“Viktor Borisov-Musatov and the masters of the Blue Rose Society” in the Russian Museum. Why should you go to the exhibition “Borisov-Musatov and the Masters of the Blue Rose”? Musatov exhibition
The exhibition presents the work of V.E. Borisov-Musatov (1870–1905), one of the leading masters of Russian symbolism, in the context of the continuation and development of his artistic program in the activities of the Blue Rose society. The exhibition allows for the first time in the Russian Museum to show the variety of ways of pictorial embodiment of the ideas of symbolism in the works of Viktor Borisov-Musatov and representatives of this group - in many ways a unique phenomenon in the cultural life of Russia at the beginning of the twentieth century.
Next to the works of Borisov-Musatov, works by Pavel Kuznetsov, Nikolai Krymov, Sergei Sudeikin, Nikolai Sapunov, Martiros Saryan, Pyotr Utkin, the Milioti brothers and other participants of the Blue Rose, the first exhibition of which took place 110 years ago, in 1907, will be displayed. Along with works by major masters who became classics of Russian painting of the last century, works by artists whose paintings and drawings are rarely found in museums and private collections (I.A. Knabe, N.P. Feofilaktov, N.P. Ryabushinsky) will be shown.
The exhibition consists of about 80 paintings and graphic works from the collection of the Russian Museum and private collections in St. Petersburg.
The general sponsor of the exhibition is the Lukoil Charitable Foundation.
110 years ago, in the spring of 1907, two important events took place in the world of Russian art: a posthumous exhibition of works by Viktor Borisov-Musatov (1870–1905) and the exhibition of his followers “Blue Rose” opened almost simultaneously in Moscow. Later, artistic youth will choose titles and mottos that shock the bourgeoisie and philistinism for their exhibitions: “Jack of Diamonds,” “Donkey’s Tail,” “Tram B.” “Blue Rose” preceded the birth of the Russian avant-garde, and its name, which corresponded to the spirit of the era of symbolism, reflected the dreamy nature of creativity characteristic of the exhibition participants. Only one exhibition took place under this name, but both it and the art of its exhibitors are among the most significant phenomena of the Silver Age.
The Borisov-Musatov exhibition was a real revelation for many in those days. By that time, in the country’s museum collections there was only one painting by the master - “Ghosts”, acquired by the Tretyakov Gallery after the death of the author.
Borisov-Musatov and the Blue Rose exhibitors were connected primarily by belonging to one direction in art - symbolism and one alma mater - the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture (MUZHVZ), as well as the fact that he was a mentor for his Saratov fellow countrymen Pavel Kuznetsov, Pyotr Utkin, Alexander Matveev, who formed the core of the Blue Rose. Other members of the community knew about Musatov not only from enthusiastic stories of Saratov friends, but also from his paintings at exhibitions of the Moscow Association of Artists (MTH) that he headed. He was their guide in art, they revered him as their idol.
Three young Saratov residents met Borisov-Musatov back in the mid-1890s. Educated, purposeful, studied at MUZHVZ, started and soon abandoned classes at the pre-reform St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, touched the pedagogical system of Pavel Chistyakov, at that time Musatov was a student at the Fernand Cormon school in Paris. In the summer, during the holidays, aspiring artists received through him news about Parisian art, learned about brilliant exhibitions, about the struggle between trends in painting and literature, about “Nabid” artists close to Musatov, about symbolism and impressionism. He was the Sun for them. They accompanied him in his work on sketches, discussed painting problems that arose and ways to solve them, and together with him they painted naked boys in the open air.
In 1897, Kuznetsov and Utkin entered the MUZHVZ. Soon, the lively and sociable Kuznetsov meets the painter Konstantin Korovin. Spectacular, talented and temperamental, having visited the Arctic and Paris many times, he becomes the second Sun for the aspiring artist. Korovin brought him into his workshop, where, together with his friends - Valentin Serov and Vasily Polenov, as well as the young Nikolai Milioti, Nikolai Tarkhov, Vasily Denisov - he painted a nude model. At the School, it seemed, nothing had changed since Musatov left it. The energetic Kuznetsov protested as best he could against routine procedures and the dominance of “naturalism” in teaching. The atmosphere in MUZHVZ will begin to change only with the arrival of Valentin Serov, Isaac Levitan, and Pavel Trubetskoy as teachers.
