Vasnetsov and Bilibin Alyonushka comparison illustrations. Bilibin Vasnetsov message.docx - Message "Bilibin and Vasnetsov" "Outstanding Russian painters"

Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin - famous Russian artist, illustrator. Born on August 4, 1876 in the village of Tarkhovka, St. Petersburg province - passed away on February 7, 1942 in Leningrad. The main genre in which Ivan Bilibin worked is book graphics. In addition, he created various murals, panels and made scenery for theatrical productions, and was engaged in the creation of theatrical costumes.Nevertheless, most of the admirers of the talent of this wonderful Russian Slavic artist know him by his merits in the fine arts. I must say that Ivan Bilibin had a good school to study the art of painting and graphics. It all started with the drawing school of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts. Then there was the workshop of the artist A. Ashbe in Munich; at the school-workshop of Princess Maria Tenisheva, he studied painting under the guidance of Ilya Repin himself, then, under his own leadership, there was the Higher Art School of the Academy of Arts. Most of his life, I.Ya. Bilibin lived in St. Petersburg. He was a member of the association "World of Art". He began to show interest in the ethnographic style of painting after he saw a painting by the great artist Viktor Mikhailovich Vasnetsov "Heroes" at one of the exhibitions. For the first time, he created several illustrations in his recognizable "Bilibinsky" style after he accidentally ended up in the village of Yegny in the Tver province. The Russian hinterland with its dense untrodden forests, wooden houses, similar to the very fairy tales of Pushkin and the paintings of Viktor Vasnetsov, inspired him so much with its originality that he, without thinking twice, set about creating drawings. It was these drawings that became illustrations for the book "The Tale of Ivan Tsarevich, the Firebird and the Gray Wolf." We can say that it was here, in the heart of Russia, in its distant, lost in the forests, settlements, that all the talent of this wonderful artist manifested itself. After that, he began to actively visit other regions of our country and write more and more illustrations for fairy tales and epics. It was in the villages that the image of ancient Rus' was still preserved. People continued to wear ancient Russian costumes, held traditional holidays, decorated their houses with intricate carvings, and so on. Ivan Bilibin captured all this in his illustrations, making them head and shoulders above the illustrations of other artists due to their realism and accurately noticed details. His work is the traditions of ancient Russian folk art in a modern way, in accordance with all the laws of book graphics. What he did is an example of how modernity and the culture of the past of our great country can coexist. Being, in fact, an illustrator of children's books, he attracted the attention of a much larger audience of spectators, critics and connoisseurs of beauty with his art. In particular, and thanks to people like this artist, many of our compatriots began to be interested in the past, to deal with the problems of history and the restoration of traditions, the customs of their ancestors. Ivan Bilibin illustrated such tales as: “The Tale of Ivan Tsarevich, the Firebird and the Gray Wolf "(1899), "The Tale of Tsar Saltan" (1905), "Volga" (1905), "The Golden Cockerel" (1909), "The Tale of the Golden Cockerel" (1910) and others. In addition, he designed the covers of various magazines, including: World of Art, Golden Fleece, publications of Rosehip and Moscow Book Publishing House. Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin is famous not only for his illustrations in the traditional Russian style. After the February Revolution, he painted a double-headed eagle, which at first was the coat of arms of the Provisional Government, and from 1992 to this day adorns the coins of the Bank of Russia. The great Russian artist died in Leningrad during the blockade on February 7, 1942 in the hospital. The last work was an illustration for the epic "Duke Stepanovich". He was buried in a mass grave of professors of the Academy of Arts near the Smolensk cemetery. The brilliant words of Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin: “Only quite recently, like America, they discovered the old artistic Rus', vandal mutilated, covered with dust and mold. But even under the dust it was beautiful, so beautiful that the first minute impulse of those who opened it is quite understandable: to return! to return!".

Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin - Russian artist, graphic artist, theater artist, member of the "World of Art", author of illustrations for Russian fairy tales and epics in a decorative and graphic ornamental manner based on the stylization of the motifs of Russian folk and medieval art; one of the largest masters of the national-romantic direction in the Russian version of the Art Nouveau style.

BIOGRAPHY OF THE ARTIST

Ivan Bilibin was born on August 16 (August 4 according to the old style), 1876, in Tarkhovka, near St. Petersburg. A descendant of an old merchant family. He studied at the studio of Anton Azhbe in Munich (1898), as well as at the school-workshop of Princess Maria Klavdievna Tenisheva with Ilya Efimovich Repin (1898-1900). Lived in St. Petersburg, was an active member of the World of Art association.

In 1899, Bilibin arrived in the village of Yegny, Vesyegonsky district, Tver province. Here, for the first time, he creates illustrations in the later "Bilibino" style for his first book, The Tale of Ivan Tsarevich, the Firebird and the Gray Wolf.

During the revolution of 1905, the artist creates revolutionary caricatures.

Since 1907, Bilibin has been teaching a class of graphic art at the school of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, continuing teaching until 1917. Among his students at the school were G.I. Narbut, K.S. Eliseev, L.Ya. Hortik, A. Roosileht (August Roosileht), N.V. Kuzmin, Rene O'Connell, K.D. Voronets-Popova.

In 1915, he participated in the establishment of the Society for the Revival of Artistic Rus', along with many other artists of his time. After the October Revolution, Bilibin leaves for the Crimea in Batiliman, where he lives until September. Until December 1919, he was in Rostov-on-Don, then, with the retreat of the White Army, he ended up in Novorossiysk.

February 21, 1920 on the steamer "Saratov" Bilibin sails from Novorossiysk. Since 1920 he has been living in Cairo. In Egypt, Bilibin is working on sketches for panels and frescoes in the Byzantine style for the mansions of wealthy Greek merchants.

In February 1923, Bilibin marries the artist Alexandra Vasilievna Shchekatikhina-Pototskaya. In the summer of 1924 he travels with his family through Syria and Palestine. In October 1924 he settled in Alexandria. In August 1925, Bilibin moved to Paris.

In 1936 the artist returned to his homeland and settled in Leningrad. Bilibin teaches at the All-Russian Academy of Arts, continues to work as an illustrator and theater artist.

Bilibin died in besieged Leningrad on February 7, 1942 in a hospital at the All-Russian Academy of Arts. He was buried in the mass grave of professors of the Academy of Arts near the Smolensk cemetery.

CREATIVITY OF IVAN BILIBIN

Bilibin began to draw very early, and later clarified this: "As far as I can remember, I have always painted."

As an artist, Bilibin was “impressed” by the exhibition of works by V. M. Vasnetsov in the halls of the Academy of Arts (1898). The national-romantic trend in painting at that time captured him as a supporter and successor of the “contour line”, which Fyodor Tolstoy was so fond of 100 years earlier and which became the textured basis of drawing in Bilibin’s modern artistic style “modern”.

Illustrations for six Russian fairy tales (starting with the first and most notable "Tales of Ivan Tsarevich, the Firebird and the Gray Wolf"), which were published in 1901-1903, immediately made Bilibin's name famous. But he reached full social significance and creative heights in further works: two illustrative cycles "according to Pushkin" "The Tale of Tsar Saltan" and "The Tale of the Golden Cockerel" were acquired by the Russian Museum of Alexander III and the Tretyakov Gallery, respectively.

Ivan Tsarevich and the Firebird Ivan Tsarevich and Vasilisa the Beautiful Ivan Tsarevich and the Frog Princess

After the February Revolution, Bilibin drew a drawing of a double-headed eagle, which was used as the coat of arms of the Provisional Government, and since 1992 this eagle has been on the coins of the Bank of Russia.

Book, magazine and newspaper illustrations were only part of Bilibin's professional life.

