the park. 1930. Private collection / Isaac Brodsky. Park alley in Rome. 1911

Repin's student Isaac Brodsky left an equally interesting mystery for researchers. IN Tretyakov Gallery his painting "Park Alley" is preserved, which at first glance is unremarkable: Brodsky had many works on "park" themes. However, the further into the park, the more colorful layers.

One of the researchers drew attention to the fact that the composition of the painting suspiciously resembled another work of the artist - "Alley of the Park in Rome" (Brodsky was stingy with the original names). This canvas was long considered lost, and its reproduction was published only in a rather rare edition of 1929. With the help of an X-ray, a mystically disappeared Roman alley was found - right under the Soviet one. The artist did not clean off the already finished image and simply made a number of simple changes to it: he changed the clothes of passers-by in the fashion of the 30s of the XX century, “took away” the cerso from the children, removed the marble statues and slightly altered the trees. So the sunny Italian park, with a couple of light hand movements, turned into an exemplary Soviet one.

When asked why Brodsky decided to hide his Roman alley, they did not find an answer. But it can be assumed that the portrayal of the "modest charm of the bourgeoisie" in 1930 from an ideological point of view was no longer appropriate. Nevertheless, of all Brodsky's post-revolutionary landscape works, "Park Alley" is the most interesting: despite the changes, the picture retained the charming elegance of Art Nouveau, which, alas, did not exist in Soviet realism.

"Morning in a pine forest" by Ivan Shishkin

Ivan Shishkin and Konstantin Savitsky. Morning in a pine forest. 1889. State Tretyakov Gallery

A forest landscape with cubs playing on a fallen tree is perhaps the most famous work of the artist. But the idea of \u200b\u200bthe landscape was suggested to Ivan Shishkin by another artist - Konstantin Savitsky. He also wrote to a bear with three cubs: the forest connoisseur Shishkin had no luck with bears.

Shishkin was impeccably versed in forest flora, noticed the slightest mistakes in the drawings of his students - either the birch bark is not depicted in this way, or the pine tree looks like a fake one. However, people and animals in his works have always been a rarity. Here Savitsky came to the rescue. By the way, he left several preparatory drawings and sketches with cubs - he was looking for suitable poses. “Morning in a Pine Forest” was not originally “Morning”: the painting was called “Bear Family in the Forest”, and there were only two bears on it. As a co-author, Savitsky put his signature on the canvas.

When the canvas was delivered to merchant Pavel Tretyakov, he was indignant: he paid for Shishkin (ordered the author's work), and received Shishkin and Savitsky. Shishkin, as an honest man, did not attribute the authorship to himself. But Tretyakov followed the principle and blasphemously erased Savitsky's signature from the painting with turpentine. Savitsky later nobly refused copyright, and for a long time the bears were attributed to Shishkin.

"Portrait of a Chorus Girl" by Konstantin Korovin

Konstantin Korovin. Portrait of a chorus girl. 1887. State Tretyakov Gallery / Back side of the portrait

On the back of the canvas, researchers found a message from Konstantin Korovin on cardboard, which turned out to be almost more interesting than the picture itself:

“In 1883, a portrait of a chorus girl in Kharkov. Written on a balcony in a public commercial garden. Repin said, when this sketch was shown to him by S.I. Mamontov, that he, Korovin, was painting and looking for something else, but what it was for - this is painting for painting only. Serov had not yet painted portraits at this time. And the painting of this sketch was found incomprehensible ?? !! So Polenov asked me to remove this sketch from the exhibition, since neither the artists nor the members - Mr. Mosolov and others like it. The model was an ugly woman, even a little ugly. "
Konstantin Korovin

The “letter” disarmed with its directness and daring challenge to the entire artistic community: “Serov had not yet painted portraits at that time,” but he, Konstantin Korovin, wrote them. And he was allegedly the first to use techniques characteristic of the style that would later be called Russian impressionism. But all this turned out to be a myth that the artist created on purpose.