Gradually, since 1897, a circle of like-minded friends began to form around Kuznetsov, a charismatic leader. These were the painting students Pyotr Utkin, Martiros Saryan, and Sergei Sudeikin, who entered the same year as him. They were joined by Nikolai Sapunov and Nikolai Milioti, who had studied painting here since the early 1890s, and brought his younger brother Vasily, a law student, to the circle. The eldest of the brothers, who during his studies more than once took sick leave and disappeared to Paris, visiting the academies of James Whistler and Rodolphe Julien there, was for the circle both a link with the “capital of the world” and a source of cultural news. On the eve of the new century, the future painter Ivan Knabe, sculptor Alexander Matveev, architects Vladimir Drittenpreis and Anatoly Arapov, who brought with him Nikolai Feofilaktov, a comrade at the Konstantinovsky Land Survey Institute, joined the community. The “Kuznetsovites” unanimously set about teaching everything that they themselves could, the younger Milioti and Feofilaktov, who had only a “home” art education, acted as a close-knit group at student exhibitions of the Moscow School of Painting and Art, where critics began to notice them.
During their years of study, many future “Goluborozovites” were under the strong charm of Korovin’s brush. It is known that Serov reproached Sapunov for writing “like Korovin.” The teacher’s strong influence was also noted by critics in Kuznetsov’s paintings. Some of the members of the circle (Kuznetsov, Sapunov, Saryan, Sudeikin, Utkin), having graduated from the “general” classes, then underwent extremely useful training in the portrait-genre workshop of Serov and Korovin. The largest Russian portrait painter and a first-class colorist, both charming personalities, they formed a wonderfully harmonious tandem of teachers. Korovin himself, casting a glance at the past, will name among the best students of the workshop Sapunov and Sudeikin, as well as Krymov and Kuznetsov.
North Cape. Sergei Diaghilev, concerned about replenishing the ranks of the “World of Art” with talented young people, spotted the works of Kuznetsov and Sapunov at the student exhibitions of the Moscow School of Painting and Painting. He wrote to Serov in 1902: “Young people are your responsibility... Kuznetsov and Sapunov, they should be ‘ours’.” Both emerging artists participated in the association's exhibition that same year. Following Korovin, who entrusted Kuznetsov and Sapunov with the design of Richard Wagner’s opera “Die Walküre” at the Bolshoi Theater (1902) based on his sketches, Mamontov recruited Sudeikin and Sapunov to work in his enterprise at the Hermitage Theater.
They reacted vividly and consciously to the situation in the art of Moscow, where the trends of impressionism and symbolism, searches in the spirit of national romanticism, and the development of symbolism in poetry and painting were intertwined. We followed with interest the evolution of the tragic Mikhail Vrubel, who worked in the modernist style, and his complete opposite, the sad lyricist Viktor Borisov-Musatov. Starting with the canvas “Self-Portrait with Sister,” all the most significant, fundamentally important works for Musatov’s work, in which he solved problems of decorative synthesis that were new to national painting—“Tapestry,” “Ghosts” and others—were exhibited in Moscow. In them, he, like his beloved Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, leaves the vulgar and prosaic everyday life into the world of a beautiful dream. Plotless, full of silence and harmony, through the music of rhythmic lines and coloristic solutions they conveyed the communication of souls, the experiences of melancholic, withdrawn heroines of the “bygone time” - the Turgenev estate women and girls. Refined in the quality of painting, marked by the grace of applying strokes, the reverence of texture, intelligently interpreting the taken motifs, deeply spiritual, these paintings were not just the subject of the “compatriot” pride of Kuznetsov and Saratov residents, but were a symbol of new trends in painting, guiding stars in art and a wonderful “ school" for members of the circle.
The “Kuznetsovites” studied and grew up in the years when the atmosphere of intellectual Moscow was thickly saturated with the ideas of symbolism. In their days, in the first years of the twentieth century, a new generation of writers and philosophers of symbolism was formed, Valery Bryusov in print and in lectures expounded the views of symbolists on the tasks of art and artists, symbolist drama was staged in theaters, the public read the works of Maurice Maeterlinck, even students of the Moscow School of Art and Culture with their own They staged his play “There, Inside” in 1902, and Kuznetsov and Sapunov designed it. The symbolism was based on the idea of “two worlds”. Symbolists believed that the world around a person is a faded and distorted reflection of a perfect and harmonious higher reality. They believed that symbolism could change the world, turn it into a kingdom of light and goodness.
In the famous article “Unnecessary Truth” (World of Art. 1902. No. 4), Bryusov addressed directly the painter, writer, and actor: “The subject of art is the soul of the artist. The mere ability to sketch what is around you does not in any way make you an artist.” In the lecture “Keys of Secrets” (1903), which he read at the Historical Museum in Moscow and published in the magazine “Scales” (1904. No. 1), he argued that it is not copying the visible, but “moments of ecstasy, supersensible intuition” that make it possible to comprehend the world phenomena: “Art is only where there is daring beyond the bounds, where there is a rush beyond the boundaries of the cognizable in the thirst to scoop up at least a drop of the “alien, transcendental element.” Let modern artists consciously forge their creations in the form of keys of secrets, in the form of mystical keys that dissolve the doors of humanity from its “blue prison” to eternal freedom.”
