Levitan's painting "March", painted with love and sunlight.

Option 1. 3-4 grade

In the painting “March” we see the very beginning of spring. The sun shines brightly. The snow begins to melt. It became loose and trampled. In some places the ground is already visible on the road.

In the courtyard of a wooden house there is a horse with an empty sleigh. The house is surrounded by trees. These are white birches and evergreen spruces.

Option 2. 6-7 grade

Isaac Levitan’s painting “March” depicts the time of the arrival of spring. It is a sunny March day among Russian nature. We see the courtyard of a two-story wooden house surrounded by trees. Maybe this is a house in some forestry.

The house has a canopy porch on four posts, and there is still snow on the canopy. Trees rise around: thin birches and evergreen pines with spreading crowns. They cast clear shadows on the snow that appear blue.

The sky is already bright blue. Snow is melting. It became soft and crumbly. The picture shows that the snow around the house has already been dug up and trampled by people and carts. In some places where it was trampled on the most, it has already come off, and damp brown earth is visible.

Little white birch trees still stand without leaves. More precisely, in some places red leaves from last year still hang on them. At the top of one of the birches there is a white birdhouse. It won't be long before it will be inhabited by feathered residents.

In the yard there is a red horse harnessed to a wooden sleigh. The light wall of the house is in harmony with the snow-white trunks of birch trees. In general, the colors in the picture, although they are quite dim, are incredibly compatible with each other. These are white, red-brown, dark green, blue. And the trunks of birch trees stretching towards the sun also create a uniquely beautiful pattern of lines in the picture. Isaac Levitan is truly an unsurpassed master of depicting Russian landscapes.

Artist: Isaac Levitan

Painting:"March"

Date of painting: March 1895

Canvas Size: 60 x 75 cm

Place of permanent exhibition: State Tretyakov Gallery (Moscow)

Looking at Isaac Levitan’s masterpiece “March”, we undoubtedly become imbued with the mood that the artist wanted to convey to us. The picture is imbued with a feeling of anticipation. This is also evidenced by a humble horse with a sleigh, standing alone near the house, waiting for its owner.

Illuminated by the sun, she apparently dozed off from the warmth of the caressing gentle spring rays.

In the foreground we see the porch and the short yellow wall of the house. The yellow color gives the painting more warmth and sunlight. There is snow on the top of the porch, but it seems that the snow is warm, because it is illuminated by the bright rays of the sun. Soon there will be drops ringing down the iron drain! The door of the house is open, any minute the owner, whom the horse has been waiting for, will come out and set off on his way.

But the main thing that attracts us in this picture is nature awaiting spring.

The perfect blue sky tells us that no snowstorms are expected. Has spring really come? The melted road and unthrown autumn leaves on the trees are waiting for change. Everything is awaiting the arrival of a new warm season. Nature basks in the warm rays of the sun. On the left we see a forest awaiting spring. The picture here is strikingly different. Coniferous greenery casts dark shadows. It is obvious that winter cold reigns in the forest, the colors are gloomy and dark. The March sunny rays have not yet had time to warm the gloomy blue-green spruce trees, but I really want the sun to illuminate their scowling crowns with bright golden light. This will happen soon, because it’s March!

The painting “March” is considered one of the most famous and striking examples of Levitan’s landscape heritage.

This life-affirming landscape, combining a picturesque image of snow, spring sky and trees, is considered a “discovery in Russian landscape painting.” Subsequently, this motif became a popular theme among many Russian landscape painters of the 20th century - Igor Grabar, Konstantin Yuon and many others.

The history of the painting

In 1894-1895, Levitan lived for several months in the Gorka estate, located one and a half kilometers from the village of Ostrovno, Tver province. The estate belonged to Privy Councilor Ivan Nikolaevich Turchaninov, and his wife Anna Nikolaevna and her daughters Varvara, Sophia and Anna often spent time there. The main building of the estate was a two-story house with a mezzanine, painted yellowish.. He is depicted in the painting “March”, as well as on Levitan’s earlier pastel “Autumn. Estate" (1894), which is currently part of the collection.

Levitan met Anna Nikolaevna Turchaninova in the summer of 1894 in Ostrovno, where he was staying at the Ushakov estate with his companion, the artist Sofia Petrovna Kuvshinnikova. Levitan and Turchaninova began an affair, which led to a quarrel and a break in relations with Kuvshinnikova. After this, Levitan moved to the Gorka estate and lived there in August and September 1894, and then returned there in the early spring of the following year. Especially for him, a two-story house-workshop was built on the estate, located on the shore of the lake.

It was then, in March 1895, that it was created painting "March". It was painted entirely from life, without preliminary sketches, in several sessions. Levitan's work on the painting was witnessed by the Turchaninovs' youngest daughter Anya, who helped the artist carry a box of paints, listened to his stories about the beauty of nature and admired how the future masterpiece was created.