The harmonious theory "Korovin - the forerunner of Russian impressionism" was mercilessly destroyed by objective technical and technological research. On the face of the portrait they found the artist's signature in paint, a little lower - in ink: "1883, Kharkov". In Kharkov, the artist worked in May - June 1887: he wrote the scenery for the performances of the Mamontov's Russian private opera. In addition, art critics have found that the "Portrait of a Chorus Girl" was made in a certain artistic manner - a la prima. This technique oil painting allowed to paint a picture in one session. Korovin started using this technique only in the late 1880s.

After analyzing these two inconsistencies, the staff of the Tretyakov Gallery came to the conclusion that the portrait was painted only in 1887, and Korovin added an earlier date to emphasize his own innovation.

"The Man and the Cradle" by Ivan Yakimov

Ivan Yakimov. The Man and the Cradle. 1770. State Tretyakov Gallery / Full version of the work

For a long time, Ivan Yakimov's painting "Man and the Cradle" aroused bewilderment among art critics. And the point was not even that this kind of everyday sketches are absolutely not typical for painting XVIII century - the rocking horse in the lower right corner of the picture has a rope too unnaturally stretched, which logically should lie on the floor. And it was too early for a child from the cradle to play with such toys. Also, the fireplace did not fit half on the canvas, which looked very strange.

"Enlightened" the situation - in the literal sense - a radiograph. She showed that the canvas was cut from the right and top.

The painting entered the Tretyakov Gallery after the sale of the collection of Pavel Petrovich Tugogo-Svinin. He owned the so-called "Russian Museum" - a collection of paintings, sculptures and antiques. But in 1834, due to financial problems, the collection had to be sold - and the painting "The Man and the Cradle" ended up in the Tretyakov Gallery: not all, but only its left half. The right one, unfortunately, was lost, but you can still see the whole work, thanks to another unique exhibit of the Tretyakov Gallery. The full version of Yakimov's work was found in the album “Collection of excellent works russian artists and curious Russian antiquities ”, which contains drawings from most of the paintings that were part of Svinin's collection.

Composition plan:

I.I. Shishkin is a landscape painter.
Early summer morning.
Foreground:
- forest;
- a tree broken by a storm;
- funny bear cubs;
- caring mother;
Background (fog).
My attitude to this picture.

Ivan Ivanovich Shishkin is an outstanding Russian landscape painter. He created many paintings in which he glorifies the beauty and poetry of his native spaces. Endless forest distances, sunlit birch and oak groves, mighty ship pines….

His canvases surprisingly accurately and realistically captures a variety of flora, which seems to come to life under the brush of the master, breathes, gives us freshness and coolness, evokes evening sadness, or, conversely, awakens bright joy from the contemplation of beauty. The painting "Morning in a Pine Forest" is known and loved by many of us since childhood. No wonder she is considered one of the the best works Shishkin.

The painting depicts a large family of bears. On an early summer morning, three little teddy bears and their mother-bear went out for a walk. The sun is just rising. It gently illuminates the tops of huge pines. A thick fog envelops the forest. It will soon dissipate from the sun's rays. In a small clearing where the bears have gathered, it has almost melted.

The animals wandered into a coniferous forest and accidentally discovered an old withered tree that had broken down during a recent storm. Its trunk cracked in two with a crash, and huge roots even twisted the earth.

The cubs shown in the picture are brown. They are not quite big yet, mischievous, clubfoot. Two of them have white collars around their necks. The bravest of them climbed almost to the very top of the trunk of a broken tree and hung at its very edge, clutched at the rough bark with its claws, looking to fall into the ravine. And the second only got to the middle.

He probably also wants to climb higher, but it's scary. Here he is, clumsy, and sat down on a tree, helplessly looking at the mother bear, not knowing what to do next. The third, the most cautious, climbed onto the other half of the broken tree, which fell on the slope of the ravine, but did not slide into it, but caught the branches of a neighboring pine tree. The bear cautiously stood on its hind legs, slightly tilted its head and listened to the sounds of the awakening forest, peering into the dense fog. There, in the fog, tall, green pines sway and rustle.