The interest of the “Kuznetsovites” in symbolism, primarily in the poetry and theoretical views of Bryusov, was so great that when the magazine “Vesy”, headed by the poet, appeared in 1904, Nikolai Feofilaktov and some of the members of the circle immediately began to collaborate in it. Under the influence of the ideas of symbolism, important changes occur in the work of the circle participants.
Kuznetsov and Utkin promptly responded in January 1904 to the intention to organize an “Evening of New Art” in Saratov, which was an attempt to embody the idea of a synthesis of arts. Music in the “new” taste was performed by Alexander Goldenveiser and Mikhail Bukinik; Konstantin Balmont performed; Poems by Edgar Poe were read by Moscow Art Theater actress Antonina Adurskaya to the appropriate music; Utkin’s paintings and especially Kuznetsov’s “tapestry” adorning the walls of the hall were an important part of the emotional environment of the concert.
It was Saratov that was chosen by the group for the first organized performance. On April 27, 1904, an exhibition opened there under a name that was unconventional for Russian exhibition life, but characteristic of the era - “Scarlet Rose”. It consisted of 109 paintings and drawings by 17 authors, as well as ceramics from the Abramtsevo plant. Symbolically, several works were presented by highly respected exhibitors Mikhail Vrubel and Viktor Borisov-Musatov.
Eight of the twelve members of the group at that time took part in the exposition: Arapov, Knabe, Kuznetsov, Sapunov, Saryan, Sudeikin, Utkin, Feofilaktov. The group’s exposition in Saratov turned out to be a modest rehearsal for the full splendor of the appearance of the “Kuznetsovites” at the XII exhibition of the MTH (March 1905). The works were presented not only by the participants of the “Scarlet Rose” (Kuznetsov, Sapunov, Saryan, Sudeikin, Utkin), but also by Vasily and Nikolai Milioti, Alexander Matveev, as well as the student-architect of MUZHVZ Nikolai Krymov, who had newly joined the circle, and a modeler from the Abramtsevo factory. Peter Bromirsky. At the same time, Arapov, Knabe, and Feofilaktov were absent.
The performance of the Kuznetsovites inspired the publication of Boris Lipkin “Emotionalism in Painting” (“Art”). He saw in the group’s work a new phenomenon in the world of Russian art: “In the chaos, a new movement emerged, ready to take on a definite form, the first signs of emotionalism appeared. Emotionalism is impressionism that has reached the point of synthesis, to generalization; in it, emotion is born from mood - just as impression is born from nature - in impressionism. This is a whole new worldview in painting.” The author considered Vrubel to be the founder of emotionalism in Russia, and the members of Kuznetsov’s circle to be its typical representatives.
Sergei Diaghilev, who out of habit looked out for the young and talented at domestic exhibitions, discovered a lot of interesting things in Moscow. His last exhibition, “The World of Art” (1906), like the earlier ones, he formed solely, which was one of the “clues” for his critics, primarily Vladimir Stasov. In the exhibition, which has been operating in St. Petersburg since February 24, Diaghilev paid tribute to the memory of the late Borisov-Musatov, essentially organizing his posthumous exhibition.
Carefully selected 65 paintings and drawings adequately represented the master. In addition, Diaghilev showed works by five “young people” who amazed Moscow at the XII exhibition of the Moscow Art Theater: Kuznetsov, the Milioti brothers, Sapunov and Feofilaktov. Among the nine works of Pavel Kuznetsov were the undisputed masterpieces of his early work - “Morning (Birth)” and “Blue Fountain”, designed in a gentle light tonality, equally inspired by reality and dreams of the subconscious, according to Dmitry Sarabyanov, which became “an expression of premonition and awakening of memory , languor and languor." It should be noted that the exhibits reflected the diversity of symbolism with its interest in the unconscious, the life of the soul, dream motifs and fairy tales as a “looking glass” of reality, exoticism, and retrospective motifs. As always with Diaghilev, the exhibition was distinguished by its logic and refined taste. Its participant Arkady Rylov recalled years later: “A special color background was chosen for each artist: for Vrubel’s works, the shields were draped with light purple muslin. Milioti's paintings in gold frames in the style of Louis XV hung on bright red velvet, and Borisov-Musatov's posthumous exhibition was all in white narrow frames on white muslin. The floor is covered with blue cloth. There are pots of hyacinths in front of the paintings, and laurel trees at the entrance.”
