Exhibition of etchings by I.I. Shishkin in the Belgorod State Art Museum
On July 26, the antique galleries "KABINET" in the Central House of Artists present an exhibition of all 60 etchings by Ivan Shishkin from the famous folder of A.F. Marx
Central House of Artists
July 26 – September 4, 2016,
Krymsky Val, 10/14, halls 14B and 15
On July 26, the exhibition “Etchings and Graphics of Ivan Ivanovich Shishkin”, organized by the antique galleries “KABINET”, will open in the halls of the Central House of Artists on Krymsky Val.
For the first time, all 60 etchings from the famous folder of A.F. will be presented in a single exhibition space. Marx - the latest and most complete album printed graphics I.I. Shishkin (1832–1898), whom his contemporaries considered the best Russian aquafortist.
Just as Pushkin’s novel “Eugene Onegin” is called an encyclopedia of Russian life, a unique album of Shishkin’s etchings published by A.F. Marx in 1894 and including 60 of the best works, can be consonantly called an encyclopedia of Russian nature and man. In these etchings, all the smallest nuances of the seasons, day and night, sun and moon, air of thunderstorms and heat, forests and fields, rivers and lakes are presented in the context of the inextricable “natural life” of Russian people.
This retrospective publication provides a comprehensive picture of the evolution of Shishkin's work as an etcher. In preparing the album, Shishkin collected all the boards that he had preserved, went through most of them with an etching needle and additional etching, and remade some compositionally, such as the 1876 etching “Winter Night,” which in the new album was called “Winter Moonlit Night.” The album also includes nineteen new works that have not been published before.
Unfortunately, the fate of the folders of Shishkin’s etchings, which happily existed in the cozy world of cabinet culture of the 19th century with its special cabinets and tables for storing and viewing engravings, turned out sadly in the subsequent turbulent times. The vast majority of folders and albums were disassembled and sold as individual sheets. Today there are a lot of collectors who own many, maybe even the best examples. But until now there was no way to show the famous folder in its entirety. Our exhibition allows the modern viewer to see this encyclopedia of Russian nature and man in its entirety, without loss.
In addition to Marx’s folder, the exhibition includes some rare etchings made both on paper and on silk: “Juniper. Crimea" (1885), which became the last engraving "Oak" (1897), as well as a unique, one-of-a-kind color self-portrait of Shishkin from the collection of the publisher A.E. Palchikova. A total of 90 exhibits will be on display at the exhibition.
The organizers took it upon themselves to offer a new interpretation of Shishkin’s etchings, transferring them into 3D images and combining the resulting stereo posters into thematic triptychs.
A catalog album was released for the exhibition, which included reproductions of works from the exhibition, as well as all famous lists artist's etchings.
Traditionally, at the exhibition it will be possible to purchase souvenirs: postcards and decorative plates with reproductions, as well as handmade posters using a unique proprietary technology that reliably imitate etching.
The exhibition will be open from July 26 to September 4, 2016 every day, except Mondays, from 11-00 to 20-00 in halls 14B and 15 on the second floor of the Central House of Artists on Krymsky Val.
I. I. Shishkin (1832 - 1895)
“I hope the time will come when all Russian nature, alive and spiritual, will look from the canvases of Russian artists”
I. I. Shishkin
In the brilliant galaxy of Russian landscape artists, I. I. Shishkin belongs to one of the most important and honorable places. He was the largest landscape painter among the Itinerant artists of 1870 - 1880, a prominent representative and exponent of democratic realism in landscape painting. Shishkin devoted all his great talent, colossal ability to work and perseverance to the development of the national theme in the landscape, the creation of truthful images of Russian nature, mainly the Russian forest, of which he was an incomparable connoisseur and lover. With his work, Shishkin affirmed the beauty of Russian nature and showed how meaningful its images can be. He taught us to love our native nature and feel it more deeply.
Like all the Itinerant artists, Shishkin saw the task of his art as a truthful reflection of characteristic and typical phenomena of reality, without any idealization or embellishment. But the choice of subjects and their interpretation reflected the artist’s point of view, his assessment of this reality. It was a look at nature through the eyes of the people, an assessment of its phenomena from the point of view of working people. A democratic artist, Shishkin in his work seemed to clearly express Chernyshevsky’s thought: “a person looks at nature through the eyes of the owner, and on earth, what also seems beautiful to him is what is associated with happiness, the contentment of human life.”
Shishkin chose for his works mainly such motifs in which it was possible to show the wealth, abundance and power of Russian nature, its benefits for humans. It depicts mighty coniferous and oak forests, the vast expanse of the flat landscape, and lush, eared fields. In a calm, courageous appearance, full of simple and clear beauty, he appears motherland in paintings, drawings and engravings by Shishkin.
Shishkin entered the history of Russian art primarily as a master of painting. His paintings are widely popular and invariably attract the attention of large audiences. Shishkin's paintings are well known and highly valued by the Soviet people. But the artist’s graphic works, his drawings, engravings, and lithographs are of no less artistic significance. Shishkin was one of the best draftsmen and the largest engraver and etcher of his time. None of the Russian landscape painters of that era played such an outstanding, in many ways decisive role as Shishkin; none of the Russian painters of the second half of the 19th century paid so much attention and time to engraving, nor was such a master of etching as Shishkin.