The bear is large, shaggy, brown. Like any mother, she worries about her mischievous cubs, who are playful and restless. She even growls and probably warns them that they might fall off the tree and must be careful. Or maybe she noticed some kind of danger and wants to warn her children about it. It's time to end your morning walk and go deep into the forest. She rushes from one bear to another, the dark green grass under her is trampled.

The artist skillfully conveys the atmosphere of an early morning in the forest. Soft diffused light falls through the dense crowns of trees and appears golden. In the background, the fog is a veil through which the slender trunks of pine trees are guessed. Thanks to the slightly blurred background, all viewers' attention is focused on the bear family.

I really like this picture because it depicts a funny and lively plot, and the cubs are so cute and funny. I just want to play with them, stroke the soft brown fur!

"Three Bears" - a picture, so called in the common people, it has an official name - "Morning in a pine forest." The canvas was painted in oil in 1889, its dimensions are 139 x 213 (rather large), it is kept in the State Tretyakov Gallery. The signature under the painting is only by Ivan Shishkin.

The most replicated picture

The official name is more consistent with the picture itself, since there are four bears on the canvas, not three. But there is no person on the territory of the CIS who would not know this work, and it is under the name "Three Bears". The picture is incredibly popular, it can be argued that, in modern terms, this is the most popular picture. This was facilitated by candy wrappers of the most bought and delicious sweets in Soviet times, tablecloths, bedspreads and wall rugs that repeat the plot. And it is the bears shown in the foreground that are famous among the general population, and the beautifully depicted morning forest serves as a background.

Not very successful co-authorship

And the bears were painted by another artist - Savitsky Konstantin Apollonovich (1844 - 1905), genre painter, academician, friend of Shishkin. Savitsky convinced Shishkin that the picture lacks dynamics, and the animals in the foreground will make up for the lack. Art critics write that Shishkin did not succeed in bears, and Savitsky did the opposite. And, indeed, the club-footed ones turned out so well that, by mutual consent, friends put their signatures under the picture. But Tretyakov and Savitsky at that time had some kind of friction, and when buying a painting for his gallery, he demanded that Savitsky's signature be removed. Obviously, the collector's desire was law, and only Shishkin's signature remained, and he received the fee alone and probably did not share it with the co-author, because they ceased to be friends.

Island covered with pine trees

This is the "wrong side" of the painting "Three Bears". The picture is so beautiful, calm, blissful. Of course, Tretyakov was a connoisseur and subtle connoisseur of painting, and the forest depicted by the unsurpassed master was of true value to the buyer, and the bears did not even like it. And experts are delighted with the landscape that Shishkin spied on Gorodomlya Island (Lake Seliger), brilliantly transferred to the canvas.

Popularly known as "The Three Bears", the picture really perfectly conveys the state of nature. At first glance, it is clear that this is the morning. The fog is amazingly depicted, penetrated by the rays of the rising sun.

Queen of landscapes

The brilliant landscape painter, in love with Shishkin, very often painted pines. Different, at any time of the year, illuminated by the sun and covered with snow, they are beautiful.

On his canvases, the smallest needles are visible, the roughness of the bark is felt, it seems that the pine smell comes from the paintings of Ivan Ivanovich. "Three Bears" - depicting the wilderness of the pine forest. It seems that you can hear the crackling of the trunks of century-old pines, and how the depth of the cliff, located behind the right bear cub, is felt. And the infinity of the forest is depicted brilliantly. And the fog, still blue at the edges, already illuminated by the sun in the center. And the teddy bear drawn on the right seems to be admiring the beautiful morning. And nature has not yet fully woken up, and blows morning coolness. An ingenious work, a masterpiece. Maybe he didn't need dynamics.

The result is complete harmony

In fairness, it must be said that bears do not spoil the canvas in any way, they fit very well into it. The painting "Three Bears", the description of which was given above, is very organic, and it is impossible to imagine it without these good-natured representatives of the wild. Perhaps the complacency emanating from the mother bear with three cubs is due to the absence of a person near. And this peace of animals also emphasizes the depth of the thicket of the forest. "... And fresh moss under the paws will be crushed, dry branches crackle under the weight ..." - wonderful words of the poet about the picture. Morning, silence, harmony in the flora and fauna, in nature in general - the picture has a very calming effect: "... and just look at this beauty, and I know that - Will Save, Warm!"