The exhibition caused a lot of opposing reviews. The patriarch of Russian criticism, Stasov, was not pleased with either flowers or trees, he came to the exhibition to smash decadence, and his first target turned out to be the works of young Muscovites: “The most kind, dear, favorite tasks of decadent painters are some of the most absurd, foggy legends and fantasies, in which are impossible to reach in any way. Meanwhile, these people would be very capable, by nature, of painting accurately and gracefully objects from life... They could write well, but they don’t want to. Decadence is prohibited."
Stasov did not ignore the Borisov-Musatov hall: “The young Moscow decadent Musatov, who recently died, together with other comrades, loved to depict ladies and gentlemen in 18th-century hoops and caftans, but he also reserved himself a special little corner, a separate microscopic specialty: this Russian ladies with curls and endlessly splayed skirts. The same dolls from the 18th century! But only with the addition of some “ghosts” standing in the garden, near unprecedented, disgusting, dead “temples”. What a significant gain for Russian art!” 24 It seems that not even a day has passed since the Russian-Finnish exhibition of 1898, at which Stasov trashed Vrubel without mincing words - the same vocabulary, complete disrespect for artists and misunderstanding of the situation in art have been preserved.
Mikhail Nesterov, who preferred not to join any artistic “parties,” assessed the exhibition differently in a letter to a friend: “Diaghilev’s exhibition was extremely good. Hello art! Really, Diaghilev organized an excellent exhibition... The “old men” - Serov, Malyavin, Somov - gave excellent things. “Youth” - Kuznetsov, Milioti, Anisfeld and others - although it has not yet been clarified, they give “their own”, extremely interesting” 26. Kuznetsov’s paintings evoked the over-refined experiences of Nikolai Tarovaty (“The Golden Fleece”): “Dreams in the azure of pale blue and matte-calm tones, trembling unearthly silhouettes, transparent stems of mystical flowers, fanned by morning dawns - on everything there is a haze of the unspeakable, comprehended only by a vague premonition " Judging by the language, the author really wanted to be at the level of the “original”. He certified the works of Vasily Milioti and his brother Nikolai in the same style.
The St. Petersburg exposition of the “World of Art” served as a prelude to the grandiose exhibition “200 Years of Russian Art”, organized by Diaghilev in the same year at the Paris Autumn Salon. He took Kuznetsov and Sudeikin with him to the “capital of the world” as assistants. The exhibition, thanks to the efforts of Diaghilev and Bakst, was distinguished by its splendor and grace. The highly revered Borisov-Musatov was still well represented (“Emerald Necklace”, “Requiem”, “Self-Portrait with Sister”, portrait of Nadezhda Stanyukovich, and others). Of the five participants in the St. Petersburg exhibition, the works of four were exhibited in Paris: Kuznetsov, the Milioti brothers and Feofilaktov; for some reason, Sapunov's works were missing. In addition, new exhibitors were invited - Arapov, Sudeikin, Utkin and Matveev (outside the catalogue).
At the end of 1907, the Blue Rose exhibitors were faced with a problem that shook the former unity of the group. The fact is that Ryabushinsky, like Diaghilev, decided to go international by organizing an exhibition-review of the latest art from Russia and France. He wanted to compare the specifically Russian works that did not coincide “stagewise” in their development, generated by the unique history, artistic and social life of the country, the creativity of the “Mir Iskusstiki”, the symbolist searches of the “Goluborozovites” and the latest achievements of the French avant-garde on the eve of the emergence of Cubism.
The naivety and “delicacy” of this idea for the prestige of national art was immediately felt by former World of Art students invited by Ryabushinsky. Soon, some of the Blue Rose exhibitors also abandoned the joint exhibition with the French, and in December of the same year they organized a separate exhibition under the symbolic, confrontational title “Wreath-Stephanos”. This was the name of the recently published collection by Valery Bryusov, editor of the magazine “Scales,” which was hostile to the “Golden Fleece.” The exhibition included works by strong “Goluborozovites”: Arapov, Bromirsky, Drittenpreis, Knabe, Krymov, Matveev, Sapunov, Sudeikin, Utkin, Fonvizin. The following year, the works of the “Goluborozovites” were shown in St. Petersburg at the “Wreath” exhibition organized by Sergei Makovsky and Alexander Gausch, where the Symbolists were united with artists of the early avant-garde. This was the first exhibition project of the future editor of Apollo magazine. The works of Bromirsky, Krymov, Kuznetsov, Matveev, Milioti, Saryan, Utkin, Feofilaktov, Fonvizin were interesting, but the exhibition did not cause much excitement or sympathy among the cold-blooded metropolitan public.
