Alexei Savrasov (24 May 1830 – 8 October 1897) was Isaac Levitan‘s (1860 – 1900) mentor. He created the “lyrical landscape.” I have already featured Savrasov, but deleted the post inadvertently. A new post is under construction.
We are still listening to Russian music and looking at the works of Russia’s artists. The piece of music I have inserted below is a lovely interpretation of one of Shostakovich‘s (25 September 1906 – 9 August 1975) Twenty-four Preludes and Fugueson the chromatic scale. Chromatic scales contain twelve semitones (C – C# – D – D# – E – F – F# – G – G# – A – A# – B). J. S. Bach wrote 48 preludes and fugues on each scale, The Well-Tempered Clavier. These exemplify equal temperament, an invention of Vincenzo Galilei, Galileo’s father.
Isaac Ilyich Levitan (30 August 1860 – 4 August 1900: aged 40) was one of AlexeiSavrasov‘s (1830 – 1897) students. Savrasov created the “lyrical landscape.” As for Levitan, he aimed to produce “mood landscapes,” a form of “lyrical” landscapes.
From Lithuania to Moscow
Levitan was born in Lithuania, now Russia. He was the son of Elyashiv Levitan, and the grandson of a rabbi. In 1870, the Levitan family moved to Moscow and, three years later, Isaac entered the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. Levitan’s mother died in 1875 and his father fell ill and died two years later, in 1877. Levitan’s family was then impoverished.
Autumn Day. Sokolniki, 1879
Impoverishment did not prevent 17-year-old Levitan from attending school. He was awarded a scholarhip. His teachers were Alexei Savrasov, Vasily Perov and Vasily Polenov. Isaac Levitan’s paintings soon proved favourites in group exhibitions and, in 1880, famous philanthropist and art collector Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov, the founder of the Tretyakov Gallery, purchased Levitan’s Autum Day, Sokolniki, shown below.
Alexei Savrasov, Levitan’s mentor, had joined the Peredvizhniki, in 1870. Members of the Peredvizhniki, or wanderers, were a group of landscape painters, wishing to free themselves from the restraints of Academic painting. In Russia, however, artists and writers also wished to avoid government censorship. Levitan joined the movement in 1991. In 1884, Levitan participated in a travelling exhibition by members of the Peredvizhniki and, in 1891, he joined the movement in 1891. This organization would be succeeded by the Association of Travelling Art Exhibits. (See Peredvizhniki, Wiki2.org.)
Russian Jews were the victims of pogroms, massacres. So Levitan had to leave Moscow when Alexander Soloviev attempted to assassinate Tsar Alexander II, in May 1879.[1]The failed attempt triggered a “mass deportation” of Jews living in Russia’s larger cities. Levitan’s family left for Saltykovka, a suburb. (See Isaac Levitan, Wiki2.org.) Levitan was soon returned to cities. In 1898, two years before his death, Levitan, then famous, would be elected to the Imperial Academy of Arts.
Levitan loved the “lyrical charm of the Russian landscape.” (see Levitan, Wiki2.org.) Moreover, as a gifted artist, he befriended élite members of the world of art and literature. In 19th-century Russia, talent was often recognised. Moreover, artists and authors formed communities where ethnicity and creed had little significance, which benefited both artists and authors. Levitan had already met author Anton Chekhovand artist, or future artist, Nikolai Chekhov. In the early 1880s, Levitan provided illustrations for the magazine “Moscow,” published by the Chekhov brothers. (Levitan, Wiki2.org.)
Levitan and Anton Chekhov became very close friends. Isaac Levitan spent his last year and died at Anton Chekhov’s home in Yalta, Crimea. Anton was a medical doctor who died of tuberculosis in 1902, two years after Levitan’s death.
We have seen that Russian musicians composed programmatic” music or music that told a story: words and music. Savrasov’s “lyrical” landscapes and Levitan’s “mood” landscapes were an attempt to unite painting and poetry.
In 19th-century Europe, musicians composed Symphonic poems. The Symphonic poem is “a piece of orchestral music in a single continuous section (a movement) in which the content of a poem, a story or novel, a painting, a landscape or another (non-musical) source is illustrated or evoked.” (Symphonic Poem, Wiki2.org.) In other words, it is “programmatic.”
The Symphonic poem can be associated with Symbolism in art as well as French literature. Symbolism was a European rather than national movement. The Symphonic poem is the German Tondichtung, first used by Carl Loewe. Franz Liszt coined the term “Symphonic poem.”