During the same period, Levitan painted another painting - “Spring. The Last Snow,” which was later in the collection of Moscow philanthropist Vladimir Shmarovin. Currently, its whereabouts are unknown, but a sketch of the same name has been preserved (25.5 × 33.3 cm, oil on canvas, Russian Museum).

The painting “March” was exhibited at the 24th exhibition of the “Itinerants”, held in 1896-1897 in St. Petersburg and Moscow, as well as at the All-Russian Industrial and Art Exhibition of 1896 in Nizhny Novgorod. In the same 1896, the painting was purchased from the author by Pavel Tretyakov.

The Gorka estate did not survive the revolutionary upheavals of the early 20th century. In 1904, the house-workshop where Levitan worked in the mid-1890s burned down. In 1914, the Gorka estate was sold to another owner. After the revolution, in June 1923, the estate building was destroyed by fire (apparently as a result of arson).

The plot of the picture

35-year-old Levitan painted a picture in the outskirts of the Gorka estate, the wall of the main house of which is visible on the very right side of the picture. A sunny March day, the snow has already begun to melt, trees and a country road approaching the porch, near which a horse with firewood stands quietly, basking in the sun. Dianka - that was the name of the horse from the Gorka estate - stands in the center of the landscape and forms an integral part of it.

The major, life-affirming motive of the painting shows the struggle between the passing winter and the coming spring, sunlight and cold snow. This is emphasized by the color contrast between the dark pines in the background and the light, sunlight-lit trunks of the aspens in front of them, which with their branches seem to stretch towards the spring sun. In particular, this upward tendency is complemented by the very high location of the birdhouse on one of the trees, so that it even gives the impression that it is attached to a branch that is too thin.

Shades of snow, blue shadows of trees and blue sky create a very picturesque picture - a plot that was later repeated more than once in the landscapes of other Russian artists.

The painting “March” is a vivid example of the so-called “Levitan landscape”, in which, even depicting "the jubilant state of nature" the artist managed to preserve the lyrical tone of experience in the painting.

Bereberdina Yu., 3 "B"

Everything around loves and sings.

A. Tolstoy

This is a painting by I. Levitan “March”. The month of March is depicted here. This is the happiest month of spring, so the picture is very picturesque.

The picture is very bright. When the sun hits the fragile birch trees, they turn golden. The light of the sun falls on everything in this picture. Even the nondescript entrance to the hut became bright.

The sky is covered with azure. There are no clouds on it. The sun touched every tree, and there was a ringing silence in the air.

The horse stands thoughtfully, as if he is thinking about spring, about all its beauty. Or she listens to the silence.

I really like this picture.

Chernyshev M., 3 "B"

Essay based on I. Levitan’s painting “March”

And everything is warmed by the breath of spring,

Everything around loves and sings.

A. Tolstoy

Levitan painted the painting “March”. He painted it with golden colors.

The painting itself depicts a bright bluish sky, golden snow, clear spring air, warm sun, birch trees still without leaves.

The painting is expressed in bright colors, so it seems cheerful.

I liked this picture. She brought joy and surprise to me.

Blinova S., 3 "B"

Essay based on I. Levitan’s painting “March”

The snow is already melting, the streams are flowing,

There was a breath of spring through the window...

A Pleshcheev

The first month of spring is March. In March there is still snow, but there is not so much of it, and yet this picture is bright, sunny and spring.

The color of this painting is very bright. The mood is joyful, but calm.

The sky is blue and bright. The sun is very bright. The air is fresh and clean. The snow is dirty and the trees are starting to bloom.

I liked this picture.

Ramazanov G.., 3 "B"

Essay based on I. Levitan’s painting “March”

And everything is warmed by the breath of spring,

Everything around loves and sings.

A. Tolstoy

The artist depicted spring and March in the picture.

The picture is bright and colorful.

The sky on it is transparent and cloudless, the sun is warm and bright, and the air is clean and warm.

The snow is melting, dirty and spongy, and the trees, especially birches, shine gold from the bright sunlight.

As soon as I saw this picture, I thought it was an ordinary photograph. I had no idea that it was possible to paint such beauty. I really liked the picture.

Fomin I., 3 "B"

Essay based on I. Levitan’s painting “March”

The snow is already melting, the streams are flowing,

There was a breath of spring through the window...

A Pleshcheev

March is the first month of spring, this is the time when the ice melts and many streams rush down.

The painting by Issac Levitan is filled with light, it is very bright and beautiful.

The sky in this picture is bright and light, the sun is cheerful, the air is filled with light, the snow sparkles and plays, and the trees are overflowing with yellow and brown colors.

I really liked this picture.

Deshura V., 3 "B"

Essay based on I. Levitan’s painting “March”

The snow is already melting, the streams are flowing,

There was a breath of spring through the window...

A Pleshcheev

March is the first month of spring. He's very lovely.

