Mark walked through the paintings. Marc Chagall - biography, information, personal life

The personality of Marc Chagall, one of the brightest and most outstanding avant-garde artists of the 20th century, still causes a lot of controversy - he is loved and scolded, admired and misunderstood. And this is not without reason, because his works are grotesque, symbolic and extraordinary. He lived a rich creative life: he was a painter, a graphic artist, an illustrator, a poet, and a master of decorative and applied arts - and everything he was not! But perhaps his main art was the art of seeing the world differently than other people. And today, everyone, looking at his paintings, can plunge into the amazing fairy-tale world of Marc Chagall.

The painting “Above the City,” painted between 1914 and 1918, is considered by many to be the most mysterious and strange in his work. Two lovers soar high in the sky above small, cozy Vitebsk. A man and a woman, having escaped from the bustle of the world, rose above the sleepy town. It is not difficult to recognize Chagall himself and his beloved Bella in this couple. The long-awaited moment of meeting after a tiring separation has arrived and now they can completely surrender to enjoying each other, forgetting about everything. Admiring them, the phrases “soar in the skies” and “fly with happiness” no longer seem so far-fetched and irrational, the boundary between dreams and reality blurs.

Symbolism and grotesquery are not only in the plot of the picture, but also in numerous details. For example, one cannot help but pay attention to the fact that lovers have one hand each - a symbol of unity, they have become one. A lonely green goat grazing, as well as a man with his pants down in the foreground, refer to the fabulousness and unreality of everything that is happening. Much attention is paid to Bella's feminine image. Her whole appearance speaks of her purity, innocence and youth: hair styled naturally, the deep calm look of her black eyes, a lace blouse and a long black skirt. She is safe, her groom holds her tightly, although his posture is light and relaxed.

However, Chagall, adhering to his style, did not draw large objects enough. The urban landscape and architecture are depicted schematically, everything seems to be covered with haze. The choice of the color scheme of the painting is also not accidental. The gray and faceless city, in contrast with the rich shades of the lovers’ clothes, tells us about the superiority of sincere feelings over boring everyday life.

But it’s not only the power of love that lifts this amazing couple off the ground, but also the power of art. All the strength and power of Chagall’s painting was combined in this picture - cubism, futurism, and true love.

Chagall's work has always been characterized by mythology and folklorism. All his paintings are filled with magic, but Chagall's love story with Bella, his main archetype and muse, was real. He dedicated all his work to her, always consulted and listened to his beloved.

Unraveling the mystery of this painting seems impossible. Everyone will see it differently. But, undoubtedly, no one will remain indifferent. After all, it refers to something so eternal, bright and simple - true love. And everyone can feel this.

Marc Chagall: “So that my painting glows with joy...”

Art critic Irina Yazykova explains why the work of an avant-garde artist is a biblical message

Three countries call the famous avant-garde artist “theirs” - Russia, France and Israel. Marc Chagall, a Jew by origin, was born in the then Russian Vitebsk and met his muse and main love there. He studied in St. Petersburg and Paris, in post-revolutionary Russia he prepared sketches of scenery for performances and designed the Jewish Chamber Theater. But Marc Chagall became a world celebrity in France, where he emigrated with his family in 1922.

Chagall's works include not only paintings. The artist illustrated “Dead Souls” by Gogol, “Fables” by La Fontaine, the collection of stories “A Thousand and One Nights” and the Bible in French. The Chagall Museum in Nice is called “The Biblical Message”.

Marc Chagall was also a master of monumental art: he made mosaics, stained glass, sculptures, and ceramics. He designed many Catholic and Lutheran churches and synagogues in Europe, the USA and Israel.

On the occasion of the 130th anniversary of the artist’s birth, art critic Irina Yazykova explains why the work of Marc Chagall cannot be perceived without a religious context, and talks about the main works with a biblical plot.

Irina Yazykova

From my early youth I was fascinated by the Bible. It always seemed to me, and it seems now, that this book is the greatest source of poetry of all time. For a long time I have been looking for its reflection in life and art. The Bible is like nature, and this is the mystery I am trying to convey.

- Marc Chagall, catalog for the opening of the Biblical Message Museum in Nice

Many art historians view Marc Chagall simply as one of the modernist artists of the 20th century. Some consider him a successor of naive art, others - a pure modernist. But Chagall is a special phenomenon in the twentieth century.

If Malevich developed various ideas, released loud manifestos, Kandinsky developed his philosophy and reflected it in the article “On the Spiritual in Art,” then Chagall did not have such a task. He did not declare anything, he simply expressed admiration for God’s world in his work. And it seems to me that it is wrong to perceive the works of Marc Chagall outside of a religious context.

As a child, I felt that there was some unsettling force in all of us. That's why my characters ended up in the sky before the astronauts.

