How the Amazon of the Russian avant-garde conquered Paris and beyond: Natalia Goncharova

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

Natalia Goncharova is an outstanding Russian artist, designer and writer. She became famous all over the world thanks to her bright, juicy and extraordinary works that combine several styles: from Fauvism and Cubism to Futurism and Art Nouveau. She was also known for her costumes and sets for ballet and theater, which were striking in their versatility and design unusual for those times.

During the first two decades of the 20th century, Russian art absorbed new styles and philosophy of Western European art and moved to the forefront of culture. Goncharova and her husband Mikhail Larionov, with their work and efforts to organize exhibitions and creative teams, found themselves at the center of this artistic revolution, which preceded and accompanied the political upheaval in the country.

Natalia was born in Nagaevo in Central Russia. The Goncharov family lost their fortune based on flax production by the end of the 18th century. The famous poet Pushkin married one of her ancestors, Natalia Goncharova, after whom she was named. Her father was an architect. The family of Natalya's mother, the Belyaev family, gave birth to several priests and were known as patrons of music.

In her early years, Natalya attended a gymnasium in Moscow. And at a more conscious age, having decided to become an artist, she entered the School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture (Moscow), where she studied sculpture with Pavel Trubetskoy, who worked in the style of Auguste Rodin. She left college three years later, despite winning a silver medal and not completing a ten-year study period for the curriculum. This coincided with her acceptance of painting as her preferred medium of expression.

1. Career and husband

By 1900, Goncharova met her future husband, Mikhail Larionov. He also went to college, but to the painting department. Her decision to take up painting was supported by Mikhail, her passion for the play of light and harmony of color in the future became the artist's hallmark.

Like many Russian artists of her time, the first few years of the twentieth century were a period of acquaintance and acceptance of the styles that developed in the capitals of Western Europe. At the time, she was attracted to Impressionism and Divisionism, styles associated respectively with Monet and Seurat. Both styles emphasized not the image of solid objects, but the capture of light (color) that was reflected from the object to the eye. As a result, the drawing was usually loose, and the emphasis was on color as well as paint strokes. This led to an awareness of paint, brush strokes, texture, and painting on canvas. These two styles were essential to freeing art from a purely representative character. Artists began to realize that art is an aesthetic expression, inspired by the appearance of the physical world, but not dependent on it.

Once the great Russian ballet impresario Diaghilev organized the inclusion of the collection of paintings by Goncharova and Larionov in the Russian section of the Autumn Salon in Paris. Their inclusion in this newly established annual exhibition of the new radical art (in the same 1906 the first group of Fauves was presented there) testifies to the fact that both artists were considered models of the Avant-garde tendencies of their country. For the next nine years, before her emigration from Russia, Natalia participated in a number of important exhibitions, many of which she and Mikhail organized. During this period, she was also presented at the 1912 Post-Impressionist exhibition organized by Roger Fry at the Grafton Gallery in London, as well as at personal exhibitions in Moscow and St. Petersburg, and at an exhibition at the Paul Guillaume Gallery in Paris with the catalog of the famous critic Apollinaire.

2. Style of districtism

The half century that preceded the start of the war was a period of rapid development of the fine arts in Russia. Natalia was at the forefront of this movement.

Surprisingly, three different directions were simultaneously manifested in her work: regionalism, neo-primitivism and cubo-futurism.

The first of them is the original style conceived by Mikhail and extensively researched by Natalia.

Districtism was at that time one of the completely abstract styles in Western art. Like Impressionism, regionalism concentrates on the rays of light reflected from objects. The space in the picture of a radiant is not measurable, but is an atmosphere charged with the energy of an infinite number of light rays, either directly from the sun, or, more likely, rays reflected back and forth from physical objects around it. The guiding principle is purely aesthetic in that colors are chosen for their harmony or visual effect.

For more than three decades, artists have been fascinated by the idea of creating non-figurative art based on the orchestration of color. If music is completely abstract and, at the same time, infinitely expressive, then can't there be an art using color (instead of sound) that would be just as abstract and expressive.

Instead of the fragmented, interconnected forms found in Cubism, the Cats series is based on long, cutting color strokes. Districtism was a short-lived style that reached its end by 1914. Franz Marc, associated with Munich's Blaue Reiter (with whom Natalia had exhibited two years earlier), admired her work and wrote in a manner inspired by districtism, possibly due to her influence.

3. Style of primitivism

Unrestrained and restless, seeking new inspiration, she also drew heavily on early Cubist painters such as Pablo Picasso for some time. This stage in her work lasted for several years and covered her painting, inspired by the Russian tradition.

But her illustrations for several poetry books by Velimir Khlebnikov and Alexei Kruchenykh showed her devotion to ancient Russian art forms such as icons, religious frescoes, and woodcuts. In 1913, she dramatically declared that she was turning away from the West, giving her sympathy to the East.

At one of her early exhibitions, primitivist and cubist paintings were presented, and at a later exhibition, organized by her husband, more than fifty works by Natalia were exhibited. She drew inspiration for primitivism from Russian icons and folk art, otherwise known as popular prints. The second, later exhibition was conceived as a deliberate break with European artistic influence and the creation of an independent Russian school of contemporary art. The event turned out to be controversial, and the censor confiscated Natalia's religious-thematic work "Evangelists", considering it blasphemous to display it at an exhibition called "The Donkey's Tail". Natalia and Mikhail have long been persecuted for their works and the way they expressed themselves. But even in the later works of Natalia, the influence of Russian futurism is noticeable. Initially passionate about icon painting and the primitivism of ethnic Russian folk art, Natalya gained fame in Russia thanks to her futuristic works (one of which was a painting called "The Cyclist").