Ivan Ivanovich Shishkin (1832-1898) - a great landscape painter. He, like no one else, conveyed the beauty of his native nature through his canvases. Looking at his paintings, many have the impression that a little more breeze will blow, or birds will be heard singing.

At the age of 20, I.I. Shishkin entered the Moscow School of Painting and Sculpture, where teachers helped him learn the direction in painting, which he followed all his life.

Without a doubt, "Morning in a Pine Forest" is one of the artist's most popular paintings. However, Shishkin did not write this canvas alone. The bears were painted by Konstantin Savitsky. Initially, the painting was signed by both artists, but when it was brought to the buyer Pavel Tretyakov, he ordered to erase Savitsky's name, explaining that he ordered the painting only to Shishkin.

Description of the painting "Morning in a pine forest"

Year: 1889

oil on canvas, 139 × 213 cm

Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow

"Morning in a Pine Forest" is a masterpiece that radiates admiration for the nature of Russia. Everything looks very harmonious on the canvas. The effect of nature awakening from sleep is masterfully created in green, blue and bright yellow tones. In the background of the painting, we can see the barely penetrating rays of the sun, they are depicted in bright golden shades.

The artist depicted the fog swirling on the ground so realistically that you can even feel the coolness of a summer morning.

The painting "Morning in a Pine Forest" is so bright and vividly drawn that it looks like a photograph of a forest landscape. Shishkin professionally and lovingly depicted every detail of the canvas. In the foreground are bears climbing a fallen pine tree. Their high-spirited game evokes only positive emotions. It seems that the cubs are very kind and harmless, and the morning is like a holiday for them.

The most vividly and richly the artist depicted bears in the foreground and sunlight in the background. All other objects on the canvas look like light complementary sketches.

The author of the painting "Morning in a Pine Forest" is the great Russian artist Ivan Ivanovich (1832-1898). However, only the landscape itself belongs to his hand. The main characters of the picture - three bears and a bear were painted by another famous artist Konstantin Apollonovich. The misconception that "Morning in a Pine Forest" was written only by Shishkin is due to the fact that Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov, who bought the painting for his collection, erased Savitsky's signature.

History of the painting

The painting was painted in 1889. Canvas, oil. Dimensions: 139 × 213 cm. Currently in the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow. Interestingly, the original title of the painting was "Bear Family in the Forest."

It is believed that the plot of the painting was invented by Ivan Shishkin while visiting Gorodomlya Island, which is located on Lake Seliger. Here the painter saw untouched nature, a dense forest that amazes the imagination with its beauty and primordiality.

Initially, there were no bears in the picture, only the forest landscape itself. Ivan Shishkin was an unsurpassed landscape painter, but in animalism, that is, the depiction of animals, he was not strong. Therefore, the bears were painted by another artist - Konstantin Savitsky.

Description of the painting "Morning in a pine forest"

The painting "Morning in a Pine Forest" literally captivates the viewer with its extraordinary beauty. The age-old forest amazes with its power, untouched nature. Pine trees with thick trunks and gnarled branches seem to hint at their ancient nature by themselves. The forest is drowning in a whitish fog, which early in the morning covered everything around with a milky curtain.

The painting depicts early morning. The sun is just beginning to rise and the forest begins to turn into golden shades of dawn. Since the sun has cast its first rays at the very tops of the trees, they are in stark contrast to the semi-darkness within the forest. Such a beautiful transition of colors and shades is mesmerizing. The shades of the picture smoothly change from dark green at the bottom to bright gold at the top.

A fallen pine tree is in the foreground. The bear family has gathered here. Three restless teddy bears are crawling along the broken trunk. Nearby is the mother bear, who watches over her children, who still want to play and examine everything unfamiliar. One of the cubs stands on its hind legs and peers into the depths of the forest shrouded in fog. Thus, he intrigues the viewer, so one wants to follow his gaze, peer deep into the picture to see what the frozen bear cub saw in the distance.