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Boris Mikhailovich Kustodiev was born in Astrakhan on March 7, 1878 into the family of a professor of philosophy, history of literature, and logic at the local theological seminary.
Between 1893 and 1896, Boris took private art lessons in Astrakhan from
Pavel Vlasov, a pupil of Vasily Perov.
Subsequently, from 1896 to 1903, he attended Ilya
Repin’s studio at the Academy of Arts in St. Peterburg. Concurrently
he took classes in sculpture under Dmitry Stelletsky and in etching under
Vasily
Mathé.
He first exhibited in 1896.
In 1904, he attended the private studio of René Ménard in Paris. In 1904, he traveled to Spain, in 1907 to Italy, and in 1909 visited Austria, France, and Germany, and again Italy. During these years he painted many portraits and genre pieces.
In 1905-06, he contributed to the satirical journals Zhupel (Bugbear) and Adskaya Pochta (Hell’s Mail). At that time, he first met the World of Art (Russian: Mir Iskusstva) artists, a group of innovative Russian artists. He joined their association in 1910 and subsequently took part in all their exhibitions. Earlier, in 1909, he was made an Academician of Painting.
In 1909, Kustodiev developed the initial symptoms of the grave illness that in 1916 paralyzed the lower part of his body, thus confining him to his studio where he continued to paint, relying on memories from his boyhood and youth and on his imagination. His ability to remain joyful and lively despite his paralysis is amazing. His colorful paintings and joyful genre pieces do not reveal his physical suffering, and on the contrary give the impression of a carefree and cheerful life. His Pancake Tuesday/Maslenitsa. (1916), Fontanka. (1916) are all painted from his memories. He meticulously restores his own childhood in the busy city on the Volga banks.
In 1923, Kustodiev joined the Association of Artists of Revolutionary Russia. He continued to paint, make engravings, illustrate books and design for the theater up until his death on May 28, 1927, in Leningrad.
Bibliography:
Kustodiev. His Time, Life and Work. By V.Lebedeva. Moscow, 1984.
Boris Kustodiev. By A. Turkov. 1986, Moscow
Boris Kustodiev. By V. Dokuchaeva. Moscow, 1991.
Russian Painters. Encyclopedic Dictionary. St. Petersburg. 1998.
Boris
Kustodiev--paintings, graphic works, book illustrations, theatrical designs
by Boris Mikhailovich Kustodiev. Aurora Art Publishers, 1983.
The
Art and Architecture of Russia (Pelican History Art) by George
Heard Hamilton. Yale Univ Pr, 1992.
A
Dictionary of Russian and Soviet Artists 1420-1970 by John
Milner. Antique Collectors' Club, 1993.
Notes:
II Congress of the Comintern -- The
Third Communist International was founded by the leaders of Left Socialist
parties in 1919. Its Second Congress took place in July 1920 in Moscow.
The Comintern would be dissolved in 1943.
See: Boris Kustodiyev. Festival
of the II Congress of Comintern on the Uritsky Square in Moscow.
Bolshevik -- Russian term for a communist.
The name originated from the Russian word “bolshinstvo” – majority. In
1903 during the congress of the Social-Democrats of Russia the party split
ideologically. The majority, which supported the radical program of Lenin,
was known hence as the “Bolsheviks”. Their opponents became known as “Mensheviks”
(from the Russian word “menshinstvo” – minority).
See: Boris Kustodiyev. Bolshevik.
27 February 1917 - The February Russian Revolution
of 1917 culminated on the 27th of February.
On the morning of the 27th an armed group of revolutionaries led a
raid on an armory, captured its stock of rifles and mounted an attack on
the prisons, setting free the revolutionaries and criminals being held
there. They then went on to launch attacks on the police stations. The
Petrograd Garrison supported the revolutionaries. Nicholas II was forced
to abdicate and a Provisional Government took over.
Real power in Russia after the February Revolution, however, lay with
the socialist leaders of the Petrograd (later All-Russian) Soviet of Workers'
and Soldiers' Deputies, who were elected by popular mandate (unlike the
ministers of the Provisional Government).
See: Boris Kustodiyev. 27
February,1917.
World of Art (*Mir Iskusstva) - a Russian
association of artists and intellectuals wishing to distance themselves
both from academism and from the insistent Russian-ness of the Wanderers’
(Peredvizhniki) art and to demonstrate their cosmopolitan interests, founded
in 1898 by a group of students headed by Alexander Benois and Sergei Dyaghilev.
The first members of the association were Constantin Somov, Dmitry Philosophov,
Walter Nouvelle, Leon Bakst and Evgeni Lanceray, (not all of them were
painters). Diaghilev was a leading figure in the association and it was
him, who in formulated the artistic principles of the association. Diaghilev
was an organizer of exhibitions and subsequently the creator of the Russian
Ballet which brought Russian themes, music and design to the West from
1909 on. Members of "The World of Art" were highly educated people with
exquisite taste; their aesthetic sympathies were so wide that a tendency
for eclectics developed. "The World of Art" program concerned all the arts
including not just painting, but also theatre, book design, applied arts
and crafts, furniture and interior design.
See: Boris Kustodiyev. Group
Portrait of the World of Art Artists.
Vasily Mathé (1856-1917) a Russian
graphic artist and a talented teacher; among his students, are Anna
Ostroumova-Lebedeva, Ilya Repin,
Valentin Serov, Isaak
Levitan, Boris Kustodiev, Constantine
Somov and many others.
See: Boris Kustodiyev. Portrait
of Vasily Mathé.
Maximilian Alexandrovich Voloshin (28.05.1877
Kiev-11.08.1932, Koktebel), poet, artist, translator, philosopher and art
critic, one of the most educated people of his time. His all-sidedly gifted
nature, kindness and lovely disposition attracted to him many authors and
artists. His house in Koktebel, Crimea, was a very popular place among
the Russian avant-garde intellectuals.
See: Boris Kustodiyev. Portrait
of the Poet M. Voloshin.
Pyotr Kapitza (09.07.1894 – 08-04.1984),
academician, physicist, Nobel Prize Winner (1978).
Kapitza was born on July 1894 into the family of a military engineer,
general of the Russian army. Pyotr graduated from the Petrograd (St. Peterburg)
Politechnical Institute in 1919. In 1921, he managed to flee the country.
In Great Britain, he came to Ernest Reserford who took Kapitza into his
laboratory in Cambridge. Kapitza worked in Cambridge for 13 years. In 1926
he headed his own laboratory, and in 1929 he was chosen a member of the
London Royal society. After 1926 he regularly visited the Soviet Union,
where he delivered lectures and consulted scientists in Leningrad and in
the Kharkov Physico-Technical institute. His outstanding discoveries
made the Kremlin leaders plot to prevent Kapitza from returning to England.
When he came to Leningrad in 1934 to participate in a scientific conference,
he was not allowed to leave the USSR. By Stalin’s decision, the new Institute
of Physical problems was created specially for Kapitza, who was actually
forced to head it. He used his position of director not only for scientific
research, but also to bravely defend many scientists from the GPU (Glavnoe
Politicheskoe Upravlenie, or Stalin’s secret police). Kapitza headed the
institute practically up to his death in 1984.
In 1978, Kapitza became a Nobel Prize winner for his inventions and
discoveries in the area of low-temperature physics.
See: Boris Kustodiyev. Portrait
of Prof. Pyotr Kapitsa and Prof. Nikolai Semyonov.