Aivazovsky Museum Overview in Feodosia

Not all artists, whose names are now ready to gather crowds of admirers of talent at the exhibition of their works, felt themselves to be fully successful creatively in life. As Balzac said: “Glory is the sun of the dead”, alas, these words can be attributed to artists with depressing frequency.

However, among the series of high-profile names, there are those who, during their lifetime, were not just accepted, but in every possible way respected, commercially successful and recognized by colleagues and fans of painting. One of these artists - Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky.

Today you can see the paintings of the master mainly on the second floor of the mansion. Of course, every second visitor to the museum in Feodosia comes here to see the textbook "The Ninth Wave", perhaps, the main visiting card of the master. But this picture is in the State Russian Museum in St. Petersburg. But the work "Among the Waves", no less strong and ambitious, takes pride of place in the Theodosia Gallery. By the way, he created her painter at the age of 80 years.

The museum has about 400 works of the master, and in general there are more than 12 thousand exhibits here. No less interesting to visitors will be to look at the household items of the Aivazovsky family, their personal belongings, photographs.

The museum lives: every year many tourists seek to visit the most famous marine painter. Pleases high-quality lighting showrooms. The mansion has a lot of windows, and old chandeliers hang from the ceiling.

The tour will take you through the main hall, the painter's workshop, the body of his sister's house. And in the museum there is a secret room, you can go there for a fee. Aivazovsky's personal belongings are kept there: a real easel, a personal notebook, and so on.

Interestingly, luck in some sense accompanied the work of the artist and after his death. Museum works could easily disappear during the Nazi occupation, but they were sent to Yerevan on time and after the war all evacuated works returned to their homeland.

300,000 visitors pass through the museum annually. Large scientific conferences and festivals of classical music are regularly held on the basis of the gallery. The museum is located at: ul. Gallery, house 2. It is not far from the railway station.

The exhibition complex is structured so that the visitor sees the pictures in the order of their writing. This shows not only the creative way of the artist, but the evolution of his skill. From the canvas to the canvas, the marine painter became more precise in the details, in the methods of transmitting light, working with color and composition. Such an exhibition structure is useful to novice artists.who can likewise find the best illustration of theoretical knowledge.

The gallery is also a place where works of Aivazovsky's followers and students are carefully kept. Here you can see the paintings of Arkhip Kuindzhi, Adolf Vessler, Mikhail Latri.

There are museums whose semantic center is two or three famous works for which tourists travel from afar. But in the gallery Aivazovsky, despite the outstanding, not in need of representation to lovers of painting St. George Monastery, Sea. Koktebel "," Sevastopol raid " and the unfinished “Ship Blast”, there are many less famous works. And they can not be called secondary.

12 000 items of exhibits in the collection of the museum complex - this is really the property of the gallery. Some tourists find themselves disappointed that the notorious “Ninth Wave” is not in the museum. But in part can compensate for this artistic experiments of Maximilian Voloshin and Lev Lagorioas well as picturesque, noteworthy canvases of marine painters of the Western European school.

The full exposition of the museum shows Aivazovsky as an enthusiastic, energetic person who has managed to realize quite a few initiatives in his long and fruitful life. But even if you are surprised by his work outside the status of a marine painter, if the very atmosphere of the house is delighted, the exhibits talking about the artist's life, the seascapes still remain in the foreground.

Those who have previously seen only the reproductions of famous paintings will certainly be impressed. Live they look even bigger, epoch-making. Decorated in heavy frames, they convey the power of the elements: inexorable and victorious, demolishing everything in their path.

It is impossible to compare even with an outstanding artistic photo: it seems that the famous marine painter has tuned his visual analyzer to the utmost clarity - the shades of water change with a stunning difference in color. From the pure, almost innocent sky-blue to the open black mouth of the deep sea. AND each landscape has its own mood, its own promise.

Some reproductions seem gloomy to the viewer, but seeing them alive, one does not appreciate gloom and in no case monotony, but the smallest details of the example of nature snatched from the eye and heart of the artist. To write like this, you need not just to be attentive, to be able to work with kind, you need to be born in these parts. Individual works are enormous both in size and in emotional charge.

It is difficult to compare these fundamental works with something. The gallery does not look like a house where only a few of the first significance of the paintings are exhibited: the grandeur of the halls large enough for the mansion and the excellent selection of works impresses tourists.