- Marc Chagall, “It’s all in my paintings », Literary newspaper, 1985

Walk, 1917-18

Oil on canvas
169.6 × 163.4 cm
State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia

For him, everything was a miracle: life, love, beauty - all this was a manifestation of a miracle. Miraculously, he almost burned down before he was born: when his mother went into labor, a fire broke out in the house, and the woman in labor was carried out of the house on the bed. He later captured this incident in a painting and said that he had undergone a baptism of fire. And this, apparently, confirmed Chagall in the idea that he was born for something great. The artist believed that God intended him to depict the beauty of the world.

I don’t remember who, most likely my mother told me that just when I was born - in a small house by the road, behind the prison on the outskirts of Vitebsk - a fire broke out. The fire engulfed the entire city, including the poor Jewish quarter. The mother and baby at her feet, along with the bed, were carried to a safe place on the other side of the city.

But most importantly, I was born dead. I didn't want to live. A sort of, imagine, pale little lump that doesn’t want to live. It’s like I’ve seen enough of Chagall’s paintings. They pricked him with pins and dipped him in a bucket of water. And finally he meowed weakly.

Birth, 1910

Oil on canvas
65 × 89.5 cm
Art Museum, Zurich, Switzerland

What are the origins of Marc Chagall's religiosity?

Marc Chagall was born in Vitebsk, into a poor and very religious Jewish family, where everyone knew the Bible and the commandments well, went to the synagogue, prayed, lit candles on Saturday and had a meal. Chagall learned Hebrew early and began reading the Bible. The Bible became a book that accompanied the artist all his life. And religiosity was, one might say, in Chagall’s blood.

If only you knew how thrilled I was standing in the synagogue next to my grandfather. How much I, poor thing, had to push through before I could get there! And finally here I am, facing the window, with an open prayer book in my hands, and can admire the view of the place on Saturday. The blue seemed thicker under the prayerful hum. The houses floated peacefully in space. And every passerby is in full view.

The service begins, and the grandfather is invited to read a prayer in front of the altar. He prays, sings, plays a complex melody with repetitions. And in my heart it’s like a wheel is spinning under a stream of oil. Or it’s like fresh honeycomb honey is spreading through your veins. I don’t have enough words to describe evening prayer. I thought that all the saints gather in the synagogue on this day.

Saturday, 1910

Oil on canvas
90 x 95 cm
Wallraf Richards Museum, Cologne,
Germany.

Faith in the Jewish understanding, the Old Testament is the native environment for Marc Chagall. The prophets from his paintings often look the same as the old people from their native place. He felt them as his blood relatives: this is his history, his family. In addition, the Jews knew their ancestry well, down to the seventh, eighth, or even tenth generation. And when the father opposed his son’s decision to study painting, Chagall made the argument that his ancestor painted a synagogue in the 18th century.

One fine day (and there are no others in the world), when my mother was putting bread in the oven on a long shovel, I came up, touched her elbow, stained with flour, and said:

Mom... I want to be an artist. I will not be a clerk or an accountant. That's enough! No wonder I always felt that something special was about to happen. Judge for yourself, am I like others? What am I good for?

What? An artist? Yes, you're crazy. Let me go, don’t bother me with putting out the bread. ...

And yet it was decided. We'll go to Pan.

Me and the village, 1911

Oil on canvas
191 × 150.5 cm
Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA

The mother took her son to the Jewish artist Yehudi Pan, who at one time studied with Ilya Repin. Chagall studied classical painting, but did not endure it for long and began to paint as his soul demanded. In this sense, he was absolutely free: the main thing for Chagall was the image, and he sought its expressiveness.

The fences and roofs, log houses and fences and everything that opened up beyond them delighted me. A chain of houses and booths, windows, gates, chickens, a boarded-up little factory, a church, a gentle hill (an abandoned cemetery). Everything is in full view, if you look from the attic window, perched on the floor. I stuck my head outside and breathed in the fresh blue air. Birds flew past.

Above Vitebsk,
1915

39 x 31 cm
Art
Philadelphia Museum,
USA

How Marc Chagall differs from all avant-garde artists

What is avant-garde? Art that goes forward, that does what did not exist before. From this point of view, Chagall is, of course, an avant-garde artist. Each avant-garde artist creates his own world and style. Chagall's world is a world of love, beauty and miracle. And both the style and manner of the artist are subordinated to this. This distinguishes him from many artists of the 20th century, who very often depicted tragedies, the negative sides of the world, not beauty, but ugliness. And although Chagall also has negative things and tragic images, the main motive is still love and freedom, joy and beauty.