Natalia and Mikhail, painting their faces with hieroglyphs and flowers, walked the streets as part of a primitivist artistic movement. Natalia herself from time to time was not afraid to appear in public half-naked with symbols on her chest. As leaders of the Moscow Futurists, they hosted provocative lecture nights in the same vein as their Italian counterparts. In addition, Natalia wrote and illustrated several avant-garde books.

Natalia has been a member of the Blue Rider avant-garde group from the very first day of its foundation (1911). Four years later, she took up the development of ballet costumes and sets in Geneva. And soon she began work on a series of sketches for Diaghilev's ballet, but, unfortunately, the ballet was never realized.

A few years later she moved to Paris, where she created a number of sets for Diaghilev's Russian ballets. She also exhibited at the Salon d'Automne and regularly participated in the Salon des Tuileries and the Salon of Independents.

Natalia and Mikhail collaborated on four charity events in Moscow. They both developed most of the promotional materials for the event.

4. Style of neo-primitivism

In parallel with Rayonism, Natalia wrote in a style that is now called neo-primitivism. It was a phenomenon that had previously taken place in France and elsewhere, and appears to be related to a change in political, social and cultural aspirations. Combined with the democratization of political and social thought, there has often been a tendency to try to discover the deeper character of national cultures by turning to traditional folk or peasant art for inspiration. Due to the ecclesiastical background of her family and the fact that she spent her youth living on a country estate, Natalia would be drawn to traditional religious and folk art as part of her formative experience and as the visual arts of her compatriots. This was the period when the intelligentsia began to view icons (Russian liturgical images) as an important national cultural heritage. The great Romanov exhibition of icons excited many aesthetically sensitive people.

Natalia has been writing on religious themes for a number of years, feeling that the intensely religious meaning and meaning of icons is one of the most important goals for an artist to capture in her work. The rich colors, dazzling decorative effects, and the highly formalized and stylized nature of the icons have already inspired her to work.

This led her to resort to a manner unrelated to academic practice. In addition to emphasizing the flat, decorative qualities, sometimes the paint appeared to be splattered over the surface or was applied quickly for a spontaneous effect. The charm and naivety, which were previously sung in Henri Rousseau's painting, appeared in the work of the Russian artist and, which is very important for her, were borrowed from local sources.

5. Style of cubo-futurism

Between 1913 and 1914, Cubo-Futurism, aspects of the then modern styles of Cubism and Futurism, appeared in Natalia's painting. Cubism was known to Russian artists through publications, exhibitions and collections such as the Morozov and Shchukin collections. Cubism was ambivalent towards color in favor of a new sense of structure-fragmentation and cohesion of form, resulting in a uniformly animate composition in which the figure / ground relationship is eliminated.

Italian futurism also had a following in Russia in the years immediately preceding the First World War.

Her futurism, like that of the Italians, was full of colors. The sensations of movement were caused by rhythmic repetitions of figures or lines. The inclusion of colored words or word fragments as if they were from signs and part of the environment through which the person passed, further contributed to this perception. Sound waves were also implied by rhythmic effects and sometimes by the use of musical notation.

6. The last years of life

Natalia spent the rest of her life in Paris, recognized as an important member of the city's artistic community. She continued to paint, but her most notable work was in the field of stage design. In this area, both she and Michael became world stars. Natalia increasingly identified her work with France. In 1936, she and Mikhail participated in an important international theatrical art competition held in Milan. They preferred to exhibit their work in the French section rather than in the section of the Soviet Union, and when they won the silver medal, it was France that went to them.

After the invasion of France by Adolf Hitler in the spring of 1940, Natalia and Mikhail found themselves under German occupation. In the difficult years that followed, they both managed to continue their careers in the theater. Then, an exhibition of their biased paintings in Paris reminded the public of their prominent role in the development of contemporary art at the turn of the century. As some have argued, the two artists deliberately outstripped some of their work, sometimes by more than a decade, in order to solidify their reputation as pioneering artists.

Mikhail suffered a stroke, and the spouses' financial situation, which had never been particularly comfortable, became even more precarious. They survived in part by selling their early paintings. Natalia also suffered many physical ailments, including a severe form of arthritis, which made it impossible to draw on an easel. Continuing to demonstrate her dedication to the work, she placed the canvas in front of her in a level position to continue manipulating the brush.

Natalia made her last attempt at theater design in 57. It consisted of costumes and sets for a series of ballets in Monte Carlo. A year later, she held the final exhibition of her painting in Paris, showing about twenty canvases inspired by the Russian launch of the Sputnik space satellite.

The spouses were still plagued by financial problems. Only the sale of a significant part of the library and the works of the couple to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London helped to maintain their solvency.

Natalia died of cancer in Paris. On her gravestone it was simply written that she was an artist and painter. Mikhail's death came shortly thereafter. He was buried next to her with the same inscription on his tombstone.

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