Meanwhile, the publisher of the “Golden Fleece” did not abandon the idea of a joint French-Russian exhibition, and on April 5, 1908, the first Salon of the “Golden Fleece” was opened (283 paintings and 3 sculptures) with a strong predominance of the French part both in quantity and quality . It was represented by works by Auguste Renoir, Vincent Van Gogh, Andre Derain, Henri Matisse, Georges Braque and others. Among the Russian artists, those who supported Ryabushinsky’s idea were Kuznetsov and Saryan, Ryabushinsky himself, who were joined by the “fugitives” Knabe, Matveev and Utkin, participants in the “Wreath-Stephanos” exhibition.
The exhibition organized by the magazine in 1909 was called “The Golden Fleece” and was also Franco-Russian in composition, but more successfully balanced by reducing the French part. The works of ten Parisian authors were exhibited, including Henri Matisse, Andre Derain, Albert Marquet, Georges Rouault, Maurice Vlaminck, Georges Braque; the Russian section presented the works of sixteen artists: eight “Goluborozovites”, as well as Natalia Goncharova, Mikhail Larionov, Nikolai Ulyanov, Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin and others.
In 1909, the rival Moscow symbolist magazines “Golden Fleece” and “Scales” closed. At the end of the year, Ryabushinsky managed to organize the third and final exhibition of the Golden Fleece. It was completely “Russian” and reflected the realities of Russian art - several “Goluborozovites” took part in it, as well as the pioneers of the emerging Russian avant-garde Larionov, Goncharova and the future “Knave of Diamonds”.
A number of former exhibitors of the Blue Rose were invited by Sergei Makovsky to the Salon exhibition he organized in St. Petersburg in early January of the same 1909, which he considered as a show of contemporary Russian art. The exhibition was extremely interesting to Benoit, who devoted about a dozen articles to it.
In 1910, Makovsky took works by Krymov, Nikolai Milioti and Sudeikin to Paris as part of an exhibition of Russian art at the Bernheim Jr. Gallery, then showed them at the International Exhibition in Brussels, where the elder Milioti’s paintings were awarded a bronze medal. At this time, four landscapes and a portrait of Krymov, two sketches by Utkin and two works by Drittenpreis participated in the grandiose project of Vladimir Izdebsky - the traveling 1st International Salon (Odessa - Kiev - St. Petersburg - Riga), which represented as fully as possible all trends in national and European art .
The 1910s were the time of greatest flowering of talent for most of the participants in the Blue Rose exhibition. They were still connected, with all the diversity of individual manifestations of talent, by a common symbolist worldview, the search for synthesis, close stylistics, and more than ten years of friendship and cooperation. For Pavel Kuznetsov, who in 1908–1909 realized the exhaustion of his previous motives, the example of Paul Gauguin and Henri Matisse suggested the need to shift artistic attention from the sphere of the subconscious to objects that are more real and close. The master begins to travel from year to year to the Volga steppes, then to the ancient centers of Central Asian civilization - Bukhara and Samarkand. There he found the ideal of natural life in harmony with the Earth and Space. Abram Efros wittily noted: Kuznetsov’s path to the East lay through Paris.
Acquaintance with the paintings of Matisse and the Fauves liberated the consciousness and natural temperament of Martiros Saryan. The mirage-like small pictures of the “Fairy Tales and Dreams” series in his work were replaced by sun-drenched, bright and sonorous colors, full of tenderness and mystery, images of Turkey, Egypt, Persia and his newly found homeland - Armenia.
The paintings of Nikolai Feofilaktov, Nikolai Milioti and Nikolai Krymov uniquely reflected the tendencies of neoclassicism. Known at the beginning of the century as the “Moscow Beardsley,” by the end of the 1900s Feofilaktov ended his graphic exercises in semi-decadence. Trips to Italy, acquaintance with old and new art, awakening the painter in him, gave him new themes and style. Heroes of ancient mythology and images of desert landscapes appeared in his canvases, with their strangeness and detachment close to metaphysical painting.
Since the beginning of the century, Nikolai Milioti has often turned to images of ancient myths. In the canvas “The Birth of Venus” he gives a new iconography of the famous legend, combining the neoclassical craving for sculptural form and his favorite motif of “colored rains” (Sergei Makovsky). Venus the girl and frolicking little putti with childishly disproportionate, heavy figures are depicted in a stream of sunlight and water splashes, when all of nature rejoices at the appearance of a new goddess. Another painting by Milioti, “Madonna,” painted in golden-pink coloring, is painted with tranquility and bright joy. Krymov’s landscapes are full of majestic harmony, detachment from the momentary flow of life, sometimes animated by the figures of bathers or villagers engaged in everyday activities. Depicting motifs of the Moscow region, with a generalized interpretation of form, and an atmosphere of timelessness, they are reminiscent of museum paintings from the era of classicism.