He began etching while still in school at the Moscow School of Painting and Sculpture in 1853, but became especially interested in this method of engraving from the early 1870s, joining the newly founded (in 1871) Society of Russian Aquafortists. Etching attracted Shishkin due to the relative speed of execution, the flexibility of the technique, and the combination of a graphic linear principle with a rich pictorial play of light and shadow. In etching, he worked mainly with a needle, sometimes using some other techniques characteristic of etching - soft varnish, finishing with aquatint.
Etching is an in-depth printing technique; printing is done on a manual press. Giving etching great importance, Shishkin experimented with creating a special, as he called, “convex” etching based on the principle of zincography, which could be printed in large quantities mechanically, by machine. These experiments did not yield entirely positive results, but they are typical of a democratic artist who sought to make his art mass and widely accessible. Along with engraving, Shishkin also worked in lithography.
Strict and precise drawing underlies all of Shishkin’s art, not only as a draftsman, but also as a painter. This meaning of drawing and the clear transmission of objectivity in Shishkin’s works are closely related to the nature of his work, in which the precise study of nature “scientifically,” as Kramskoy said, formed the basis. All landscape painters of the realistic school, contemporaries of Shishkin, strived for an objective representation of nature. But while A.K. Savrasov or F.A. Vasiliev were especially fascinated by the sincerity and lyricism of the images of Russian nature, and in their works they sought to convey the poetic experience of nature, Shishkin saw his task in the narration of nature and its life, narration simple, calm and very sober. He thus acts as a kind of “writer of nature.” His strict drawing serves these purposes, accurately depicting objects in all their detail and capturing the results of the study of nature in artistic images. “Nature must be sought in all its simplicity - the drawing must follow it in all its whims of form,” said Shishkin.
Shishkin's drawings are easily divided into two groups: numerous natural ones and relatively rare compositional ones. Among the first we see both long, detailed and quick sketches. But both of them are only sketch material for paintings or composite drawings with the same complete image of nature as in the paintings. As for the artist’s engraving sheets, in most cases these are original and independent compositions of great figurative content and high artistic beauty of execution.
Looking at Shishkin’s drawings and etchings, you clearly see how carefully and soulfully, with love and patience he studied nature in all its large and small manifestations, from mighty trees to thin openwork fern leaves, from proud clouds in the high sky to modest forest grasses and flowers.
The drawing “Oak” (1882) reproduced here (ill. 14) is typical in this regard. Carefully and accurately, truly as if in a “scientific way”, the artist conveys the powerful volumes of the old trunk, all the cracks in the bark, all the flaws that time and bad weather have left, conveys the huge spreading curved branches and twigs covering their lush patterned foliage. But following the bend of the branches and twigs, you feel how the artist was captivated by the beauty and grace of their forms, the rhythm of the bends, in which he tried to read the story of how this tree grew and lived. It’s as if he becomes his biographer. Careful study and a keen sense of nature are inextricably linked in this narrative; here the simplest and most ordinary object acquires deep content and expressive beauty. This living sense of nature, the artist’s love and interest in it make his accurate sketches free from deathly naturalistic herbarism. The small etching “Forest Flowers” (1873) attracts not only with its amazing accuracy and clarity of all the details, but also with its loving experience of nature. It seems that the landscape painter peered at these poor and modest flowers, grass and bushes with such close attention and heartfelt interest with which an attentive and subtle portrait painter strives to read the character and story of a person’s life in his facial features (ill. 10).
This meaningful perception of nature, lovingly peering into it, the ability to see and capture the quiet “life of objects” in nature, helped the artist in the most difficult task - to “understand” the complexity of the forest landscape: in all this abundance and interweaving of branches, one after another “layers” " foliage, in a pile of mosses, trunks, dry branches, windbreaks, herbs and flowers. The ability to perfectly understand all this, to see and convey the unique order of relationships between individual objects, is clearly evidenced by the drawing “Fir Tree” (1894), which conveys details with amazing clarity without loss of generality (ill. 13). In order to depict the wilderness of the forest in such a way as we see in the etching “Taiga” (1880), one must not only be able to draw wonderfully, have the fidelity of the eye and the steadiness of the hand, developed by the technique of a fine, sharpened line, but in addition to all this - an impeccable knowledge of the depicted objects - spruce trees , stones, mosses, etc. You need to deeply understand this forest thicket, breathe its heavy, humid air more than once, enter into its seemingly simple, but so complex, hidden from human eyes, life. It is precisely the fact that any “object” depicted here lives its own life, “behaves” in the drawing as in life, and allows one to depict a complex motif so clearly and simply, instilling a feeling of deep vitality and fidelity to the image. The etching “Taiga” is filled with the harsh beauty of nature itself (ill. 18).
Shishkin was a remarkable master of the most difficult thing: pen drawing, which does not allow corrections or alterations. Using this pen drawing technique, he sometimes produced large sheets with complex images. A pen drawing is somewhat reminiscent of a needle etching, when the artist, as it were, draws with a needle on the varnish with which a copper board is coated. Already during his studies at the Academy, Shishkin's pen drawings were sometimes mistaken for an excellent engraving. Shishkin’s lithographs, executed with a pen and collected in the album “Pen Sketches on Stone” (St. Petersburg, 1868), are essentially a type of pen drawing. The lithograph “Oak” (1867) gives a good idea of the skill and variety of strokes in Shishkin’s drawings when depicting foliage, how the artist creates the impression of each leaf being drawn with simple “brackets”, and depicts grass with straight strokes and flourishes. He also skillfully creates the impression of highlighting and deep shadows on the background (ill. 3). And in pencil drawing we see the same richness and variety of short, energetic lines and strokes when depicting various objects.
