It is difficult to name a picture that would have enjoyed the same success with contemporaries as The Last Day of Pompeii. As soon as the canvas was completed, the Roman workshop Karla Bryullova suffered a real siege. "INall Rome flocked to see my picture", - wrote the artist. Exhibited in 1833 in Milan"Pompeii" literally shocked the audience. Laudatory reviews were full of newspapers and magazines,Bryullov was called the revived Titian, the second Michelangelo, the new Raphael...
In honor of the Russian artist, dinners and receptions were arranged, poems were dedicated to him. As soon as Bryullov appeared in the theater, the hall exploded with applause. The painter was recognized on the streets, showered with flowers, and sometimes the honors ended with the fact that fans with songs carried him in their arms.
In 1834 a painting, optionalcustomer, industrialist A.N. Demidov, was exhibited in Paris Salon. The reaction of the public here was not as hot as in Italy (envy! - the Russians explained), but "Pompeii" was awarded the gold medal of the French Academy of Fine Arts.
It is hard to imagine the enthusiasm and patriotic upsurge with which the picture was received in St. Petersburg: thanks to Bryullov, Russian painting ceased to be a diligent student of the great Italians and created a work that delighted Europe!The painting was donated Demidov Nicholas I , who briefly placed her in Imperial Hermitage and then donated academies arts.
According to the memoirs of a contemporary, "crowds of visitors, one might say, burst into the halls of the Academy to look at Pompeii." They talked about the masterpiece in the salons, shared opinions in private correspondence, made notes in diaries. The honorary nickname "Charlemagne" was established for Bryullov.
Impressed by the picture, Pushkin wrote a six-line:
“Vesuvius zev opened - smoke gushed in a club - flame
Widely developed like a battle banner.
The earth is worried - from the staggering columns
Idols are falling! A people driven by fear
Under the stone rain, under the inflamed ashes,
Crowds, old and young, run out of the city.
Gogol dedicated "The Last Day of Pompeii" remarkably deep article, and the poet Yevgeny Baratynsky expressed the general rejoicing in the well-known impromptu:
«
You brought peaceful trophies
With you in the paternal shade,
And became "The Last Day of Pompeii"
For the Russian brush, the first day!
Immoderate enthusiasm has long subsided, but even today Bryullov's painting makes a strong impression, going beyond the limits of those sensations that painting, even very good, usually evokes in us. What's the matter here?
"Street of the Tombs" In the background is the Herculaneus Gate.
Photo of the second half of the 19th century.
Since excavations began in Pompeii in the mid-18th century, interest in this city, which was destroyed by the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD, has been on the rise. e., did not fade away. Europeans flocked to Pompeii to wander through the ruins freed from the layer of petrified volcanic ash, admire the frescoes, sculptures, mosaics, and marvel at the unexpected finds of archaeologists. The excavations attracted artists and architects, etchings with views of Pompeii were in great vogue.
Bryullov , who first visited the excavations in 1827, very accurately conveyedfeeling of empathy for the events of two thousand years ago, which covers anyone who comes to Pompeii:“The sight of these ruins involuntarily made me go back to a time when these walls were still inhabited /…/. You can’t go through these ruins without feeling some completely new feeling in yourself, making you forget everything, except for the terrible incident with this city.
Express this "new feeling", create new look antiquity - not an abstract museum, but a holistic and full-blooded, the artist strove in his picture. He got used to the era with the meticulousness and care of an archaeologist: from more than five years to create the canvas itself with an area of 30 square meters it took only 11 months, the rest of the time was taken up by the preparatory work.
“I took this scenery all from nature, without retreating at all and without adding, standing with my back to the city gates in order to see part of Vesuvius as main reason”, - Bryullov shared in one of the letters.Pompeii had eight gates, butfurther the artist mentioned “the stairs leading to Sepolcri Sc au ro "- the monumental tomb of the eminent citizen Skavr, and this gives us the opportunity to accurately establish the scene chosen by Bryullov. It's about about the Herculanean Gates of Pompeii ( Porto di Ercolano ), behind which, already outside the city, began the "Street of Tombs" ( Via dei Sepolcri) - a cemetery with magnificent tombs and temples. This part of Pompeii was in the 1820s. already well cleared, which allowed the painter to reconstruct architecture on canvas with maximum accuracy.