By the early 1910s, the prestige of Sapunov and Sudeikin as theater artists was so high that Alexander Benois, in a January 1911 letter to Diaghilev, refusing to stage his brainchild - the ballet "Petrushka" - in the program of the next Russian ballet season, saw himself as a replacement only in their face. Sapunov’s works with theatrical scenes, his series of “tea parties” and “restaurants”, castigating the narrow-mindedness and lack of spirituality of the philistinism, are mostly colored with notes of tragedy. According to the memoirs of contemporaries, long before his death the artist lived in constant anticipation of his sudden death. The works of Sudeikin were different in their emotional structure, often parodying the techniques of popular prints and the “beauty” of provincial rugs - they are permeated with cheerful irony. Konstantin Korovin highly valued his former student. Describing the situation in the field of Western theater, he noted: “There is some work here on the scenery and costumes. There are many Russian artists - Benois, Somov, Sudeikin. The best of them, of course, is Sudeikin.”
It should be noted that of the 16 participants in the Blue Rose, only three - Nikolai Milioti, Sergei Sudeikin and Nikolai Ryabushinsky - ended up in exile. 1917, the year of two Russian revolutions, changed the lives of many “Goluborozovites”, previously focused only on creativity. Alexander Matveev becomes a professor at the Central School of Technical Drawing in Petrograd, a member of the Commission for the Protection of Palaces, and was elected from the sculptors as an authorized member of the Temporary Committee for the creation of the Union of Artists. Pavel Kuznetsov and Pyotr Bromirsky, who returned from the army, are members of the artistic section of the Moscow Council of Soldiers' Deputies. Kuznetsov becomes the organizer and artistic editor of the magazine “The Path of Liberation”, in which he attracts Krymov and Arapov; participates in the decoration of Moscow for revolutionary holidays. Nikolai Krymov is a member of the Commission for the Protection of Monuments of Art and Antiquities under the Moscow City Council, and Sergei Sudeikin, who is in Crimea, is a member of the Commission for the Accounting of Artistic Values of the Vorontsov Palace. Petr Utkin takes part in the creation of the College of Fine Arts at the Saratov Council of Workers' Deputies. Arthur Fonvizin heads the Proletkult fine arts studio in Tambov.
In the 1920s, “Goluborozovites” worked intensively, went on business trips to construction sites and collective farms, experienced a new flowering of their creativity, and, thanks to large thematic and anniversary exhibitions, printed publications, the country learned about the artists and their work. Some of them (Krymov, Kuznetsov, Matveev, Utkin, Fonvizin, Saryan) teach in art schools. Their first personal exhibitions are taking place. In 1926, Saryan received the title of People's Artist of Armenia, three years later Kuznetsov received the title of Honored Artist of the RSFSR. Together with former colleagues from the “World of Art”, the “Goluborozovites” organized the artistic association “Four Arts” (1925–1931), the participants of which were Kuznetsov (chairman), Mat veev, Saryan, Utkin, Feofilaktov. Krymov is a member of the Society of Moscow Artists (1927–1932).
In 1925, the Tretyakov Gallery organized the exhibition “Masters of the Blue Rose” using materials from its collection, which presented 72 works (paintings, drawings and one sculpture) by ten participants in the exhibition “Blue Rose” (1907), as well as Viktor Borisov-Musatov and Georgy Yakulov.
At the end of the decade, the pressure of sociological criticism on artists and associations began. After the appearance of Alexey Fedorov-Davydov’s article “The Exhibition of P. V. Kuznetsov and its Interpreters” in the publication “Art to the Masses” 50, the artist lost his job at the university, and the artistic association “Four Arts”, which he headed, was forced to dissolve itself. In the 1930s, Arthur Fonvizin was accused of formalism, and in 1948, Alexander Matveev.
Materials from an article by Vladimir Kruglov for the exhibition catalog at the Russian Museum
Russian symbolists who became the harbingers of the avant-garde will be shown in St. Petersburg
Nikolay Krymov. "After the spring rain." 1908. Photo: State Russian Museum
It is difficult to believe that the Russian Museum did not have exhibitions of Viktor Borisov-Musatov and the Blue Rose artists. But the old-timers of the museum will not remember this. The large museum project “Symbolism in Russia”, of course, represented Borisov-Musatov and his followers: Pavel Kuznetsov, Nikolai Sapunov, Sergei Sudeikin, Pyotr Utkin. But that was already 20 years ago!