Personally, I'm not sure that theory is such a boon for art. Impressionism and cubism are equally alien to me.
In my opinion, art is, first of all, a state of mind.
And the soul is holy for all of us who walk on the sinful earth.
The soul is free, it has its own mind, its own logic.
And only there there is no falsehood, where the soul itself, spontaneously, reaches that stage that is usually called literature, irrationality.

I don’t mean old realism, not symbolic romanticism, which brought little new, not mythology, not phantasmagoria, but... but what, Lord, what?

Betrothed and the Eiffel Tower, 1913

Oil on canvas
77 x 70 cm
National Museum of Marc Chagall, Nice, France

In addition, most often the avant-garde artists were non-believers, even anti-clerical; some, however, were inspired by religious art (Goncharova, Petrov-Vodkin, even Malevich), but understood in their own way. And Chagall combines religion and the avant-garde.

Apparently, he inherited a lot from Hasidic Judaism. And Hasidim pay great attention to emotions, be it sincere joy or deep repentance before God. Their prayer is expressed not only in words, but also in singing and dancing. This was also passed on to Chagall and was reflected in the nature of his painting.

There was a holiday: Sukkot or Simchas Torah. They are looking for grandfather, he is missing. Where, oh where is he?

It turns out that he climbed onto the roof, sat on a chimney and gnawed on carrots, enjoying the good weather. A wonderful picture.

Let anyone, with delight and relief, find the key to my paintings in the innocent quirks of my family. If my art did not play any role in the life of my relatives, then their lives and their actions, on the contrary, greatly influenced my art.

Feast of Tabernacles(Sukkot), 1916

Canvas, gouache
33 x 41 cm
Gallery Rosengart, Lucerne, Switzerland.

What are the features of Marc Chagall's figurative language?

First of all, Chagall has a special, spherical perspective. He sees the world from a bird's or angel's perspective and wants to embrace the world entirely. And this is also connected with his perception of life, the desire to rise above everyday life, above the uncomfortable world. He believed that man was created free, capable of flying, for love, and it is love that lifts man above the world. Although at the beginning of the twentieth century everyone, to some extent, dreamed of flying, overcoming space and time.

Artist, where is this good? What will people say?

This is how they honored me in the house of my bride, and in the mornings and evenings she brought warm homemade pies, fried fish, boiled milk, pieces of fabric for draperies and even planks that served as my palette to my workshop.

Just open the window - and she is here, and with her azure, love, flowers.

From those ancient times to this day, she, dressed in white or black, hovers in my paintings, illuminating my path in art. I don’t finish a single painting or a single engraving until I hear it “yes” or “no”.

Above the city
1918

Oil on canvas
56 x 45 cm
State
Tretyakovskaya
gallery.

Like many artists, Chagall was passionate about the revolution, and on its first anniversary he was appointed commissar of art in Vitebsk. The artist had to paint the streets and make posters. But suddenly a huge scandal broke out: instead of red flags, the Bolshevik authorities saw flying cows, angels and lovers hovering above the earth on the posters.

The commissioners seemed less pleased. Why, pray tell, is the cow green and the horse flying across the sky? What do they have in common with Marx and Lenin?

Chagall could not understand the reasons for the discontent, he was for freedom! And flying is an expression of freedom. Moreover, he was in love then - the artist adored his young wife Bella. The state when a person can create, love, fly to heaven - in Chagall’s understanding, this was absolute freedom. The artist's revolutionary career ended there.

Birthday, 1915

Oil, cardboard
80.5 × 99.5 cm
Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA.

I would not be at all surprised if, a short time after my departure, the city destroys all traces of my existence in it and generally forgets about the artist who, having abandoned his own brushes and paints, suffered and fought to instill Art here, dreamed of turning simple houses into museums, and ordinary people - into creators.

But Chagall's path continued and, inspired by his love, he works tirelessly and writes everything that his eye sees and his soul feels. Chagall sees the world transformed. On the one hand, in this world everything is simple, close, recognizable: houses, people, cows... That’s why Chagall’s language seems naive, simple, almost childish babble, but behind this simplicity and naivety an amazing philosophical depth is revealed. Sometimes it seems that the drawing is somehow incorrect, the compositions are confusing, but if you look closely, Chagall arranges his paintings very clearly, moreover, he often creates a composition as a piece of music, polyphony. He has vibrant colors and memorable images.

Here, in the Louvre, in front of the paintings of Manet, Millet and others, I understood why I could not fit into Russian art.

Why is my language alien to my compatriots?
Why didn't they believe me? Why did the artistic circles reject me? Why in Russia I have always been the fifth wheel in the cart.
Why does everything I do seem strange to Russians, but everything they do seems far-fetched to me? So why?

I can't talk about it anymore.
I love Russia too much.

Artist over Vitebsk, 1977-78.