Since 1904, he declared himself as a highly gifted theater artist, a connoisseur of ancient costumes of different peoples, but primarily Russian. Starting cooperation with the newly organized Old Theater in St. Petersburg (the idea of the director and theorist of the theater N.N. Evreinov), Bilibin participated in S. Diaghilev's enterprise, creating sketches of Russian costumes for M. Mussorgsky's opera "Boris Godunov" (1908), Spanish costumes for Lope de Vega's comedy "The Sheep Spring" and Calderon's drama "The Purgatory of St. Patrick" (1911), etc. Bilibin vividly demonstrated the art of decorator in the famous production of N. Rimsky-Korsakov's opera "The Golden Cockerel" (staged at the Moscow theater S Zimina in 1909).

Bilibin also has works related to church painting. In it, he remains himself, retains his individual style. After leaving St. Petersburg, Bilibin lived for some time in Cairo and actively participated in the design of the Russian house church in the premises of a clinic arranged by Russian doctors. According to his project, the iconostasis of this temple was built.

There is also a trace of him in Prague - he made sketches of frescoes and an iconostasis for a Russian church at the Olshansky cemetery in the Czech capital.

BILIBI STYLE

The Bilibino drawing is characterized by a graphical representation. Starting work on the drawing, Bilibin sketched out a sketch of the future composition. Black ornamental lines clearly limit the colors, set the volume and perspective in the plane of the sheet. Filling in black and white graphic drawing with watercolors only emphasizes the given lines. Bilibin generously uses ornament to frame the drawings.

INTERESTING FACTS FROM THE LIFE OF IVAN BILIBIN

Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin was going to become a lawyer, studied diligently at the Faculty of Law of St. Petersburg University and successfully completed the full course in 1900.

For those who are engaged in the revival of native traditions, I strongly recommend reading the article to the end.

In the previous article, about the fashion for Russian patterns in clothes during the period of the late 19th century and the beginning of the 20th, it was about some “tricks” that appear at a time when interest in Russian culture increases.

We will reveal this topic in more detail using the example of the work of the well-known artist Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin (1876 - 1942).

Most of those who were born in the USSR began to comprehend this world with Russian fairy tales “Vasilisa the Beautiful”, “Sister Alyonushka and Brother Ivanushka”, “Marya Morevna”, “Feather Finist-Yasna Sokol”, “White Duck”, “Princess- frog". Almost every child also knew the tales of Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin - "The Tale of the Fisherman and the Fish", "The Tale of Tsar Saltan", "The Tale of the Golden Cockerel".

Fairy tales were read by parents, grandparents from children's books with drawings. And we knew every fairy tale by heart and every picture in our favorite book. Pictures from books with fairy tales were one of the first images of ours that we absorbed naturally in a childish way. Just like in these pictures, we then imagined Vasilisa the Beautiful.

And most of these pictures belonged to the brush of Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin. Can you imagine what influence this artist had on our worldview, our perception of Russian myths, epics and fairy tales? Who is he?

Ivan Bilibin was born on August 4 (August 16), 1876, in Tarkhovka, near St. Petersburg.
The Bilibins family is a separate topic of consideration, let's just say that this family is from merchant merchants, as a result, the owners of factories. This is enough for now.

Next, we look at where Ivan Yakovlevich studied. He studied at the studio of Anton Azhbe in Munich (1898), as well as at the school-workshop of Princess Maria Klavdievna Tenisheva with Ilya Efimovich Repin (1898-1900). Systematic drawing classes under the guidance of Ilya Repin and acquaintance with the magazine and the World of Art society (!) contributed to the development of Bilibin's skill and general culture. Bilibin's work was greatly influenced by Japanese (!) xylography (woodcut).

Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin - is considered a Russian artist, graphic artist, theater artist, author of illustrations for Russian epics and fairy tales in a decorative and graphic ornamental manner based on the stylization of the motifs of Russian folk and medieval art, one of the largest masters of the "national-romantic" direction in the Russian version modern style (!).
But Bilibin himself considered himself a "nationalist artist."