Interest in artists of this circle is supported by two important circumstances. The first is ensured by the role of symbolism as one of the sources of the Russian avant-garde. The second is the steady interest in symbolism among the general public. Those eager to escape from problematic reality into the world of dreams will always be interested in how 100 years ago artists built their virtual paradise, or, in the words of Fyodor Sologub, created a “sweet legend.”
Victor Borisov-Musatov. "By the pond." 1902. Photo: State Russian Museum
An informal association of artists formed at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. Its leader Pavel Kuznetsov competently began exhibition activities from his native Saratov under the calmer label “Scarlet Rose”, where pride of place was given to the works of Borisov-Musatov, whom the young authors called their teacher, setting themselves the task of developing, like him, the ideas of impressionism, finding the path from the fleeting to the eternal values that lie beyond the visible world. The new symbolists were noticed immediately. “Almost everything is smoky-pink dreams and insights,” said critic Nikolai Tarovaty, after seeing the “Kuznetsovites” at the XII exhibition of the Moscow Association of Artists. In 1906, Sergei Diaghilev invited them to St. Petersburg. Vladimir Stasov was ironic in the spirit that they could, but the decadent charter does not allow it. Mikhail Nesterov defended symbolism: “The exhibition is extremely good.” “Blue Rose” opened exactly 110 years ago, in March 1907, in Moscow, in the trading house of porcelain manufacturer Matvey Kuznetsov on Myasnitskaya. It was financed by Nikolai Ryabushinsky, an amateur artist and heir to his father’s fortune, which he, however, quickly and completely spent on culture. The project involved 15 authors, as well as the sponsor himself.
Disputes about the origin of the name of the exhibition have not subsided to this day. The most popular version remains that it was invented by Valery Bryusov, who said that the ability to draw alone does not make an artist an artist; supersensible intuition is required. Another version: the artists used the poem “Blue Rose” by Konstantin Balmont. In particular, it contains lines about a mountain flower that no one will ever pick.
Vasily Milioti. "Morning". 1905. Photo: State Russian Museum
Later, Pavel Kuznetsov and his comrades participated in the salons of Sergei Makovsky in St. Petersburg and Paris, their works toured different cities with the salon of Vladimir Izdebsky. But they never gathered again under the sign of the Blue Rose, except for the 1925 exhibition at the Tretyakov Gallery. By that time, Sapunov had died, Sudeikin and Nikolai Milioti had emigrated.
The Russian Museum decided to limit itself to showing Borisov-Musatov and the Blue Rose artists from its collection and St. Petersburg private collections. The main Musatov hits of the museum - “Self-Portrait with Sister”, “Behind the Embroidery”, “Spring”, “Walk at Sunset” - show the path from a sketch to an image of a symbolic procession to Bryusov’s supersensible world. Milioti used Musatov’s delicate, melting palette to create the large (2 x 4 m) canvas “The Birth of Venus,” where a little girl emerges from huge sea spray. The same flavor is in “Sheep Shearing”, “The Bird Seller” by Pavel Kuznetsov, “To the Source” by Martiros Saryan. Sapunov will be represented in a variety of ways: the aesthetic “Masquerade”, the Fauvist “Carousel” with an international cast of skaters to the music of a strange orchestra of tambourine and violin, and neoclassical floral still lifes. The final point of the exhibition is “Oriental Carpet” by Sudeikin and “Landscape with Bathers” by Nikolai Krymov. And it’s a stone’s throw from them to the characters of Larionov and Goncharova.
"Blue Rose" is an association of artists that existed at the beginning of the 20th century. In those years, symbolism was very popular - a direction in art that originated at the end of the 19th century. The artists of "Blue Rose" are Pavel Kuznetsov, Pyotr Utkin, Alexander Matveev. They became the founders of a creative union. Later they were joined by other painters and sculptors. Representatives of the creative association "Blue Rose" will be discussed in this article.
Symbolism
Representatives of this trend, who became famous at the beginning of the 20th century, are Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, Paul Sérusier, Henri Fantin-Latour. They were well acquainted in Russia, where symbolism was just emerging.
A painter whose work is close to the work of the French masters named above is Mikhail Vrubel, known primarily for his “Demon”. This artist was an eccentric, mysterious person, and, in addition, suffered from a mental disorder. But Vrubel was one of the most outstanding figures in art at the turn of the century, and it was he who inspired the young Kuznetsov, Utkin and Matveev to create a creative association of symbolists. The paintings of this artist attracted attention with their subtlety, colorfulness, and richness of the palette. All his works are imbued with a desire for an unreal world.