In the large pen drawing "Apiary" (1884), with the smallest detail, the artist managed to preserve the whole, the general. Conveying the volume and materiality of objects - beehives in the foreground, bushes in the background and pine trees in the background, on a hillock, Shishkin gives here a spatial and very plastic sense of relief. The viewer seems to follow into the depths of the landscape, visually moving upward from the bottom of the picture (ill. 11). It should also be noted that with the fineness of the strokes, due to the detail of the rendering of objects, Shishkin managed not to “clog” such a large drawing, to avoid lethargy and monotony in the arrangement of light and shadow. The ability to combine refined details and completeness of the image with the unity of the landscape characterizes Shishkin’s best paintings.
The beauty of lines and the play of strokes in the rendering of vegetation are especially felt in etchings. Cut into the metal and convexly imprinted on the paper of the print, the line here receives a special emphasis, and the interweaving and crossing of lines - almost jewelry-like subtlety and beauty. At the same time, the line does not lose its visual significance. Shishkin felt well and knew how to use the depth of dark color and the sonority of highlighted areas, that glow of white paper that we see in engraving prints. Working as an etching, using deep re-etching in the right places, he was remarkably able to convey the reverent play of sunlight in the depths of the forest. Thus, in the etching “Cows in the Forest” (1873), the play of light and shadows, as if the sparkle of sunlit foliage next to dark trunks, well conveys the atmosphere of the forest. Perceiving this etching, you well understand the charm of merging the expressiveness of the image with the artistic beauty of the means of its depiction, as if a special “melody” of the engraving (ill. 5).
The second half of the 19th century knows many good draftsmen. But only in Shishkin at this time will we find a special interest in what could be called “graphism”.
Shishkin drew and engraved a lot all his life, because, naturally, he creative path reflected with the same clarity and certainty in graphic works as in paintings. Shishkin's graphic heritage makes it possible to trace the entire path of formation and development of his realistic creative method and contains excellent examples of the artist's achievements in creating truthful and meaningful artistic image Russian nature. All this was reflected so clearly in Shishkin’s drawings and engravings that even the small amount that was possible to reproduce here testifies to this with sufficient clarity.
The lithograph “Slum” (1860), depicting a view on the island of Valaam, is a typical example of the artist’s early works during his studies at the Academy of Arts (ill. 2). Valaam in the 1850s was a favorite place for young artists to work, and the Academy sent Shishkin there twice - in the summer of 1858 and 1859. The reproduced lithograph, as it were, summarizes the artist’s impressions and sketches on location during these two years, as they were summed up by two picturesque paintings - views of Valaam, for which Shishkin received a gold medal in 1860 and the right to travel abroad. Already in this early lithograph, the artist’s close attention and love for nature is evident, but they still manifest themselves in the naive form of passion for little things, individual objects and their details. The view as a whole is still constructed only as a simple combination of these particulars. Hence the cluttered image, unrelated plans, variegated contrasts of dark and light places. This reproduction of nature is very typical of the work of young people in the 1850s. This is how young A.K. Savrasov and M.K. Klodt painted their first landscapes naively and somewhat sentimentally and romantically. The features of romance, coming from the school tradition, are reflected in the lithograph “Slum” and in the choice of motif - a combination of huge stones and thickets - and in the interpretation that gives this virgin nature, through the transmission of gentle sunlight, a kind of intimacy and “coziness”.
Traditional techniques of drawing on colored paper, with tinting with white and shading the pencil with spots, were reflected in the complex technique of this lithography, which is a unique combination of a variety of techniques, including scratching. This testifies to the young artist’s diligent study of the lithography technique and the great success he achieved in mastering it. visual means and opportunities. Therefore, the review of similar works by Shishkin from his first teacher Mokritsky was fair: “These are the best landscape lithographs that have hitherto been printed here in Russia.”
Romantic moments are also palpable in the drawings of the 1860s, executed both in Russia and during his stay abroad. This is a period of searching for a young artist, expanding his horizons. In his desire for a realistic and meaningful landscape, Shishkin fills it with an external story, a story conveyed both by the actions of human and animal figures and by the reproduction of the complex state of nature. Characteristic in this regard is the drawing “Shepherd with a flock” (chic 4). The romantic motif of a cloud, the effect of sunlight and the dynamics of the image are interpreted by Shishkin in a completely realistic manner, while the artist strives to “tell” the viewer as much as possible.
This complexity of the story, yet external fable, is also characteristic of those paintings by Shishkin of the late 1860s, in which he already gives clearly expressed national Russian landscape images, such as “Cutting Wood” (1867, Tretyakov Gallery). The etching “A Stream in the Forest” (1870) reproduced here corresponds to similar paintings by Shishkin. We see the same complexity of the motif, in which a detailed, but still outwardly descriptive, characteristic of the landscape is manifested (ill. 6).
Shishkin's further evolution follows the line of overcoming this external complexity of the image and creating a single holistic image, delving into which the viewer gradually sees details and details. Shishkin comes to the display of nature in the paintings “Forest Wilderness” (1873, State Russian Museum) or “Rye” (1878, Tretyakov Gallery), striving to find content not in the plot introduced from the outside, but in revealing the very life of nature. In graphics, this goal is now served by both details and the complex, reverent play of light and shadows.