Oil on canvas
65 × 92 cm
Private collection

How to understand the paintings of Marc Chagall

The world in his paintings is diverse; you can often find incompatible things. Chagall's language is a bit fanciful; you definitely can't call him a realist. But Chagall knows more about reality than anyone else, and he encourages us to look deeper into it. So, for example, he draws a cow with a human face, and inside it there is a calf, a new life. Chagall sees the inner, the hidden. He sees the meaning of this world, knows that God created it with love and wants people to live in love. In all his works there is admiration for the beauty of creation.

I wandered the streets, looking for something and praying: “Lord, you who hide in the clouds or behind the cobbler’s house, make my soul manifest, the poor soul of a stuttering boy. Show me my way. I don't want to be like others, I want to see the world in my own way.

And in response, the city burst like a violin string, and people, leaving their usual places, began to walk above the ground. My friends sat down to rest on the roofs.

The colors mix, turn into wine, and it foams on my canvases.

Artist: to the moon, 1917

Gouache and watercolor, paper
32 × 30 cm
Private collection

Chagall's paintings are very interesting to look at and interpret; every detail in his work means something. At first glance they seem very simple, but you start to take it apart and see the essentials behind ordinary things. At this time, no one has such layers. And this comes precisely from his biblical view of the world.

Dark. Suddenly the ceiling opens, thunder, light - and a swift winged creature bursts into the room in a cloud of clouds.
Such a flutter of wings.

Angel! - I think. And I can’t open my eyes - the light was too bright from above. The winged guest flew around all the corners, rose again and flew out into the gap in the ceiling, taking with him the shine and blue.

And again darkness. I'm waking up.
This vision is depicted in my painting “Apparition”.

Apparition, 1918

Private collection

Biblical scenes in the works of Marc Chagall:
main works

Praying Jew (Rabbi of Vitebsk), 1914

Oil on canvas
104 × 84 cm
Museum of Modern Art, Venice, Italy

This picture was painted in Vitebsk. For prayer, Jews put on a cape (tallit), tie phylacteries - boxes with texts of the Holy Scriptures, and sit, swaying, and pray. And they can pray like this for hours. Chagall was fascinated by this. And in this picture he doesn't just show the beauty of black and white, although it is beautifully done. But the internal state is also important here: God and man, life and death, black and white. Chagall always goes beyond what he paints, he always wants to show the depth of life.

I also had half a dozen uncles or a little more. All are real Jews. Some with a fat belly and an empty head, some with a black beard, some with a chestnut one. A painting, and that’s all.

On Saturdays, Uncle Nekh put on an inferior tales and read the Scriptures aloud. He played the violin. Played like a shoemaker. Grandfather loved to listen to him thoughtfully.

Only Rembrandt could understand what this old man - a butcher, a merchant, a cantor - was thinking about, listening to his son play the violin in front of a window stained with rain splashes and traces of greasy fingers.

Street violinist, 1912-13.

Oil on canvas
188 × 158 cm
City Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands

The Fiddler on the Roof is a well-known Jewish image. And this is always a symbol of something important, since violinists were invited to the most solemn moments: a wedding or a funeral. Just as our bells ring, so the violinist goes out onto the roof and notifies everyone of joy or sadness. Like an angel, he connects heaven and earth: in Chagall he stands with one foot on the roof and the other on the ground. In this picture we see both a church and a synagogue, as was the case in many places. Chagall grew up on this and, along with Jewish culture, adopted Christian culture.

Around are churches, fences, shops, synagogues, simple and eternal buildings, like in Giotto's frescoes. My sad and cheerful city! As a child, as a fool, I looked at you from our threshold. And you completely opened up to me. If the fence got in the way, I stood up to attack. If it wasn’t visible anyway, he climbed onto the roof. And what? Grandfather climbed there too. And I looked at you as much as I wanted.

Loneliness, 1933

Oil on canvas
102 × 169 cm
Tel Aviv Art Museum, Israel

This picture is already from the 30s. What do we see here? A seated prophet with the Torah or a simple Jew. And then there is a cow with a completely human face and a violin nearby, and an angel flies above them. What is this picture about? It is about man before God. The Jew sits and thinks about his existence.

And everything becomes spiritual. In the calf one can see the image of a calf - a symbol of sacrifice: a white animal, without a spot of blemish. Man, angel, animal, heaven and earth, Torah and violin - this is the universe, and man comprehends its meaning and reflects on its destinies. I would like to remember the words from the Psalm: “What is man, that you remember him, and the son of man, that you visit him?” (Ps. 8:5).

"The Bible Message" by Marc Chagall -
series of illustrations for the Bible

In the 1930s, French book publisher Ambroise Vollard invited Marc Chagall to make illustrations for the Bible. The artist, of course, is fascinated by this idea, and he takes it very seriously: taking advantage of the order, he goes on a trip to Palestine to get a feel for the country about which he has read so much, but has never been.