Tomb of Skaurus. Reconstruction of the 19th century
Recreating the picture of the eruption, Bryullov followed the famous messages of Pliny the Younger to Tacitus. The young Pliny survived the eruption in seaport Miseno north of Pompeii and described in detail what he saw: houses that seemed to have moved from their places, flames spread widely over the cone of the volcano, hot pieces of pumice stone falling from the sky, heavy rain of ash, black impenetrable darkness, fiery zigzags like giant lightning ... And all this Bryullov transferred to the canvas.
Seismologists are amazed at how convincingly he portrayed the earthquake: looking at collapsing houses, you can determine the direction and strength of the earthquake (8 points). Volcanologists note that the eruption of Vesuvius was written with all possible accuracy for that time. Historians argue that Bryullov's painting can be used to study ancient Roman culture.
In order to reliably capture the world of ancient Pompeii destroyed by the catastrophe, Bryullov took objects and remains of bodies found during excavations as samples, made countless sketches in the archaeological museum of Naples. The way to restore the death poses of the dead by pouring lime into the voids formed from the bodies was invented only in 1870, but even during the creation of the picture, the skeletons found in the petrified ashes testified to the last convulsions and gestures of the victims. Mother hugging two daughters; a young woman who was crushed to death when she fell from a chariot that ran into a cobblestone, turned out of the pavement by an earthquake; people on the steps of the tomb of Skaurus, protecting their heads from rockfall with stools and dishes - all this is not a figment of the painter's fantasy, but an artistically recreated reality.
On the canvas, we see characters endowed with portrait features of the author himself and his beloved, Countess Yulia Samoilova. Bryullov portrayed himself as an artist carrying a box of brushes and paints on his head. The beautiful features of Julia are recognized four times in the picture: a girl with a vessel on her head, a mother hugging her daughters, a woman clutching a baby to her chest, a noble Pompeian who fell from a broken chariot. A self-portrait and portraits of a girlfriend are the best evidence that in his penetration into the past, Bryullov really became related to the event, creating a “presence effect” for the viewer, making him, as it were, a participant in what is happening.
Fragment of the picture:
Bryullov's self-portraitand a portrait of Yulia Samoilova.
Fragment of the picture:
compositional "triangle" - a mother hugging her daughters.
Bryullov's painting pleased everyone - both strict academicians, zealots of the aesthetics of classicism, and those who valued novelty in art and for whom "Pompeii" became, according to Gogol, "a bright resurrection of painting."This novelty was brought to Europe by a fresh wind of romanticism. The dignity of Bryullov's painting is usually seen in the fact that the brilliant pupil of the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts was open to new trends. At the same time, the classicist layer of the painting is often interpreted as a relic, an inevitable tribute to the artist's routine past. But it seems that another turn of the theme is also possible: the fusion of two “isms” turned out to be fruitful for the picture.
The unequal, fatal struggle of man with the elements - such is the romantic pathos of the picture. It is built on sharp contrasts of darkness and the disastrous light of the eruption, inhuman power soulless nature and high intensity of human feelings.
But there is something else in the picture that opposes the chaos of the catastrophe: an unshakable core in a world shaking to its foundations. This rod is a classic balance the most complex composition which saves the picture from a tragic sense of hopelessness. The composition, built according to the "recipes" of academicians - the "triangles" ridiculed by subsequent generations of painters, into which groups of people fit, balanced masses on the right and left - is read in the lively tense context of the picture in a completely different way than in dry and deathly academic canvases.
Fragment of the picture: a young family.
In the foreground is a pavement damaged by an earthquake.
Fragment of the painting: dead Pompeian.
“The world is still harmonious in its foundations” - this feeling arises in the viewer subconsciously, partly contrary to what he sees on the canvas. The hopeful message of the artist is read not at the level of the plot of the picture, but at the level of its plastic solution.The violent romantic element is subdued by the classically perfect form, And in this unity of opposites lies another secret of the attractiveness of Bryullov's canvas.