Here I would like to mention the beautiful drawing “Ferns in the Forest” (1877) - a completed sketch, twice repeated in painting (ill. 15). Before us is a holistic, immediately perceived view - the depths of the forest illuminated by the sun, overgrown with fern bushes. Shishkin remarkably succeeded in conveying the horizontally arranged patterned leaves of the fern and revealing the perspective movement of space in depth. Looking at these ferns and the play of the sun's rays softly illuminating them, the viewer seems to be immersed in quiet life nature, perceiving its charm. From a simple corner of the forest, Shishkin creates a charming image of nature, full of bright happiness and peace.
In the large etching “Hunter in the Swamp” (1873) we see an image of nature that is very rich in content and synthetic (ill. 8). In the far-spreading swampy rays, in the high sky with clouds, the depth of which is emphasized by a flying flock of birds, Shishkin shows breadth and spaciousness. Peering at this landscape, you see its wide appearance, filling it with the living breath of nature. But this is no longer the former complexity of a simple combination of particulars, but the gradual development and deepening of a single and holistic image of nature in which his inner life unfolds. This is not the complexity of the external description, but the richness of the content of the image, which the artist conveys, gradually revealing to us the depicted view. The greater degree of refinement and completeness of the drawing is the result of the fact that the artist has a lot to show the viewer. This is not a single impression, but the result of long-term observations - a thoughtful, experienced and deeply felt image of the artist’s native country. The figurine of the hunter invites the viewer to tune into the appropriate mood. It hints at what a person experiences during hunting wanderings, in long-term communication with nature.
This gradual disclosure of the image, in which the artist strives to convey the life of nature, acting as if it were its “writer of everyday life,” is manifested with no less clarity in the etching “Taiga” (1880) mentioned above.
The theme of endless expanses of fields, the breadth of Russian nature, its free breathing began to attract Shishkin early on. A typical example is his beautiful small painting “Noon. In the vicinity of Moscow” (1869, Tretyakov Gallery), with its high sky and large, elegant cumulus clouds festively, joyfully floating in it. We find this bright and high expanse, festive summer image of nature in a number of the artist’s etchings. Such is the beautiful sheet of “Clouds over a Grove” (1878), with its complex motif of sun rays falling down onto fields and groves from behind clouds (ill. 7). It is interesting to note that this bright, joyful image is presented with Shishkin’s usual sobriety and calmness, without any special elation or pathos. But still, sometimes in this rendering of the endless distances and breadth of nature, Shishkin was captivated by an epic moment, a poetic experience of open spaces, the exciting power of space. This is how such canvases as “Among the Flat Valley...” (1883, Russian Museum) and such sheets as the etching “From the banks of the Kama near Yelabuga” (1885) (ill. 23) were born. Behind a cliff overgrown with huge fir trees, you can see the mirror of the river below, and behind it, an endless plain covered with forest goes towards the horizon. A large bird soars over the cliff, enhancing the feeling of space beckoning into the distance. The mighty and harsh breath of the virgin nature of the Russian north emanates from this etching. The lively, free drawing “Forest River” (1876) is an example of Shishkin’s sketches from nature (ill. 12). With great knowledge and confidence, he draws the trunk of a pine tree, its branches and needles. The pencil easily and boldly draws on paper, outlining trees, a bank, a river and buildings in the distance. The motive is perfectly expressed and spatial plans are conveyed. With all the freedom of the full-scale sketch and drawing, compositional structure is evident. Before us is a typical example of the Itinerant method - finding a picture in nature itself.
Turning from this drawing to the drawings of the 1890s - “Tops of Pines” and “Clouds”, we see how Shishkin’s style of sketching from life becomes more and more free and broad. At the same time, however, the line retains all its clarity and accuracy. His knowledge of nature is so great that Shishkin immediately conveys the entire character of the subject with one or two lines. So, with amazing freedom, one fluent contour line, with quick shading within the contour, he conveys the silhouette of the forest in the drawing “Clouds” (ill. 20), and we feel a living nature. Looking at the firmness and confidence of the lines of the drawing “Tops of Pines” (ill. 22), you involuntarily recall the drawings of the classical artist of the late 18th - early XIX century F. M. Matveev, his famous sketches of pine trees.
Thus preserving a linear drawing until the end of his work, Shishkin at the same time began to draw in a pictorial manner in the 1880s. Striving to convey air and light, he begins to draw with charcoal and chalk on colored paper. The drawing “Cobweb in the Forest” (1880s) is characteristic for its picturesqueness and soft transmission of air (ill. 16). Etching “Sands” (1886) - reflects in the graphics Shishkin’s passion for plein air tasks, the transmission of sunlight and air, the search for spontaneity in the depiction of nature (ill. 21). The etching is imbued with living dynamics; It seems you can hear the light noise of pine trees under the wind coming from the sea. The sand of the dunes overgrown with dry grass, illuminated by the sun, is perfectly conveyed. In a one-color engraving, Shishkin creates the impression of colorful nature - light yellow sand and dark green pine needles. Looking at this etching, you involuntarily recall Shishkin’s beautiful painting “Pines illuminated by the sun” (1886, Tretyakov Gallery), full of light, sun, air, imbued with the living thrill of life. In the same way, the painting “Oak Grove” (1887, Kiev State Museum of Russian Art) brings to mind the simultaneous sunny etching “Three Oaks” (1887), one of Shishkin’s best graphic works. The light of the sun, its play on the emerald grass, luminous, sun-pierced patterned foliage against the backdrop of dark oak trunks are conveyed here with amazing truthfulness. Taking the image against the light, Shishkin evokes a feeling of airiness by conveying the light contour. At the same time, he skillfully uses light reflexes to work out shapes in the shadows. Thanks to this, the dark trunks of oak trees do not appear as flat silhouettes. Shishkin achieves here a harmonious combination of graphically volumetric and pictorial principles. This leaf seems to breathe upon us with forest freshness, the warmth of the sun, the moisture of greenery, the aroma of nature’s summer blossoms (see reproduction of the etching on the cover).