For ten years he has been creating a series of prints called “Biblical Message”. Initially, this cycle was conceived in black and white. And in 1956, the Bible with Chagall’s illustrations was published as a separate book, it included 105 engravings. After the war, the artist became acquainted with color lithography, and from that moment on he continued to illustrate biblical scenes in color. Marc Chagall's illustrations for the Bible are like nothing else. No one could illustrate the Bible like that. All these illustrations made up the exhibition of the Marc Chagall Museum in Nice, which opened in 1973 and was called “The Biblical Message”.

Illustrations in graphics:

Abraham and three angels

A well-known biblical story about the visit of the forefather Abraham by three messengers of God or by God Himself. Abraham is depicted facing us, and we see the angels only from the back. Chagall remembered the covenant that God cannot be depicted, so he does not show the faces of angels. True, in later works he will portray God. In this sense, he was an infinitely free person; for him there was no question: is it possible to draw like this? As the soul demands, so he draws.

Abraham mourns Sarah

On the one hand, Chagall is not a realist, but on the other hand, he depicts some things so deeply that a realistic artist cannot always do so. He depicts the grief of Abraham mourning the death of Sarah in such a way that it cannot but touch.

Jacob's fight with the angel

The freedom of the artist and the originality of his thinking are sometimes amazing. In this picture, the angel with whom Jacob enters into combat is clearly not slender, this is not a light unearthly creature. It’s like two Jewish teenagers are fighting here, and it’s not yet clear who will win. Chagall shows sacred events through the realities of Jewish life familiar to him. But these seemingly everyday details in no way diminish the high spiritual pathos of these works.

Joseph and Potiphar's wife

The biblical story from the life of Joseph is illustrated in the traditions of naive folk painting. Such a naked beauty with round breasts, reclining on a bed, and a poor young man who does not know how to dodge her. Chagall is not afraid to depict sacred events with irony. For him, Holy Scripture is not a sacred cow that cannot be approached. This is a text that we should reflect on, which gives a projection on our lives and helps us understand ourselves.

Mariam and the women dance after the Exodus

The dance of Mariam and the Israeli wives is full of joyful passion. Surely Chagall saw such women in his shtetl. He was in close contact with Hasidic culture, and Hasidim are very musical, and their prayer is expressed, among other things, in dance.

Marc Chagall, along with the avant-garde artists Heinrich Emsen and Hans Richter, was an artist whose genius frightened and repelled. When creating paintings, he was guided solely by instinct: compositional structure, proportions and light and shade were alien to him.

It is extremely difficult for a person lacking imagery of thought to visually perceive the creator’s paintings, because they do not fit into the concept of exemplary painting and are strikingly different from classical works and works, where the accuracy of lines is elevated to the rank of absolute.

Childhood and youth

Movsha Khatskelevich (later Moses Khatskelevich and Mark Zakharovich) Chagall was born on July 6, 1887 in the Belarusian city of Vitebsk, within the boundaries of the Russian Empire, separated for the residence of Jews. The head of the Khatskel family, Mordukhov Chagall, worked as a loader in a herring merchant’s shop. He was a quiet, pious and hard-working man. The artist's mother Feig-Ita was an energetic, sociable and enterprising woman. She ran the household and managed her husband and children.

From the age of five, Movsha, like any Jewish boy, attended cheder (primary school), where he studied prayers and the Law of God. At the age of 13, Chagall entered the Vitebsk city four-year school. True, studying did not give him much pleasure: at that time Mark was an unremarkable stuttering boy who, due to lack of self-confidence, could not find a common language with his peers.

Provincial Vitebsk became for the future artist both his first friend, his first love, and his first teacher. Young Moses enthusiastically painted endless genre scenes, which he watched every day from the windows of his house. It is worth noting that the parents did not have any special illusions about their son’s artistic abilities. The mother repeatedly placed drawings of Moses instead of napkins on the dining table, and the father did not want to hear about his son’s training with the eminent Vitebsk painter Yudel Pan at that time.

The ideal of the Chagall patriarchal family was a son-accountant or, at worst, a son-clerk in the house of a wealthy entrepreneur. Young Moses begged his father for money for a drawing school for a couple of months. When the head of the family got tired of his son’s tearful requests, he threw the required amount of money out the open window. The future grafist had to collect the rubles that had scattered across the dusty pavement in front of the laughing inhabitants.

Studying was difficult for Movsha: he was a promising painter and a poor student. Subsequently, these two contradictory character traits were noted by all people who tried to influence Chagall’s artistic education. Already at the age of fifteen, he considered himself an unsurpassed genius and therefore could hardly withstand the comments of his teachers. According to Mark, only a great one could be his mentor. Unfortunately, there were no artists of this level in the small town.