Art Nouveau, at that time, sought to become a single synthetic style in which all elements from the human environment were made in the same key. Art Nouveau artists drew inspiration from the art of Ancient Egypt (!) and other ancient civilizations. The art of Japan, which became more accessible in the West with the beginning of the Meiji era, had a noticeable influence on the Art Nouveau style. A feature of Art Nouveau was the rejection of right angles and lines in favor of smoother, curved lines. Often, modern artists took ornaments from the plant world as the basis of their drawings. The “visiting card” of this style was Hermann Obrist’s embroidery “Blow of the Scourge”.

Further - more interesting.
Bilibin, living in St. Petersburg, was an active member of the World of Art association.
The founders of the "World of Art" (1898-1924) were the St. Petersburg artist Alexander Nikolaevich Benois and the "theatrical figure-philanthropist" Sergei Pavlovich Diaghilev

Reader, take the time to find information on the Internet about what kind of people they were. You will immediately understand the essence of the association that you belonged to or were close to:

Bakst Lev Samoilovich
Zionglinsky Yan Frantsevich
Dobuzhinsky Mstislav Valerianovich
Roerich Nicholas Konstantinovich
Purvit Wilhelm
Vereisky Georgy Semyonovich
Lansere Evgeny Evgenievich
Chambers Vladimir Yakovlevich
Mitrokhin Dmitry Isidorovich
Ostroumova-Lebedeva Anna Petrovna
Levitan Isaac Ilyich
Yakovlev Alexander Evgenievich
Somov Konstantin Andreevich
Golovin Alexander Yakovlevich
Grabar Igor Emmanuilovich
Korovin Konstantin Alekseevich
Kustodiev Boris Mikhailovich
Serov Valentin Alexandrovich
Vrubel Mikhail Alexandrovich

Sketch of a group portrait of the artists of the "World of Art". From left to right: I.E. Grabar, N.K. Roerich, E.E. Lansere, B.M. Kustodiev, I.Ya. Bilibin, A.P. Ostroumova-Lebedeva, A.N. Benois, G.I. Narbut, K.S. Petrov-Vodkin, N.D. Milioti, K.A. Somov, M.V. Dobuzhinsky.

This is such a fun environment!

Now you understand why the Bilibino "gingerbread kingdoms" are frankly surreal, riddled with crafty irony?

Now do you understand why Bilibin had an anti-monarchist-LIBERAL worldview?

That is why the artist took part in the satirical magazines Zhupel and Infernal Post, which appeared during the First Russian Revolution of 1905. His political grotesques stand out for their evil sarcasm, merciless to the existing system. Such, in particular, is the caricature of Nicholas II (“Donkey in 1/20 of natural size”, 1906), for which he was even subjected to a brief administrative arrest!

Yes, there was Bilibin on an expedition to the Russian North (1905–1908).
Yes, I was interested in the “pre-Petrine” era.
Yes, everything unique in his work began with an exhibition of Moscow artists in 1899, at which Bilibin saw Vasnetsov's painting "Bogatyrs".

That is why, brought up in a St. Petersburg environment, far from hobbies for the national past, the artist unexpectedly showed interest in Russian antiquity, fairy tales, folk art!

Yes, Bilibin was interested in the atmosphere of Russian antiquity, epic, fairy tales. And he had rich material of the expedition, photographs of embroidery of tablecloths, towels, peasant buildings, utensils, clothes. There were sketches made in the village of Yegny. These are painted wooden and earthenware, houses with carved architraves and chapels.

But Bilibin, despite the thoroughness of the technique of performing his works, did not seek to convey the originality of the patterns, ornaments and decorations of our ancestors!
But it was Russian patterns and ornaments that were the favorite motif of the ancient Russian masters and carried a deep semantic load.

But from genuine ornaments, details, Bilibin created a semi-real, semi-fantastic image! All page illustrations are surrounded by ornamental frames, just like rustic windows with carved platbands. But these ornamental frames do not carry originality and traditionalism, but reflect only Bilibin's view and have only a decorative function!