The film tells a lot of exciting and touching stories. Here is a young man in despair peering into the face of a girl in a wedding crown, who has lost consciousness or died. Here is a young man trying to convince an exhausted old woman of something. This couple is called “Pliny with his mother” (although, as we remember, Pliny the Younger was not in Pompeii, but in Miseno): in a letter to Tacitus, Pliny conveys his argument with his mother, who urged her son to leave her and, without delay, run away, and he did not agree to leave the weak woman. A helmeted warrior and a boy are carrying a sick old man; a baby, miraculously surviving a fall from a chariot, embraces a dead mother; the young man raised his hand, as if to divert the blow of the elements from his family, the baby in the arms of his wife, with childish curiosity, reaches for the dead bird. People try to take away the most precious things with them: a pagan priest - a tripod, a Christian - a censer, an artist - brushes. dead woman she was carrying jewels, which, useless to anyone, are now lying on the pavement.
Fragment of the painting: Pliny with his mother.
Fragment of the picture: earthquake - "idols fall."
Such a powerful plot load on the picture can be dangerous for painting, making the canvas a "story in pictures", but Bryullov's literary character and abundance of details do not destroy the artistic integrity of the picture. Why? We find the answer in the same article by Gogol, who compares Bryullov’s painting “in terms of its vastness and the combination of everything beautiful in itself with opera, if only opera is really a combination of the triple world of arts: painting, poetry, music” (by poetry, Gogol obviously meant literature at all).
This feature of "Pompeii" can be described in one word - synthetic: the picture organically combines a dramatic plot, vivid entertainment and thematic polyphony, similar to music. (By the way, at theatrical basis paintings real prototype- Opera by Giovanni Paccini "The Last Day of Pompeii", which during the years of the artist's work on the canvas was staged at the Neapolitan theater of San Carlo. Bryullov was well acquainted with the composer, listened to the opera several times and borrowed costumes for his sitters.)
William Turner. Vesuvius eruption. 1817
So, the picture resembles the final scene of a monumental opera performance: the most expressive scenery is in store for the finale, all storylines connect, and musical themes are intertwined into a complex polyphonic whole. This picture-performance is similar to ancient tragedies, in which the contemplation of the nobility and courage of the heroes in the face of inexorable fate leads the viewer to catharsis - spiritual and moral enlightenment. The feeling of empathy that grips us in front of a picture is akin to what we experience in the theater, when what is happening on the stage touches us to tears, and these tears are heart-pleasing.
Gavin Hamilton. Neapolitans watch the eruption of Vesuvius.
Second floor. 18th century
Bryullov's painting is breathtakingly beautiful: a huge size - four and a half by six and a half meters, amazing "special effects", divinely built people, like antique statues come to life. “His figures are beautiful despite the horror of his position. They drown it out with their beauty," Gogol wrote, sensitively capturing another feature of the picture - the aestheticization of the catastrophe. The tragedy of the death of Pompeii and, more broadly, of the entire ancient civilization is presented to us as an incredibly beautiful sight. What are these contrasts of a black cloud pressing on the city, a shining flame on the slopes of a volcano and ruthlessly bright flashes of lightning, these statues captured at the very moment of falling and buildings collapsing like cardboard…
The perception of the eruptions of Vesuvius as grandiose performances staged by nature itself appeared already in the 18th century - even special machines were created to imitate the eruption. This "volcano fashion" was introduced by the British envoy to the Kingdom of Naples, Lord William Hamilton (husband of the legendary Emma, Admiral Nelson's girlfriend). A passionate volcanologist, he was literally in love with Vesuvius and even built a villa on the slope of the volcano to comfortably admire the eruptions. Observations of the volcano when it was active (several eruptions occurred in the 18-19 centuries), verbal descriptions and sketches of its changing beauties, climbing to the crater - these were the entertainments of the Neapolitan elite and visitors.
It is human nature to follow with bated breath the disastrous and beautiful games of nature, even if for this you have to balance at the mouth of an active volcano. This is the same “rapture in battle and the gloomy abyss on the edge”, which Pushkin wrote about in “Little Tragedies”, and which Bryullov conveyed in his canvas, which for almost two centuries has made us admire and be horrified.