Having saved money, Chagall, without telling his parents, left for St. Petersburg. The capital of the empire seemed to him the promised land. There was the only art academy in Russia, where Moses was going to enter. The harsh truth of life made the necessary adjustments to the young man’s rosy dreams: he failed his first and last official exam. The doors of the prestigious educational institution never opened to the genius. The guy, not used to giving up, entered the Drawing School of the Society for the Encouragement of the Arts, headed by Nicholas Roerich. There he studied for 2 months.

In the summer of 1909, despairing of finding his way in art, Chagall returned to Vitebsk. The young man fell into depression. Paintings from this period reflect the dejected inner state of an unrecognized genius. He was often seen on the bridge over Vitba. It is unknown what these decadent moods could have led to if Chagall had not met the love of his life, Bertha (Bella) Rosenfeld. The meeting with Bella filled his empty vessel of inspiration to the brim. Mark wanted to live and create again.

In the fall of 1909 he returned to St. Petersburg. To the desire to find a mentor equal to his talent, a new fixed idea was added: the young man decided to conquer the Northern capital at all costs. Letters of recommendation helped Chagall enter the prestigious drawing school of the eminent philanthropist Zvantseva. The artistic process of the educational institution was led by the painter Lev Bakst.

According to the testimony of Moses' contemporaries, Bakst took him without any complaints. Moreover, it is reliably known that Lev paid for the training of a budding graphic artist. Bakst directly told Movsha that his talent would not take root in Russia. In May 1911, Chagall went to Paris on a scholarship received from Maxim Vinaver, where he continued his studies. In the capital of France, he first began to sign his works with the name Mark.

Painting

Chagall began his artistic biography with the painting “The Dead Man.” In 1909, the works “Portrait of My Bride in Black Gloves” and “Family” were written, created under the influence of neo-primitivist style. In August 1910, Mark left for Paris. The central works of the Parisian period were “Me and My Village”, “Russia, Donkeys and Others”, “Self-Portrait with Seven Fingers” and “Calvary”. At the same time, he painted the canvases “Snuff” and “Praying Jew,” which made Chagall one of the artistic leaders of the reviving Jewish culture.

In June 1914, his first personal exhibition opened in Berlin, which included almost all the paintings and drawings created in Paris. In the summer of 1914, Mark returned to Vitebsk, where he was caught by the outbreak of the First World War. In 1914–1915, a series of paintings consisting of seventy works was created, based on impressions from nature (portraits, landscapes, genre scenes).

In pre-revolutionary times, epically monumental typical portraits were created (“Newspaper Seller”, “Green Jew”, “Praying Jew”, “Red Jew”), paintings from the “Lovers” cycle (“Blue Lovers”, “Green Lovers”, “Pink” lovers") and genre, portrait, landscape compositions ("Mirror", "Portrait of Bella in a White Collar", "Above the City").

In the early summer of 1922, Chagall went to Berlin to find out about the fate of the works exhibited before the war. In Berlin, the artist learned new printing techniques - etching, drypoint, woodcut. In 1922, he engraved a series of etchings intended to serve as illustrations for his autobiography “My Life” (a folder with engravings “My Life” was published in 1923). The book, translated into French, was published in Paris in 1931. To create a series of illustrations for the novel “Dead Souls” in 1923, Mark Zakharovich moved to Paris.

In 1927, a series of gouaches “Circus Vollard” appeared with its crazy images of clowns, harlequins and acrobats, which were cross-cutting throughout Chagall’s work. By order of the Minister of Propaganda of Nazi Germany in 1933, the master’s works were publicly burned in Mannheim. The persecution of Jews in Nazi Germany and the premonition of an approaching catastrophe painted Chagall's works in apocalyptic tones. In the pre-war and war years, one of the leading themes of his art was the crucifixion (“White Crucifixion”, “Crucified Artist”, “Martyr”, “Yellow Christ”).

Personal life

The first wife of an outstanding artist was the daughter of a jeweler, Bella Rosenfeld. He later wrote: “For many years her love illuminated everything I did.” Six years after their first meeting, on July 25, 1915, they got married. With the woman who gave him his daughter Ida, Mark lived a long and happy life. True, fate worked out in such a way that the artist outlived his muse: Bella died of sepsis in an American hospital on September 2, 1944. Then, returning after the funeral to the empty house, he put a portrait of Bella, which he had painted back in Russia, on an easel, and asked Ida to throw away all the brushes and paints.