In the fairy tale “Vasilisa the Beautiful”, the illustration with the Red Horseman (the sun) is surrounded by flowers for some reason.

And the Black Horseman (night) is mythical birds with human heads.

The illustration with Baba Yaga's hut is surrounded by a frame with toadstools (what else could be next to Baba Yaga? Yes?).

Yes, and Baba Yaga herself is terrible and terrible!

Bilibin, having the opportunity to revive the art of the pre-Petrine era, created Art Nouveau, a "remake", that is, a "fake" - "trick". Very carefully executed, with elaboration of fonts, stylized as an old manuscript, distinguished by a patterned pattern and bright decorative effect "FALSE"!

Maybe that's why "The Tale of the Golden Cockerel" was the most successful artist? Bilibin achieves special brilliance and fiction in his illustrations. Luxurious royal chambers are completely covered with patterns, paintings, decorations. Here, the ornament so abundantly covers the floor, ceiling, walls, clothes of the king and the boyars that everything turns into a kind of unsteady vision that exists in a special illusory world and is about to disappear.

Just like in "The Tale of Tsar Saltan"

When the Bolsheviks came to power, Ivan Bilibin participated in the propaganda of the Denikin government, and in 1920 he was evacuated from Novorossiysk together with the White Army, lived in Cairo and Alexandria, where he actively worked in Alexandria, traveled around the Middle East, studying the artistic heritage of ancient civilizations and Christian Byzantine Empire.

Then, in 1925, he moved to Paris. In 1925 he settled in France: the work of these years - the design of the magazine "Firebird", "Readers on the history of Russian literature", books by Ivan Bunin, Sasha Cherny, as well as the painting of the Russian church in Prague, scenery and costumes for Russian operas The Tale of Tsar Saltan (1929), The Tsar's Bride (1930), The Tale of the City of Kitezh (1934) N.A. Rimsky-Korsakov, "Prince Igor" by A.P. Borodin (1930), "Boris Godunov" by M.P. Mussorgsky (1931), for the ballet The Firebird by I.F. Stravinsky (1931).

Bilibin created many colorful panels to decorate private houses and restaurants. His decorative style - patterned, exotically catchy - has become a kind of standard of "Russ style", that is, "Russian style", abroad, nourishing nostalgic memories. He also designed a number of Orthodox churches in Egypt and Czechoslovakia.

The "national-Bolshevik" turn in politics, the spread of the ideas of "Soviet patriotism", which were characteristic of the Stalin era, contributed, oddly enough, to Bilibin's return to his homeland. Having decorated the Soviet embassy in Paris with monumental patriotism (1935-1936), he again settled in Leningrad.

The storyteller Bilibin should be thanked for the double-headed eagle, which is depicted on the coat of arms of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, on ruble coins and paper banknotes. Interestingly, this eagle was originally located on the seal of the interim government.

In the picture gallery of paper money in modern Russia, on the ten-ruble "Krasnoyarsk" banknote, the Bilibin tradition is clearly traced: a vertical patterned path with a forest ornament - such frames framed Bilibin's drawings on the themes of Russian folk tales. By the way, in cooperation with the financial authorities of tsarist Russia, Bilibin transferred the copyright to many of his graphic designs to the Gosznak factory.

In the last decade of his life, Bilibin taught at the All-Russian Academy of Arts, still acting as a book and theater artist: he again designed The Tale of Tsar Saltan (as an opera by Nikolai Andreevich Rimsky-Korsakov at the State Theater of Opera and Ballet named after Sergei Mironovich Kirov, 1936-1937, and as a book by Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin, published in the same years in Goslit).

Sergei Eisenstein planned to involve Ivan Yakovlevich as an artist to work on the film "Ivan the Terrible", but the death of Bilibin did not allow this idea to come true.

Ivan Bilibin died on February 7, 1942, in besieged Leningrad. Why did he choose this outcome? Maybe because, despite his worldview, sometimes he felt love for the Motherland?