Modern Pompeii
Bryullov Karl Pavlovich (1799-1852)
Neither of European artists did not receive such a grandiose triumph in the 19th century as fell on the lot of the young Russian painter Karl Pavlovich Bryullov when, in the middle of 1833, he opened the doors of his Roman workshop to the public with a freshly finished painting" ". Like Byron, he had the right to say about himself that one fine morning he woke up famous. The word "success" is not enough to characterize the attitude towards it. picture. There was something more painting caused the audience an explosion of delight and admiration for the Russian artist, who seemed to open a new page in the history of world art.
Autumn 1833 painting appeared on exhibition V Milan. Here the triumph of the Russian master reached its highest point. Everyone wanted to see a work "of which all Rome is talking." Rave reviews were published in Italian newspapers and magazines about " The last day of Pompeii"and its author. As the great masters of the Renaissance were once honored, so now they began to honor Bryullov. He became the most famous person in Italy. He was greeted with applause in the street, they gave him an ovation in the theater. Poets dedicated poems to him. When moving on the borders of the Italian principalities, he was not required to present a passport - it was believed that every Italian was obliged to know him by sight.
In 1834 "" was exhibited at the Paris Salon. French Academy arts awarded Bryullov gold medal . One of the first biographers Bryullov, N. A. Ramazanov, says that, despite the envious talk of some French artists, the Parisian public mainly riveted their attention to " The last day of Pompeii"and with difficulty and reluctance moved away from this paintings".
The glory of Russian art has never spread so widely throughout Europe. More celebration awaited Bryullov at home.
Brought to St. Petersburg in July 1834 and exhibited first in the Hermitage and then at the Academy of Arts, it immediately became the center of attention of Russian society and became a subject of patriotic pride.
“Crowds of visitors, one might say, burst into the halls of the Academy to look at Pompeii,” a contemporary narrates. In his official annual report Academy of Arts acknowledged bryullovskaya picture best creation 19th century. Widespread engraved playback "Last day of Pompeii". They smashed glory Bryullov throughout the country, far beyond the capital. The best representatives of Russian culture enthusiastically welcomed picture. Pushkin wrote:
Vesuvius zev opened - smoke gushed in a club, flames
Widely developed like a battle banner.
The earth worries - from staggering columns
Idols are falling! A people driven by fear
Under the stone rain, under the inflamed ashes,
Crowds, old and young, run out of the city.
Gogol wrote about The last day of Pompeii"an extensive article in which he acknowledged this picture"a complete universal creation", where everything is "so powerful, so bold, so harmoniously brought into one, as soon as it could arise in the head of a universal genius."
Bryullov's painting unusually high interest in painting in the most wide circles Russian society. The incessant talk about The last day of Pompeii"in the press, in correspondence, in private conversations, they clearly showed that a work of painting can excite and touch people no less than literature. public role fine arts in Russia began precisely with the Bryullov celebrations.
history painting, which has long occupied a leading position in academic art, addressed, for the most part, to stories taken from the Bible and the Gospel or from ancient mythology. But even in cases where plot paintings was not a legendary legend, but a real historical event, the painters of the Academy were, in fact, very far from historical accuracy in understanding and interpreting what was depicted. They weren't looking historical truth, because their goal was not to recreate the past, but to embody one or another abstract idea. In their pictures historical figures took the form of conditional " ancient heroes", regardless of whether the event was depicted in ancient Roman or Russian history.
"paved the way for a completely different understanding and interpretation of the historical theme.
In search of life's truth Bryullov, the first among Russian artists, set himself the goal of recreating in picture real event past, based on the study historical sources and archaeological data.
In comparison with the fantastic "archeology" of predecessors Bryullov this outward historicism was in itself a major pioneering achievement. They, however, far from exhaust the meaning bryullovskaya paintings. Archaeological authenticity served Bryullov only a means for a deeper disclosure of the topic, for expressing a modern attitude to the past.