“Artistic mourning” lasted 9 months. Only thanks to the attention and care of his daughter did he return to life. In the summer of 1945, Ida hired a nurse to care for her father. This is how Virginia Haggard appeared in Chagall’s life. A romance broke out between them, which gave Mark a son, David. In 1951, the young lady left Mark for the Belgian photographer Charles Leirens. She took her son and abandoned 18 works by the artist, given to her at different times, leaving only two of his drawings for herself.

Moses again wanted to commit suicide, and in order to distract his father from painful thoughts, Ida brought him together with the owner of a London fashion salon, Valentina Brodskaya. Chagall arranged his marriage with her 4 months after meeting her. The creator’s daughter has regretted this pimping more than once. The stepmother did not allow Chagall’s children and grandchildren to see him, “inspired” him to paint decorative bouquets because they “sold well,” and thoughtlessly spent her husband’s fees. The painter lived with this woman until his death, however, continuing to constantly paint Bella.

Death

The eminent artist died on March 28, 1985 (98 years old). Mark Zakharovich was buried in the local cemetery of the commune of Saint-Paul-de-Vence.

Today, Marc Chagall's works can be seen in galleries in France, the USA, Germany, Russia, Belarus, Switzerland and Israel. The memory of the great artist is also honored in his homeland: the house in Vitebsk, in which the graphic artist lived for a long time, was turned into a Chagall house-museum. Fans of the painter’s work to this day can see with their own eyes the place where the avant-garde artist created his masterpieces.

Works

"Dream" (1976);
“A Spoonful of Milk” (1912);
“Green Lovers” (1917);
“Russian Wedding” (1909);
"Purim" (1917);
"The Musician" (1920);
“For Vava” (1955);
“Peasants at the Well” (1981);
"The Green Jew" (1914);
"Cattle Dealer" (1912);
"The Tree of Life" (1948);
"The Clown and the Fiddler" (1976);
"Bridges over the Seine" (1954);
"The Couple or the Holy Family" (1909);
"Street Performers at Night" (1957);
"Reverence for the Past" (1944);

To understand Chagall Mark Zakharovich, a short biography may not be enough. Therefore, I will introduce you not just to dates, but to a way of life, thoughts, experiences, and creativity. Although there is no complete catalog of works and the number of all masterpieces is not reliably known, I will show the most famous paintings that have excited the consciousness of people all over the world for decades.

Biography

Marc Chagall's real name is Moses Khatskelevich Chagall. The artist is of Belarusian-Jewish origin, born in Vitebsk on July 7, 1887. He had Russian and French citizenship, lived a significant part of his life in his hometown, St. Petersburg, Moscow, and he also liked life in Provence, France. In addition, he worked in the USA, Israel, and many European countries. The appearance of Vitebsk and nearby villages, provincial life, folklore - these images and motifs passed through all the artist’s work, no matter where he was.

Mark began painting as a child. So his first teacher, Yudel Peng, was a prominent figure in the “Jewish Renaissance” in the art of the early twentieth century. Then his education continued in St. Petersburg. As the artist himself wrote: “... I, a ruddy and curly-haired young man, am going to St. Petersburg with a friend. It’s decided!” It would be untrue to say that his father supported his decision, but at the same time he did not delay him by force in Vitebsk. He gave me 27 rubles and promised that he was not going to help in the future.

In St. Petersburg, Marc Chagall studied under the guidance of Nicholas Roerich at the Drawing School of the Society for the Encouragement of the Arts. Next was the private school of Elizaveta Zvantseva, where he took classes from Lev Bakst. The teacher recognized the young man’s talent and paid for his art training. Although it cannot be said that there were no disagreements between them, in response to Bakst’s words that Chagall’s line was crooked and he would not soon become a true artist, Mark, leaving, told the teacher that he was a talented fool, and Marc Chagall was a genius. At the same time, Bakst immediately besieged Chagall - his work would not take root in Russia. But, fortunately, the artist had the opportunity to find out what impression his paintings would make on the European viewer already in 1911. It was then that he received a scholarship from Maxim Vinaver and went to Paris. While studying at the Academie de la Palette, Chagall was influenced by Cubism. But at the same time, critics noted that the avant-garde artist’s works differed from the “arrogant” paintings of the Cubists.

In 1913, the artist’s first personal exhibition in Paris opened at the Maria Vasilyeva Academy. In the same year, the paintings were shown at the First German Autumn Salon in Berlin.

After an exhibition in Germany, artist Marc Chagall returns to Vitebsk. He did not intend to stay in his hometown for long; his goal at that time was to get married and take his beloved with him to Europe. But the plans did not come to fruition. The beginning of the First World War, closed Russian borders. Afterwards, the genius of his time worked in the theater - his path was eventful and unpredictable. The years of Marc Chagall's life often depended on some kind of providence, but without this there would not have been such bright and meaningful paintings written by a genius. The artist died on March 28, 1985 in Provence, France, while going up to his studio.