The painting by artist I. Levitan is filled with bright colors, it is very cheerful and calm.

The sky is bright and blue, the sun is not visible, but it is clear that it is shining very brightly. The air is clean and cool. There are whole snowdrifts. It shines brightly in the sun, and the trees are yellowish.

The picture is very beautiful.

Bosenko P., 3 "B"

Essay based on I. Levitan’s painting “March”

In front of me is Levitan’s painting “March”. The artist depicted the first month of spring.

Levitan used bright colors: white, yellow, brown and blue. The mood is joyful, cheerful. The sky looks calm and quiet. The sun's rays illuminate the whole picture, and it turns out very beautiful. Clean Air.

The snow looks full of holes and dirty. The horse stood and fell asleep because there was complete silence.

I really liked this picture. It's colorful and bright!

Probably, M. Alpatov’s descriptions of Levitan’s landscapes are the most complete and interesting. But either Alpatov is unaware of the metaphorical meaning of the picture, or does not want to delve into its essence (most likely the first), but he did not reveal the meaning of the work. Some important details of the painting were not captured by the art critic, did not attract his attention, and as a result did not find their way into the idea of ​​the painting.

"Creating this picture, Levitan lay in wait for a particularly touching moment in the life of our northern nature: a bright eve before the onset of spring. In the forest, among the trees, there is still deep snow, the air is still cold with frost, the trees are still bare, even the first spring guests, rooks and starlings have not appeared in our area.

(A very important inaccuracy: it is cold in the forest and the snow is untouched by warmth, but “not a single tree has shed its leaves in the fall”).

But the sun is already warming up in the heat, the snow sparkles dazzlingly in its rays, the shadows are filled with a lilac blue, swollen buds are already noticeable on bare branches against the sky, the approach of warm days is felt in the air - everything portends spring; all nature, all objects - “everything is permeated with expectation.” This state of expectation is expressed in its own way by the humble village horse with a sleigh, which stands, motionless, on the warm porch and patiently waits for its owner.”

There is no waiting in any subject. This remark does not seem very significant, however, it allows us to enter into the picture. The horse is not waiting for its owner: its whole body is in the warm light, its eyes are blinded by the sun, and it has covered them with its eyelids. There are multi-colored circles before his eyes, a warm fog spreads over his head, and the horse has completely disconnected from everything around him.

“The construction of “March” is distinguished by exceptional simplicity, clarity and accuracy. The edge of a wooden house with its boards extending into the depths of the picture, as well as a wide strip of thawed road, draw the viewer into the picture, helping to mentally enter into it, but from most of Levitan’s other landscapes “March” has a more closed, cozy character; the movement inside is somewhat weakened by the lines of slenderly curved, fan-shaped white trunks, which, tremblingly bending, stand out against the blue sky and dark coniferous greenery, consonant with the outlines of the road. The “horizontal edge” of the snow field divides the picture into two equal part and brings a touch of calm into it. These simple relationships of lines are not intrusive: everything seems simple, natural and even uncomplicated, and yet the highlighting of these compositional lines gives the modest corner completeness and completeness."

It is unlikely that the short wall of the house and the porch contribute to involvement in the picture. But it seems that the artist does not expect the viewer to enter the picture: he immediately puts in front of us a square of a yard, bounded by snow on the left, a wall of a house on the right, a horse and bare trees with converging peaks behind it.

Alpatov notes the most essential element of the picture - the horizontal edge of the field, which divides the picture in half. It is logical now to compare the resulting two parts of the picture, but the researcher does not do this. In the front part there is a warm languor: a heated yellow wall of a wooden house, warm yellow parts of the porch, a heated porch roof and melting snow on it, a warm brown road, a limp horse, warm snow and naked trees fanned out in the sun. We see something completely different in the back half: dark gloomy trees do not rejoice in the sun, birches have not dropped their leaves in the pre-winter period, snow is undisturbed by anything and there are cold blue shadows on it.

Hence the simple idea of ​​the painting. By the new spring, not everything had survived the old and was freed from it. Not everyone managed to throw off the burden of accumulated burdens and worries and prepare for “renewal, revival”, to be ready to start building something new. The time was lost when everything greedily grabbed every minute of existence, every grain of moisture, warmth and light, swelled, hurried to bloom and bear fruit. Perhaps the thicket of the forest, poor soil, lack of moisture did not allow us to use the allotted time, the first cold froze life: the trees did not have time to bloom and complete their life cycle. The rhythm of life and its natural flow are disrupted. Therefore, the forest tree does not rejoice in the new sun and new warmth.

If human life is divided into several periods, then the words of Pushkin can be roughly attributed to each of them: “Blessed is he who was young from his youth, blessed is he who matured in time...” Everything has its time and it is necessary to use it fruitfully. Otherwise - life tragedies, poor, joyless lives.
S. Sandomirsky