"Thought paintings belongs entirely to the taste of our age, which, as if feeling its terrible fragmentation, seeks to aggregate all phenomena into common groups and chooses strong crises felt by the whole mass, "Gogol wrote, revealing the content" Last day of Pompeii".
Unlike the previous history painting with its cult of heroes and emphasized attention to individual, opposed to the impersonal crowd, Bryullov conceived "" as crowd scene in which the people would be the only and true hero. All major characters V picture are almost equal exponents of its theme; meaning paintings is embodied not in the depiction of a single heroic act, but in an attentive and accurate transfer of the psychology of the masses.
However, Bryullov with intentional and even sharp straightforwardness emphasizes the main contrasts in which the idea of the struggle of the new with the old, life with death, the human mind with the blind power of the elements is expressed. Everything is subject to this thought. ideological And artistic solution paintings, hence its features that determined the place " Last day of Pompeii in Russian art of the 19th century.
Subject The painting is taken from ancient Roman history. Pompeii(or rather Pompeii) - an ancient Roman city located at the foot of Vesuvius - on August 24, 79 AD, as a result of a strong volcanic eruption, it was flooded with lava and covered with stones and ash. Two thousand inhabitants (of which there were about 30,000 in total) died on the streets of the city during a stampede.
For more than one and a half thousand years, the city remained buried underground and forgotten. Only in late XVI century, during the production of earthworks, a place was accidentally discovered where a lost Roman settlement had once been. From 1748 began archaeological excavations, especially revived in the first decades of the XIX century. They aroused increased interest in artistic circles not only in Italy, but throughout the world. Each new discovery became a sensation among artists and archaeologists, and the tragic subject Ibeli Pompeii at the same time it was used in literature, painting and music. Opera appeared in 1829 Italian composer Paccini, in 1834 - historical novel English writer Bulverlitton " Last days Pompeii". Bryullov turned to this topic earlier than others: etude sketches of his future paintings belong to 1827-1828.
Bryullov was 28 years old when he decided to write "". The fifth year of his retirement in Italy was expiring. He already had several serious works, but none of them seemed to the artist quite worthy of his talent; he felt that he had not yet justified the hopes that were placed in him.
From Bryullov waited big historical picture - precisely historical, because in the aesthetics of the early 19th century this kind of painting was considered the highest. Without breaking with the dominant aesthetic views of his time, Bryullov and he himself sought to find a plot that would correspond to the inner possibilities of his talent and at the same time be able to satisfy the requirements that could be presented to him. contemporary criticism and the Academy of Arts.
Looking for a story like this Bryullov I hesitated for a long time between themes from Russian history and ancient mythology. He intended to write picture "Oleg nails his shield to the gates of Constantinople", and later outlined the plot of stories Peter the Great. At the same time, he made sketches on mythological themes (" Death of Phaethon", "Hylas kidnapped by nymphs"and others). But the mythological theme, highly valued at the Academy, contradicted the realistic tendencies of the young Bryullov, and for the Russian theme, he, being in Italy, could not collect material.
Subject destruction of Pompeii solved many problems. The plot itself was, if not traditional, then undoubtedly historical, and from this side it met the basic requirements of academic aesthetics. The action was to unfold against the backdrop of the ancient city with its classical architecture and monuments of ancient art; the world of classical forms was thus included in picture without any deliberateness, as if by itself, and the spectacle of the raging elements and tragic death opened access to romantic images in which the talent of the painter could find new, yet unseen possibilities of image big feelings, passionate spiritual impulses and deep feelings. It is no wonder that the topic has captivated and captured Bryullov: it combined all the conditions for the most complete expression of his thoughts, knowledge, feelings and interests.
Sources based on which Bryullov solved his topic, authentic monuments of antiquity appeared, discovered in the lost city, the works of archaeologists and a description catastrophes V Pompeii made by a contemporary and an eyewitness, Roman writer Pliny the Younger.
Work on " The last day of Pompeii" dragged on for almost six years (1827-1833), and the evidence of deep and intense creative pursuits Bryullov are numerous drawings, sketches and sketches, clearly showing how the artist's idea developed.