Personal life

Mark's friends during his studies in St. Petersburg were young intellectuals passionate about poetry and art. In these circles, he met his first wife and, no matter how pretentious it may sound, the muse of his life - Bella Rosenfeld. The artist's contemporaries describe him as an extremely charming person with a smile that was conducive to heart-to-heart conversations. It was precisely such an open person who appeared before Bella.

Returning to Russia after living in France, Mark married Bella in 1915. A year later, the couple had a daughter, who later became a researcher of her father’s work and his biographer. Later, the artist remarried. In total, he had three wives, including one civilian, but his heart was always devoted to Bella.

The work of Marc Chagall

“Gravity breaker” is exactly what screenwriter and playwright Dmitry Minchenko called Marc Chagall, who studied the life and work of the artist and was familiar with his family and friends.

Oddly enough, realist artists always claimed that Chagall could not write. His works contain a lot of irrational, metaphorical, and sometimes even expressive things.

Psychoanalytically, Mark Zakharovich had a fierce love for the color red. People who have examined his work believe that this is due to the fact that the artist was born in a fire. Not far from the house where he was about to be born, buildings caught fire. And so the woman in labor was carried further away from the fire. It was in such turmoil that a genius emerged. At one time, Picasso, looking at the paintings of Marc Chagall, said: “Everything is good in your life, but the red is too rough.” As Chagall said, he himself did not immediately realize the meaning of his “rough” red. Only over time he explained that such a color palette appeared during the times of his life, filled with experiences and thoughts about the proximity of death.

Very typical of Chagall's works during the First World War, but it cannot be said that they were “permeated with the spirit of struggle” or anything like that. In 1915, Mark Zakharovich got married, so most of his works are confirmation of a happy marriage. At this time, the paintings “Birthday” and “Double Portrait with a Glass of Wine” appeared. Although the artist sometimes raised social problems of society in his works, they were all written out allegorically.

Marc Chagall loved to depict references to proverbs and various folk wisdom in his canvases, thus he emphasized his attachment to the people, to their mind, and at the same time, as if he was starting a game with the viewer. In this case, it is not surprising that imagery of thought is what people need to perceive the paintings.

If you want to find out what Marc Chagall himself thought about himself and those around him, his genius, I recommend reading the autobiographical book “My Life”. It is publicly available on the Internet.

Marc Chagall - paintings with titles

"White Crucifix", 1938

The painting is an allegory about the persecution of Jews in Central and Eastern Europe. When Mark Zakharovich fell into depression, he developed a difficult relationship with reality, he began to paint a crucifix. At the time when the artist lived, a crucifix painted by a Jew was considered null and void; no one ever bought it. And Vava (Valentina Brodskaya, Chagall’s second legal wife) told her husband that it was worth painting flowers, for which there would definitely be a demand.

"Walk", 1917

The painting was painted in the first two years of his life with his wife Bella Rosenfeld. The canvas depicts a kind of lyrical flight, which conveys the desire to soar upward, away from everyday life, from the revolution. The eternal theme of love is revealed. Chagall wrote in his autobiography that “An artist sometimes needs to be in swaddling clothes” - to see everything with the unblinded gaze of a child. Also in this picture the proverb “Better a bird in the hand than a crane in the sky” is played out. In the picture, Mark is holding a bird in his lowered right hand, while in his left he grabbed the “crane” - Bella. The artist probably wants to say that you don’t always have to make a choice.

"Bella in a White Collar", 1917

The painting depicts Bella, who towers over everything, including the artist’s life. It symbolizes the omnipresence of the image of the beloved.

"Me and the Village", 1911

The picture is woven from various fragments of memories, which individually give rise to different associations, but always connected with Vitebsk.

"Self-Portrait with Seven Fingers", 1913

An eccentric portrait-interpretation of the Jewish proverb about a jack of all trades. The painting is a joke on one’s own skill.

"Above the City", 1918

This is the third painting in the triptych from the paintings “Double Portrait with a Glass of Wine”, “Walk” and “Lovers Over the City”. She is the embodiment of the metaphor of “flying with happiness.” The author depicted in the picture all the most important things in that period of his life - family well-being with Bella and hometown of Marc Chagall– Vitebsk.

"Reclining Nude", 1911

Mark Zakharovich loved to paint naked women; a similar image can be found more than once on his canvases. He admired perfection and absolute beauty. The artist’s relatives said that he himself sometimes liked to paint completely naked in the studio, which gave openness to ideas and increased receptivity.

"The Violinist", 1923-1924

The plot of the picture is characterized by the word “too much”, adding to it “rich”, “unusual”, “colorful”. This characterizes a certain dynamics of the canvas, its internal energy.