“Shishkin is a milestone in the development of Russian landscape, he is a man - a school,” wrote I. N. Kramskoy about him in 1878. I. I. Shishkin appears to us as a remarkable connoisseur of nature and a brilliant draftsman in his drawings and etchings. The images he created in graphics are deeply truthful, meaningful and impressive. The love for nature, which generated them and with which they are permeated, revealed a feeling of their native country, sincere and living patriotism. The artist faithfully served his country, his people, revealing to them the beauty and wealth of his homeland, teaching them to appreciate it and believe in it. In the images of nature he was the foremost man of his time. He uniquely captured the feelings and thoughts of democrats in the landscape. The images of nature in Shishkin’s works are topical and social. All this is valuable and instructive for us from the point of view of critical development of the heritage of classical Russian realistic art. Shishkin's graphics, delivering great and pure joy to the Soviet viewer, enriching his sense of nature, teach our Soviet landscape painters a lot.
2012 Cultural studies and art history No. 2(6)
UDC 76:027.7 (571.16)
M.A. Petrova
ETCHINGS by I.I. SHISHKIN IN THE SCIENTIFIC LIBRARY OF TOMSK STATE UNIVERSITY*
The article is devoted to the collection “Etchings of Professor I.I. Shishkin", which is stored in the collections of the Scientific Library of Tomsk State University. The author provides the background to the creation of this collection and brief description etching techniques. The features of the album and the history of its appearance in the library are analyzed. The collection is considered as part of the legacy of the great Russian artist, which characterizes him as a talented etcher.
Key words: I.I. Shishkin, etchings in Scientific library Tomsk State University, etchings by I.I. Shishkina.
Ivan Ivanovich Shishkin is one of the largest Russian landscape painters of the second half of the 19th century. To understand his paintings, to feel the originality of his extraordinary personality, it is necessary to get acquainted with his creative positions, views, the process of spiritual formation, and the development of his talent as a landscape painter.
A man of exceptional hard work, Shishkin painted with real gusto, with joy and sometimes even with bitterness. “An artist and scientist improves until the end of his days,” he wrote on one of the drawings made at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture.
Shishkin managed in his work to most fully express popular ideas about Russian nature, the Russian forest. That is why he is considered one of the largest representatives of Russian realistic landscape painting of the second half of the 19th century. “Shishkinsky forest” has become the same typical concept as “Turgenev’s girl” or “Levitan’s autumn.”
Shishkin belonged to the circle of progressive academic youth, who were brought up on the ideas of progressive materialist aesthetics and literature and rebelled against art, alien to modernity, against the state-bureaucratic order. For Shishkin, the artist’s duty was to enter the life of Russian society, become interested in its fate, and become imbued with the “ideas of the century.”
Based on an in-depth analytical study of nature, Shishkin’s creative method was in tune with the era of enlightenment with its characteristic interest in the exact sciences, and in particular in natural science. The approval of this new realistic method, which debunked the principles of pseudo-romantic landscape sanctified by academic authority, was the artist’s most important merit.
* The article was prepared with the financial support of a joint competition between the Russian Humanitarian Foundation and the Administration Tomsk region, project No. 11-11-70001a/T.
A clear understanding of the tasks facing Russian realistic art, pronounced democratic views, and rejection of the academic system naturally led the artist to the ranks of the Wanderers. Here, in the Association of Traveling Art Exhibitions, one of the founders of which Shishkin became in 1870, he found true like-minded friends, and his works a responsive viewer. From the founding of the Association of Traveling Art Exhibitions, Shishkin remained among its members until the end of his life.
Along with Shishkin’s picturesque heritage, he made a great and significant contribution to the treasury of the national artistic culture There are also drawings and numerous etchings made by the artist.
Etching is a method of producing a custom printed form that combines hand engraving methods with chemical etching. A copper or zinc plate with a thickness of 0.5 to 2.5 mm is coated with acid-resistant varnish or acid-resistant primer, which includes wax, rosin, and asphalt. The lines of the design are scratched across the varnish film (primer), exposing the surface of the metal. Then the plate is etched in several stages: the copper plate with a solution of ferric chloride, the zinc plate with nitric acid, obtaining in-depth printing elements. After the first etching, sufficient to slightly deepen the strokes in the lightest areas of the image, these areas are covered with a protective varnish, excluding them from further etching processes. Then the plate is subjected to a second etching, areas of the next tone gradation are covered with varnish, etc. Thanks to this, strokes are obtained of varying depths and, moreover, by simpler means than in chisel engraving. Finally, the varnish is removed.
An etching is also a name for a print obtained on paper from a proprietary printing plate made using the technology given above. Etching is a circulation technique where each print is numbered and is an independent work. As a rule, this averages from 5 to 20 prints.
Working a lot and seriously in the field of engraving, Shishkin achieved great success and took an honorable place in the history of Russian etching of the 19th century. Shishkin showed a penchant for engraving while he was still a student at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. There is a single print of the etching "Mountain Road", signed "I.Sh." (1853). He probably reproduces some other person’s original, but in the manner of execution one can already sense familiarity with the rules of engraving.