Conclusion
A discussion of Isaac Levitan differs, to a rather large extent, from a dicussion of The Five. Although Pavel Tretiakov wanted to create a Russian Art Gallery and members of the Peredvizhniki painted the Russian landscape, they did not attempt, at least not primarily, to give their art an Eastern appearance. Orientalism pervades 19th-century art, but in Russia, Orientalism was expressed by composers mainly. I suspect, however, that Russian communities of artists and writers would include composers. All were creative minds. Ilya Repin portrayed the Slavic composers, meeting at the Moscow Conservatory.
As for “mood” and “lyrical landscapes,” these could stimulate more than one sense, as in synesthesia, but they could simply be evocative and melancholic. Romanticism was an important movement. Vanishing points, are a common feature in the visual arts. But when roads and lanes vanish into the distance, we know not where they lead.
At the end of Rachmaninoff’s All-night Vigil, Vespers, 🎶 one can hear a basso profondo or profundo. This vocal range is more common in Russia and Eastern Europe than in most countries.
We associate artist Isaac Ilyich Levitan (30 August 1860 – 4 August 1900: aged 40) with mood or lyrical landscapes, but he also left lovely paintings featuring flowers.
I am very tired and must rest, but I am thinking of you.
“It is generally believed that by depicting various reaction of young man’s household Repin tried to show diverse but mostly positive attitude of society toward revolutionary movements of that time. Actually, under strict censorship of Czarist Russia, it was a political declaration disguised as an everyday genre scene.” (Wikiart.org.)
In the second half of the 19th century and the first quarter of the 20th century, Russia changed dramatically. The Emancipation of serfdom, in 1861, led to a major social upheaval. Ironically, several former serfs had to pay for the piece of land they had been cultivating for centuries, but more importantly, an agrarian society was industrialized. (See Industrialisation of Russia, Wiki2.org.) Many Serfs became factory workers whose working conditions were unacceptable.
Matters culminated in a massacre known as Bloody Sunday, 22 January 1905. From 3,000 to 50,000 factory workers marched towards Saint Petersburg’s Winter Palace to deliver a petition (←text) to Tsar Nicholas II. Some 4,000 demonstrators, an approximate number, were gunned down or injured by the Imperial Guard. Others were arrested.
Tsar Nicholas II of Russia (18 May [O.S. 6 May] 1868 – 17 July 1918) had abdicated on 2 March 1917. He and his family were executed during the night of 17 – 18 July 1918.
The painting above is immensely foreboding.
But let us listen to another part of Mussorgsky’s Khovanshchina, its introduction.
—ooo—
Mussorgsky’s Dawn on the Moskva-River Introduction to Khovanshchina
Barge Haulers on the Volga by Ilya Repin, 1873 (Wikiart.org.)
I eliminated my post on the Emancipation Reform of 1861. Although the Emancipation Reform of 1861 had deleterious effects on many Russians, Mussorgsky (21 March 1839 – 28 March 1881) became an alcoholic because extreme behaviour was fashionable in his days. (See Modest Mussorgsky, Wiki2.org.)
However, those who turned to the “worship of Bacchus” did not necessarily become alcoholics. Mussorgsky did, and it led to his death.
Repin‘s portrait of Mussorgsky, the eyes in particular, is one of his finest paintings.
We have already seen two paintings by Isaac Levitan’s (August 30, 1860 – August 4 1900). Isaac Levitan, a Jew, was a Lithuanian-Russian artist and he created the “mood landscape,” lyrical landscape paintings. Levitan was associated with the Peredvizhniki(wanderers), a group of artists who sought more freedom than was allowed by academic art. Levitan was a friend of Nikolai Chekhov, a painter, and also befriended Nikolai’s brother, Anton Chekhov.
Nikolai had died of tuberculosis in 1889 and, as mentioned in earlier posts, Levitan spent the last year of his life at Anton Chekhov’s house, in Crimea. Levitan died of a terminal illness at the age of forty. Anton, a medical doctor, died of tubercolusis in 1894.
Despite ill-health, Levitan was extremely productive. According to Wikipedia, “Isaac Levitan‘s hugely influential art heritage consists of more than a thousand paintings, among them watercolors, pastels, graphics, and illustrations.”
The above painting reminds me of Canada where birch trees are plentiful. You probably remember from our voyageurs blogs that canoes were made of birch. If one was destroyed, voyageurs and Amerindians could build a new one quickly by helping themselves to what birch trees provided. Nails were not used in building canoes.