Viktor Borisov-Musatov also influenced the formation of the creative union. The images in the paintings of this master seem to be dozing, his heroes live in an extraordinary world of calm and bliss.
Victor Borisov-Musatov
He was from Saratov. After graduating from high school, he went to Paris, where he entered the art academy. Borisov-Musatov often visited his native land, where he communicated with aspiring painters. Among them were the future founders of the Blue Rose creative association. Boris-Musatov taught Kuznetsov, Matveev and Utkin several lessons in expressionism and symbolism. Thus began a friendship that lasted for many years.
Young artists left for the capital. All three became students at the School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. In pre-revolutionary Russia, this educational institution was one of the best among those that trained professional artists. During their years of study, future participants of the Blue Rose became close to other artists. Many students of the school were in one way or another connected with the creative association.
"Red rose"
The creative association was founded in 1907. And in 1904, Kuznetsov and Utkin organized an exhibition called “Scarlet Rose”. Not only their paintings were presented, but also works by Vrubel and Boris-Musatov. Young artists thereby emphasized the influence of experienced painters on their work.
Why was the exhibition called "Scarlet Rose"? From time immemorial, this flower has been considered the most romantic. As for the association of artists "Blue Rose", founded three years after the exhibition, then perhaps there is a connection with the romantic poets who sang the blue flower - a symbol of an unattainable ideal.
Early work of artists
The Blue Rose participants worked on joint projects even before the founding of the creative association. Sapunov, another member of the artistic union, worked with Kuznetsov on the set for Wagner's opera Die Walküre. A little later, playwright Sergei Mamontov, the same one in whose house Vrubel painted the famous painting “The Seated Demon,” invited future “Goluborozovites” to set up an enterprise in the Hermitage Theater.
The founders of the Blue Rose were very fashionable artists in Russia. But it cannot be said that they caused an unambiguous reaction from criticism. So, in 1902, Utkin, Kuznetsov and Petrov-Vodkin created frescoes for the Church of the Kazan Mother of God, a famous temple in Saratov. However, their work was rejected and destroyed.
Artists of the Blue Rose Union
Paintings by the most famous members of the creative association are kept today in the most famous museums in Russia. The work of Utkin and Kuznetsov is described in more detail below. First, it’s worth naming the other members of the creative union. Among them were: Martiros Saryan, Nikolay Sapunov, Sergey Sudeikin, Nikolay Krymov, Anatoly Arapov, Nikolay and Vasily Milioti, Ivan Knabe, Nikolay Feofilaktov.
Maritor Saryan, like other members of the Blue Rose union, began his creative career as a theater artist. He was also known for his landscapes, which depicted picturesque Armenian landscapes. Some of Saryan's paintings are kept in the Tretyakov Gallery.
Nikolai Sapunov gained fame after designing the play based on Blok’s work “Balaganchik”. In Moscow, on Kuznetsky Most, there is a historical building, the Sokol Apartment House. The attic of this building is decorated with majolica mosaics by Nikolai Sapunov. The first paintings in Moscow were presented at an exhibition organized by Utkin and Kuznetsov. Among the artist's later works there are mainly still lifes.
Nikolai Ryabushinsky
The famous Russian philanthropist, founder of the Golden Fleece magazine, played a significant role in the work of the Blue Rose artists. Ryabushinsky is often called the organizer of the association. It was he who founded the first exhibition, after which they started talking about the “Goluborozovites” in Moscow and St. Petersburg.
The main brainchild of the philanthropist at that time was the magazine “Golden Fleece”. This project could not be called commercial. Ryabushinsky invested more into it than he received. The publication included colorful illustrations, each page was decorated with gold inserts. More than thirty issues were published. Moreover, the magazine did not have a clear concept. Leonid Andreev, Konstantin Balmont, Ivan Bunin, Fyodor Sologub, Korney Chukovsky published their works there. The first issues were dedicated to the creativity of members of the Blue Rose union.
Exhibition of symbolist artists
The exact date of foundation of the association cannot be given. It is believed that a creative union arose after the exhibition of the same name, that is, in 1907. Paintings by the Blue Rose artists were exhibited in the gallery located in a building on Myasnitskaya Street.
The works of sixteen painters were presented to the audience. Most of the painters later became part of the Blue Rose. The main inspirer of the exhibition was Borisov-Musatov, but it took place after the master’s death. The idea for the name belongs to Sapunov, an artist whose work was influenced by Aubrey Beardsley.
The paintings presented at the exhibition were made in the same style: pastel, bluish tones, a desire for the “extraordinary”. The interior of the hall in which the exhibition was organized also corresponded to the creative spirit. There were vases of roses everywhere, and the walls were painted a light azure color.
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