Devoting the summer time to work on sketches, Shishkin continued to intensively engage in etching in the winter, often reproducing the motifs of his summer sketches. It can be said that Shishkin’s experience in working on pictorial sketches endlessly enriched his etchings. Thus, by 1886, the artist had already released three albums of etchings, the last of which contained 25 sheets. The artist printed some of the sheets himself.
In 1894, St. Petersburg publisher A.F. Marx began working on the last album of Shishkin's etchings, which was published in 1895. Shishkin handed over the etching boards to the publisher, some of which he revised and corrected for this edition. As a result, it was compiled
M.A. Petrova
an album that included the artist’s best etching sheets and was published under the title “60 etchings of Professor I.I. Shishkina".
It was this publication that was found in the department of book monuments and manuscripts of the Scientific Library of Tomsk State University. This edition contains 54 etchings and 1 frontispiece etching with the title and surname of the author. The title page read: “Makushin’s account. January 9, 1916. 25 rubles. Sold to Professor Mikhailovsky (philosophy of law)".
Indeed, overcoming enormous difficulties and improving his skills, Shishkin as an etcher was an outstanding phenomenon. His etchings constitute, as it were, an encyclopedia of the Russian landscape and, no less than his paintings, show the breadth and versatility of his talent. Many sheets are given in various "states". This shows that Shishkin, in each subject he chose, sought not only a successful resolution of his print, but, above all, the internal completeness of the image he created. In this regard, a striking example is his etching “In the Crimea,” depicting a mountain landscape. It has a series of sequentially executed boards of the same motif, in which the artist sought ways to create a generalized sublime image. Among the etchings made by Shishkin there is also a self-portrait of the artist (1886).
The collection, in addition to the etchings themselves, the title page, also contains a complete list of etchings and a preface written by the publisher A.F. Marx. He notes the features of this publication, tells the biography of the artist and characterizes the etchings and how Shishkin created them. “He not only printed sheets, but also varied them indefinitely,” writes A.F. Marx about the truly creative participation of the artist himself in the publication of the album. - Shishkin drew on the board with paint, put new shadows... made other spots, stars, moonlight highlights. Covered in paint, excited by his work, strong, confident, he was truly a great master and repeated such an expensive type of the great masters of the past.”
A.F. Marx also talks about the artistic side of the album, noting that almost all the etchings are imbued with poetry; that in each of them there is enormous “mastery of work and design.”
The sheets of his etchings left by the artist, together with the boards on which he worked so hard, should become the subject of serious and in-depth study. For younger generation Shishkin's etchings can be a real school for artists, not only introducing them to the technical techniques of engraving, but also equipping them with a very integral method, which was based on working on location.
The etching works of I. I. Shishkin are distinguished by their subtle knowledge of nature, beautiful and faithful drawing and perfect technique. In addition to the usual technique with a needle, the artist used soft varnish, aquatint, and dry point. His numerous natural drawings served as materials for engraving works. With his autographic etching works I.I. Shishkin greatly expanded the circle of his viewers, drawing their attention to his native Russian nature.
Shishkin's work is a wonderful heritage of Russian culture, having world value. Highly appreciated during his lifetime by representatives of the progressive artistic community, Shishkin in our time has become a source of genuine pride for Russia. In the light of modern artistic interests, the remaining vast painting material of Shishkin represents a rich heritage that reflected the advanced artistic ideas of the 19th century.
Shishkin's etchings, stored in the Scientific Library of Tomsk State University, make it possible to study the existence of works published by the famous Russian artist. They also draw attention to the role of Russian philanthropists and publishers, such as P.I. Makushin and A.F. Marx, in the fate of Russian painting, in particular etching art. All this represents enormous material for studying the history of art, and an integral part of the cultural and spiritual heritage of the country.
Literature
1. History of Russian painting. M.: Eksmo, 2010. 604 p.
2. Ivan Ivanovich Shishkin. Correspondence. Diary. Contemporaries about the artist / comp. and entry Art. I.N. Shuvalova. L.: Art, 1978. 463 p.
3. Maltseva F. Masters of Russian landscape. Ivan Shishkin [Electronic resource] / Association of Traveling Art Exhibitions. Electron. Dan. M.: Association of Peredvizhniki Artists, 2011. iL: http://tphv.ru/shishkin_malceva.php (access date:
4. Zvontsov V.M., Shistko V.I. Etching: technique, history. St. Petersburg, 2004. 269 p.
5. From the publisher (preface by A.F. Marx) // 60 etchings by Professor I.I. Shishkina. St. Petersburg: Artistic institution A.F. Marx, 1894.
The exhibition, organized by the Kabinet gallery, will feature 90 works of circulation graphics by the famous Wanderer, including 60 of the best etchings from a valuable folder from 1894
Antique galleries "Cabinet"
July 26 - September 4, 2016
daily, except Monday, from 11:00 to 20:00 in halls 14b and 15, 2nd floor
Moscow, Central House of Artists, st. Krymsky Val, 10
Etchings by Ivan Ivanovich Shishkin are among the undisputed leaders in terms of liquidity on the Russian auction market. We once calculated that in 2014/2015, out of 100 exhibited works by Shishkin, 69 were sold. This takes into account all categories, including painting and original graphics. And almost everything that is exhibited is sold separately in the circulation schedule.
And this is quite understandable.