This can be evidenced by the words of Bilibin: “Only quite recently, like America, they discovered the old artistic Rus', vandal mutilated, covered with dust and mold. But even under the dust it was beautiful, so beautiful that the first minute impulse of those who discovered it is quite understandable: to return it! return!"

Everyone who believes in the revival of native traditions, who contributes to this, must reject attempts to falsify and distort traditional, primordial images.

Yes, pictures in books with fairy tales attract the attention of the child and arouse interest. But we must take into account what kind of pictures they are and whether they really reflect the wisdom that our ancestors passed on to us. It is best not to lure with pictures, but simply read fairy tales to the child and give him the opportunity to imagine and create images himself.
Encourage him to develop and draw these images on his own.
The result will be amazing!

Nevertheless, most of the admirers of the talent of this wonderful Russian know him by his merits in the fine arts. I must say that Ivan Bilibin had a good school to study the art of painting and graphics. It all started with the drawing school of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts. Then there was the workshop of the artist A. Ashbe in Munich; at the school-workshop of Princess Maria Tenisheva, he studied painting under the guidance of Ilya Repin himself, then, under his own leadership, there was the Higher Art School of the Academy of Arts.

Most of his life, I.Ya. Bilibin lived in St. Petersburg. He was a member of the World of Art association. He began to show interest in the ethnographic style of painting after he saw a painting by the great artist Viktor Mikhailovich Vasnetsov "Bogatyrs" at one of the exhibitions. For the first time, he created several illustrations in his recognizable "Bilibinsky" style after he accidentally ended up in the village of Yegny in the Tver province. The Russian hinterland with its dense untrodden forests, wooden houses, similar to the very fairy tales of Pushkin and the paintings of Viktor Vasnetsov, inspired him so much with its originality that he, without thinking twice, set about creating drawings. It was these drawings that became illustrations for the book "The Tale of Ivan Tsarevich, the Firebird and the Gray Wolf." We can say that it was here, in the heart of Russia, in its distant, lost in the forests, settlements, that all the talent of this wonderful artist manifested itself. After that, he began to actively visit other regions of our country and write more and more illustrations for fairy tales and epics. It was in the villages that the image of ancient Rus' was still preserved. People continued to wear ancient Russian costumes, held traditional holidays, decorated their houses with intricate carvings, and so on. Ivan Bilibin captured all this in his illustrations, making them head and shoulders above the illustrations of other artists due to their realism and accurately noticed details.

His work is the traditions of ancient Russian folk art in a modern way, in accordance with all the laws of book graphics. What he did is an example of how modernity and the culture of the past of our great country can coexist. Being, in fact, an illustrator of children's books, he attracted the attention of a much larger audience of spectators, critics and connoisseurs of beauty with his art.

Ivan Bilibin illustrated such tales as: "The Tale of Ivan Tsarevich, the Firebird and the Gray Wolf" (1899), "The Tale of Tsar Saltan" (1905), "Volga" (1905), "The Golden Cockerel" (1909 ), "The Tale of the Golden Cockerel" (1910) and others. In addition, he designed the covers of various magazines, including: World of Art, Golden Fleece, editions of Rosehip and Moscow Book Publishing House.

Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin is famous not only for his illustrations in the traditional Russian style. After the February Revolution, he painted a double-headed eagle, which at first was the coat of arms of the Provisional Government, and from 1992 to this day adorns the coins of the Bank of Russia. The great Russian artist died in Leningrad during the blockade on February 7, 1942 in the hospital. The last work was an illustration for the epic "Duke Stepanovich". He was buried in the mass grave of professors of the Academy of Arts near the Smolensk cemetery.

The brilliant words of Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin: “Only quite recently, like America, they discovered the old artistic Rus', vandal-mutilated, covered with dust and mold. But even under the dust it was beautiful, so beautiful that the first minute impulse of those who discovered it is quite understandable: to return it! return!".