How the failed priest Plastov became a famous artist praising the eternal peasant Russia

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Today I would like to tell you about the artist of the last century, whose biography and work entered the history of not only domestic, but also world art as a bright page. it Arkady Plastov - the most famous painter of the Soviet era, who came out of the people and devoted all his creative heritage to them. The incredible beauty of the rural world on his canvases excited and attracted viewers in the last century, it is no less interesting for the current generation.

The integral and impressionable nature of the painter was completely absorbed in the theme of the Russian countryside, its nature and people, the wise folk way of life, which has been developing for centuries. Arkady Plastov dedicated his bright and powerful talent to all this. And I will not be mistaken if I say that the future belongs to his creative heritage. And it has 10 thousand paintings that are included in the gold reserve of Russian culture. And this is not counting the fact that a huge number of the painter's paintings, painted before 1931, burned down in the fire.

The artistic works of a member of the Academy of Arts, laureate of State prizes, People's Artist of the USSR - Arkady Alexandrovich Plastov have long become classics of Russian painting of the twentieth century and continue the struggle for the spiritual revival of the nation and all mankind. The most valuable exhibits are kept in the collections of the Tretyakov Gallery, the Russian Museum and other domestic and foreign museums.

A few words from the biography of the people's artist

Arkady Plastov (1893-1972) comes from the village of Prislonikha near Simbirsk (now the Ulyanovsk region). It is here that the artist's life and creative path will take place. The villagers spoke with delight about the extraordinary fine mental organization of little Arkasha, who, in their opinion, could understand the language of the earth. He talked to everything that surrounded him. One could often observe how the boy talks with the sunset in the evenings, and gives advice to growing grass in the spring, not to mention the pets, who understood him as "their own." And apparently, this is why the parents prepared for their son the fate of a spiritual mentor, which he abruptly changed.

His grandfather Gregory was a rural architect and was engaged in icon painting. In due time, according to his projects, temples were built in Prislonikha and surrounding villages. Grigory Gavrilovich with his son Alexander, the father of Arkady, painted the church in Prislonikha, and some of his icons have survived to this day. It was he who passed on his love for art to his son, and through him to his grandson. However, as often happens, parents, wishing well for their child, saw the future of Arkasha in serving God. And after three classes of education in a rural school, a 10-year-old boy is sent to study at the Simbirsk Theological School, where, after studying for five years, Arkady enters a theological seminary.

And once a 15-year-old boy was impressed by the work of an artel of icon painters, restoring church paintings in his native Prislonikha. It was from that time that he firmly decided: by all means be a painter.

After graduating from the seminary, Arkady, full of determination, went to Moscow in 1912 and entered the capital's Stroganov School of Industrial Art, and two years later at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture at the sculpture department. At the same time, he attends painting classes in the workshops of A. E. Arkhipova, A. M. Korin, A. S. Stepanova.

After the 1917 revolution, Plastov returned to his native land, where, along with economic and social work, he took up painting. He paints from life portraits of his fellow villagers and their children, which are included in the cycle of paintings dedicated to village life, called "Living-Bye".

One day the unexpected happened, the artist's house burned to the ground, and all the works that he managed to paint were destroyed: not a single sketch, not a single sketch survived. This tragedy became a turning point in the life of Arkady Alexandrovich. It was 1931, and 40-year-old Plastov was left with practically nothing, he had to start everything from scratch. He firmly decides to leave field work and devote himself entirely to painting. The artist again picks up a brush, and forty years of tireless work will pass - and the number of his works will amount to almost 10 thousand exhibits. There are hundreds of portraits, most of which are from fellow villagers, not to mention landscapes, still lifes and genre paintings.

Plunging headlong into the creative process, Plastov regularly visits exhibitions of the Itinerants, Russian classical artists, learning from them and adopting their best achievements. Some four years will pass and fame will come to the artist. In 1935, Plastov's paintings were exhibited for the first time at an exhibition in Moscow: Sheep Shearing, At the Haymaking, Collective Farm Stable. It was from that debut that the artist began to constantly exhibit at all major art exhibitions.

However, the most significant work of Arkady Plastov of that time was recognized as the painting "Bathing Horses", created in 1938, for the anniversary exhibition "XX Years of the Russian Red Army" and considered the freest and most sincere painting of its time. Having written it, Plastov became an artist and gained wide popularity.

The composition of this canvas, built on a harmonious combination of movement and statics, is saturated with many images of young guys and horses, who are intertwined in a single whirlwind. And its emotional background is literally permeated with a sense of joy, youth and enthusiasm. Plastov, who has an excellent sense of form, painted the figures almost sculpturally: his studies in sculpture were not in vain. Juicy plein-air painting, enchanting play of sun reflexes on wet bodies and water swell, rich contrasts - all this makes the viewer an unforgettable impression.

Plastov's performance was amazing. So, imbued with some vital motive, he could rewrite it several times at different times of the year, changing and complicating the artistic task, honing the artistic skill to the cherished perfection. So, applying centuries-old traditions, and creating his own techniques, he made his invaluable contribution to the development of the Russian school of painting.

Throughout his creative career, the artist went from the truth of life to the high truth of poetic generalization,

Time will pass, and Arkady Plastov will be recognized as the best creator who managed to rise to the heights of this very generalization of the majestic image of the common man and nature, their harmonious interaction.

Bonus

And now for those who went to school during the Soviet era. Remember the inserts of textbooks of the Soviet period, which literally dazzled with reproductions of paintings by Arkady Plastov. I remember them well from childhood. And you?

And in conclusion, I would like to say that the artist's unique gift was his ability to go from the momentary to the eternal: the concreteness of life plots acquired a truly metaphorical meaning under his brush. And the desire to convey through the images of ordinary peasants and their life a deep philosophical meaning, a technique characteristic of the artist, formed the basis of the author's handwriting and style.

Until his last breath, Arkady Plastov lived and worked among his fellow countrymen, never separating himself from them. He so convincingly and passionately recreated the small world of the village and its inhabitants on his canvases that sometimes, it seems, his creations seem to have grown out of that very life, revealing to us its higher, innermost meaning.

And in continuation of the theme of the artists, reproductions of paintings which flaunted on the pages of textbooks of the Soviet era, read the article: What the artist, whom all Soviet schoolchildren knew from the picture in the textbook "Native Speech", painted: Post in memory of Ksenia Uspenskaya.