First reason: we're talking about not about an exercise or a passing direction for the artist’s creativity, but about work in the technique in which Ivan Shishkin was especially strong. Shishkin was an impeccably accurate draftsman. And if he was not successful in painting and working with color, then drawing and complex printmaking techniques became his true element, where he felt like a fish in water.
The second reason is even simpler: these spectacular, painstaking, authentic etchings by a Russian artist of the first rank are quite affordable on the Russian market - from 25,000 to 80,000 rubles per sheet, more often around 65,000 rubles. Many collectors can afford these items.
Quite a few of the Itinerant’s etchings were also sold at auctions at the Kabinet house, which became the organizer of the current exhibition “The Unknown Shishkin.” It will open in the central halls of the Central House of Artists on Krymsky Val on June 26 and will last until September 4, 2016.
The center of the exhibition will probably be the rare folder of the publisher and bookseller Alfred Fedorovich Marx. The last folder, published in a small edition, included 60 selected etchings by Shishkin - the pinnacle of his creativity in printmaking. In preparing this album, Shishkin updated his old boards, went through the etching needle, and even modified some of them compositionally. In particular, the etching “Winter Night” of 1876 (made 18 years earlier), which Shishkin even renamed “Winter Night”, underwent such modification. moonlit night" In addition to the old completed etchings, Shishkin included 19 new works in the album, previously unpublished.
The fate of complete albums (as well as artist's books and any books with lithographs) is often difficult. Owners and sellers are very tempted to dismantle them and sell them in parts - it’s easier and more profitable. The same thing happened with the Marx folder. It seems that there were not so few of them, and only a few have survived in complete form to this day. And the exhibition provides a rare chance to see it in its entirety.
The Central House of Artists will have not only Shishkin’s etchings. “Cabinet” will show a single-copy color self-portrait of Shishkin from the collection of publisher A.E. Palchikov, a unique etching on silk “Juniper. Crimea" from 1885 and Shishkin's last engraving "Oak" (1897).
"Cabinet" promises other surprises. There will be no Pokemon, but the organizers have come up with “a new interpretation of Shishkin’s etchings, transferring them into 3D images and combining the resulting stereo posters into thematic triptychs.” In general, it is not yet clear. But it is clear that there will be plates with reproductions of Shishkin’s works and posters produced using special technology. A catalog has been prepared for the exhibition, which includes not only reproductions of items from the exhibition, but all known etchings by Shishkin.
Vladimir Bogdanov,A.I.
May 22, 2015 in the exhibition hall of the Belgorod State Art Museum as part of the project “The Property of Russian Museums for Belgorod Citizens!” The grand opening of the exhibition “Ivan Shishkin. Etchings" from the funds of the Sevastopol Art Museum named after. M.P. Kroshitsky.
At the exhibition, the viewer can get acquainted with interesting and, at the same time, less known for the master’s heritage - engravings. To the M.P. Museum Kroshitsky's prints with images of nature came into possession in 1989; the complete collection of printed works was donated to the museum by the widow of botanist and geologist Evgeniy Lavrenko, a member of the USSR Academy of Sciences and a passionate collector.
Shishkin Ivan Ivanovich was born on January 13, 1832 in the small provincial town of Elabuga, located on the high bank of the Kama. At the age of 12, he was assigned to the 1st Kazan gymnasium, but, having reached the 5th grade, he left it, explaining his action by his lack of desire to become an official.
Shishkin entered the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture (1852–1856) only at the age of twenty, having difficulty overcoming the foundations of his family, which opposed (with the exception of his father) his desire to become an artist. In August 1852, he was already included in the list of students admitted to the Moscow School of Painting and Sculpture, where he received good preparation under the leadership of Apollo Mokritsky, a former student of Alexey Venetsianov.
At the school, Ivan Shishkin immediately revealed himself as an unrivaled landscape painter. Here he first became acquainted with the technique of engraving and reproduced someone else’s work called “Mountain Road” (1853), but already in this work the original artistic style of the future master was felt.
The richness and diversity of plant forms truly captivated the artist. Everything seemed interesting to him - the image of an old stump, a snag, a dry tree, blades of grass in the wind. Ivan diligently studied the anatomy of nature, making many sketches from nature. All the drawings of the future master were extremely simple - a pine tree on a cliff or near water, a bush on a swampy plain, a rocky bank of a winding river. At the same time, the artist depicted carts, barns, fences, roadside chapels, apiaries and beehives, all kinds of boats, which later also found their place in many works, although they were of secondary importance.
By the end of his studies, Shishkin had already acquired some professional skills as a landscape painter and began to stand out noticeably for his talent among his comrades. But the desire to improve his drawing prompted him to go to St. Petersburg in January 1856 to enter the Academy of Arts.
A few months after admission, Shishkin began to attract the attention of teachers with his landscapes depicting the outskirts of St. Petersburg, and in 1857 he received two small silver medals, and in 1858 a small gold medal. These years also included the young artist’s first experiments in lithography. Based on the author’s sketches, Ivan Shishkin performs 14 works in lithographic pencil on stone for the book by Alexei Vladimirovich Vysheslavtsev “Pen and pencil sketches from a circumnavigation of the world (1857–1860).” But due to shortage Money These works were published in the “Russian Art Album” only in 1961.
Shishkin's training at the Academy of Arts with Socrates Vorobyov had almost no effect on his work. The island of Valaam, which served as a place for summer practice for academic students and amazed the artist with its granite rocks, centuries-old pines and spruces, became a real school for Ivan Ivanovich. Having graduated from the Academy of Arts in 1960 with a large gold medal for “The Locality of Cucco on Valaam,” Shishkin went on a retirement trip abroad.