In a spacious two-story house, where the museum of the marine painter is located, architectural Italian style is guessed. This house, Ivan Konstantinovich, as it is easy to guess, built according to his own project. This art gallery, bequeathed to the city, became the state museum in 1920. But the history of the museum is not the most even and prosperous. During the years when the country was changing, the Cheka headquarters and divisional divisions of the Red Army and Navy were located here.

As a museum visitor, you will definitely find yourself in the house of Ekaterina Konstantinovna Aivazovsky. This is not just an addition to the main exposure, it is an important part of it. In Armenian families, it was so customary to settle in the neighborhood with close relatives.Because next to the house of the brother is the mansion of Catherine.

If you want to see how the classic worked on biblical and mythical scenes in painting, be sure to take a look here. In the mansion of Aivazovsky’s sister, the organizers of the museum decided to expose the artist’s canvases, abstract from maritime subjects. These are pictures that combine religious themes, biblical subjects.

From school, probably, everyone remembers that Aivazovsky is an artist who incredibly accurately conveyed seascapes on canvases. In addition to the great paintings devoted to the water element, he wrote Ivan Konstantinovich and major battle scenes, biblical scenes and even portraits. And the artist could call himself a collector and patron of the arts.

The real name of the classic is Hovhannes Ayvazyan and this is the most famous artist with Armenian roots. His biography is unique. In childhood, the boy showed not only artistic abilities, it is known that he himself learned to play the violin.

The outstanding artist was patronized by Nicholas I. I was lucky to work with Aivazovsky in the south of Italy - these creative years were especially fruitful. The enthusiasm of critics and commercial success have not bypassed the marine painter. For his work Ivan Konstantinovich was awarded Gold Medal of the Paris Academy of Arts.

Once, when the artist was 27 years old, he sailed towards a house on a ship, in the Bay of Biscay the ship fell into a storm, nearly sank - an obituary about the death of a Russian painter appeared in Parisian newspapers. They say that a false report about death promises a long life - Aivazovsky lived 82 years. Interestingly, being a 75-year-old, Ivan Konstantinovich and his wife visited America, and it was at the end of the XIX century.

Aivazovsky had a lot of time where he lived: he studied in St. Petersburg, commanded in Italy, was in Paris, Portugal, Spain, in Egypt, Constantinople, in the Caucasus. By the way, the master had the rank of a real secret adviser, which was equal to the rank of admiral, and in 1864 the artist received a hereditary nobility.

Despite such a vast circle of travel, Ivan Konstantinovich said: "My address is always in Feodosia." And these were not just words. Aivazovsky dealt with the affairs of his hometown with all the zeal, a sincere desire to arrange a homeland, to improve the place of his eternal love.

In the city, the master opened an art school and an art gallery. Feodosia and until now is center of pictorial culture in southern Russia. Thanks to Ivan Konstantinovich, a concert hall appeared in the city, and a library was being arranged. With his own money, the painter erected a fountain of memory of Kaznacheyev, who was at that time the mayor of Theodosia.

The artist was actively interested in archeology issues, he personally supervised kurgan excavations, and individual objects found during these excavations are in the Hermitage today. Besides, Aivazovsky became the initiator of the construction of the railway "Theodosius - Dzhankoy", he also advocated the expansion of the Feodosia seaport, and the largest trading port in the Crimea was indeed in Feodosia.

20 years before the end of the 19th century, the artist opened an exhibition hall in his own house. There he exhibited paintings which, by his decision, should never have left the limits of Theodosia. Completed the exhibition and still unfinished work.

Curious is the fact that, although not in the most enthusiastic tones, but Chekhov wrote about Aivazovsky, it follows from this that these two classics happened to meet. Anton Pavlovich was surprised that when he personally met Pushkin, Aivazovsky did not read a single of his books. And I did not read books at all. But even the memoirs say: an interesting person was Ivan Konstantinovich, alive, active, with his own opinion, very energetic for his respectable age.

Quite rightly, Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky became the first honorary citizen of the city of Feodosia. Therefore, every guest of the famous southern resort should pay tribute to the memory of an outstanding person of his era and visit the Aivazovsky Museum in Feodosia.

In the next video, see the review of the museum Aivazovsky in Feodosia.