In 1863, in Zurich (Switzerland), Shishkin visited the workshop of painting professor Rudolf Koller, an animal painter and landscape painter. Koller at that time lived and worked in a house on the shore of the beautiful Lake Zurich, which, like the city itself, is surrounded by mountains. It was there that Ivan Shishkin again tried his hand at the etching technique, popularly called “royal vodka” by engravers of that time. Later, the artist trially executed two more engravings, but they turned out so good that they awakened the master’s desire to take the creation of similar works more seriously. Unfortunately, the subsequent return to his homeland and the need to work hard on his paintings distracted the artist from his favorite activity.
Having received the title of academician upon returning from his retirement trip, Shishkin became one of the founders of the Association of Traveling Art Exhibitions. In 1970, he again took up engraving and founded the “Society of Russian Aquafortists” (1871–1874), being a founding member of the partnership. As the more experienced member of the circle, he helps many with his advice and example, and together with them publishes his works in collective editions of engravings.
In the 70s, Shishkin began to devote more and more time to engravings, trying to find moments of leisure between painting large works of painting. His famous paintings “Apiary in the Forest” (1876) and “Rye” (1878) date back to this time.
If other contemporary artists mainly used etching to reproduce their works, then Ivan Shishkin found in it a way to create new works, allowing him to preserve the manner and richness of the line-line drawing. He produces prints, both individual sheets and entire series, each time increasingly awakening the enthusiasm of collectors and forcing them to compete in the pursuit of the first and best prints of works.
Shishkin devotes a lot of time and effort to making etching boards and creates over a hundred sheets during his life, devoting them entirely to depicting his native Russian nature, in which he managed to organically combine the features of romanticism and realism. In addition to the usual technique with a needle, the artist actively used soft varnish, aquatint and dry needle in his work. At one time, in order to find a new, less expensive and more effective way to reproduce his compositions, Shishkin undertook a series of experiments in zincography.
In 1968, the first album of his engravings (6 lithographs) “Studies from life with pen and on stone” was published; in May 1873, he prepared and himself printed his first album of etchings (11 sheets), released as a prize from the Society for the Encouragement of Artists. The next two folders were published in 1878 and 1886, and in 1894 the album “60 etchings by I.I. Shishkina. 1870–1892."
The retrospective album, released by the St. Petersburg publishing house of Adolf Fedorovich Marx, contains all the best engraving works of Ivan Shishkin. Today it is known for certain that although the publisher bought the etching boards from the artist as full ownership, he continued to reproduce the sheets under the strict guidance of the master. And this is not surprising; Marx and Shishkin have maintained partnerships for a long time. Their business connections were established when Ivan Ivanovich began illustrating Russia’s first mass weekly magazine “for family reading,” Niva.
It is noteworthy that at the exhibition in the Belgorod State art museum All 60 etching sheets originally included in the album are presented. Some of them were just being prepared as supplements to the magazines “Pchela”, “Svet” and “Niva”.
Similar works include the landscape “Beehives”; the artist brought the beehives and thatched barn closer to the viewer, shortened the detailed story and achieved great capacity and integrity of the artistic image.
In the 80s and 90s, the artist was increasingly attracted by the changing states of nature and quickly passing moments. Thanks to his interest in the light-air environment, he is good at creating works with the changing state of nature: the sky after the rain (“Before the Storm”, “On the River After the Rain”), at night (“At the Cutting Tree”, “Gurzuf”) and twilight (“Dawn” ).
In Shishkin's etchings one can find many images of monuments of natural and archaeological heritage. Among them are “Tsarev Kurgan”, “Fir trees in Shuvalovsky Park” and “Mount Ayu-Dag” - a portrait of a “failed” volcano, covered with relict plants, special varieties of pistachios and junipers.
“Forest Flowers”, “First Snow”, “Field”, “Crimea” and many other works, in addition to their amazing fidelity to nature, immerse the viewer in a world of elusive sensations. The forest stream flows slightly in the stones. Picturesque rock faults and cliffs can be seen all around. The centuries-old spruces, pines, oaks, groves of birches and fern bushes, keeping freshness in their leaves, are silent. The movement of water and grass is miraculous - you see it not with your eyes, but feel it. There is silence and space everywhere.
Among the most interesting works exhibition - the etching “Anthill”, and not one, but two. One of these valuable exhibits came to Belgorod with the rest of the album, and the second was donated to the Belgorod State Art Museum in 2007 by the Governor of the Belgorod Region E.S. Savchenko at the opening of a new building.
The exhibition also includes a self-portrait of Ivan Shishkin, painted in 1886. The background of the portrait is made with a dynamic stroke, like most of the master’s works.
Etchings by I.I. Shishkin’s works are of great interest, as they provide a visual understanding of the various techniques of etching, the play of lines and shadows in black and white.
In his works one can see the artist’s desire for a plastic interpretation of natural forms, anatomical design, as well as good professional training.
Live and work in one of the European art centers of his time or if he had been more concerned about distributing prints abroad, Ivan Ivanovich Shishkin’s fame as an excellent engraver would have been greater. Unfortunately, today only ardent art lovers and passionate collectors pay tribute to Shishkin’s etchings.
And in the end I would like to note that this exhibition is truly unique. It not only introduces the visitor to a rare printed publication, but also allows you to enjoy the little-known works of an outstanding master, the best of which have become classics national painting and graphics.