Among these preparatory works, a sketch of 1828 occupies a special place. In terms of the strength of artistic influence, he, perhaps, is not inferior to the most picture. True, the sketch remained not completely finalized, individual images and characters were only outlined in it, and not fully disclosed; but this external incompleteness is combined in a peculiar way with deep internal completeness and artistic persuasiveness. The significance of individual episodes, subsequently developed in detail in picture, here, as it were, dissolves in a common passionate impulse, in a single tragic feeling, in an integral image of a dying city, powerless before the pressure of the elements falling on it. The sketch is based on the romantically understood idea of man's struggle with fate, which is personified here by the elemental forces of nature. Death approaches with inevitable cruelty, like ancient fate, and a person with all his mind and will is unable to resist fate; it remains only for him to face inevitable death with courage and dignity.
But Bryullov did not stop at this decision of his topic. He was not satisfied with the sketch precisely because the notes of hopeless pessimism, blind resignation to fate and disbelief in human strength sounded so insistently in it. Such an understanding of the world stood outside the traditions of Russian culture, contradicted its healthy folk foundations. The life-affirming power inherent in gifting Bryullov, couldn't come to terms with" Last day of Pompeii", demanded an exit and permission.
Bryullov found this way out, opposing the destructive elements of nature with the spiritual greatness and beauty of man. Plastic beauty turns in him into a powerful force that affirms life in spite of death and destruction. "... His figures are beautiful with all the horror of their position. They drown him out with their beauty," wrote Gogol, who subtly noticed the main idea bryullovskaya paintings.
In an effort to express the various psychological states and shades of feelings that gripped the inhabitants of the dying city, Bryullov built his picture as a cycle of separate, closed episodes, plot-wise not connected with each other. Their ideological meaning becomes understandable only when the gaze of all groups and independent plot motifs, constituting "".
The idea of beauty triumphing over death is expressed with particular clarity in the group of figures crowded on the steps of the tomb on the left side. paintings. Bryullov deliberately combined here the images of blossoming strength and youth. Neither suffering nor horror distorts their ideally beautiful features; on the faces one can read only an expression of surprise and anxious expectation. Titanic power is felt in the figure of a young man, with a passionate impulse making his way through the crowd. It is characteristic that in this world of beautiful classical images, inspired by ancient sculpture, Bryullov brings a noticeable shade of realism; many of his characters are undoubtedly painted from life, and among them stands out a self-portrait of Bryullov, who depicted himself as a Pompeian artist who, escaping from the city, takes with him a box of brushes and paints.
In the main groups of the right side paintings the main ones are the motives that emphasize the spiritual greatness of a person. Here Bryullov concentrated examples of courage and selfless fulfillment of duty.
In the foreground there are three groups: “two young Pompeians carrying on their shoulders their sick old father”, “Pliny with his mother” and “young spouses” - a young husband supports his wife, who is falling in exhaustion, crowned with a wedding wreath. However, last group psychologically almost not developed and has the character composite insert necessary for rhythmic balance paintings. Much more meaningful is the group of sons carrying their father: in the image of an old man, majestically stretching out his hand, the proud inflexibility of the spirit and stern courage are expressed. In the image of the youngest son, a black-eyed Italian boy, one feels an accurate and direct sketch from nature, in which a vivid realistic feeling is clearly manifested. Bryullov.
Realistic beginnings are expressed with particular force in the remarkable group of Pliny with his mother. In sketches and early sketches, this episode is developed in classical forms, emphasizing the historicity and antique character the scene taking place. But in picture Bryullov resolutely moved away from original intention- the images created by him amaze with their unbiased and genuine vitality.
IN center paintings there is a prostrate figure of a young woman who crashed when falling from a chariot. It can be assumed that in this figure Bryullov wanted to symbolize the whole perishing ancient world; a hint of such an interpretation is also found in the reviews of contemporaries. In accordance with this intention, the artist sought to find the most perfect classical embodiment for this figure. Contemporaries, including Gogol, saw in her one of the most poetic creations Bryullov.
Not all episodes are equally important for the development of the theme, but in their alternation and comparison, it is persistently revealed the main idea Bryullov about the struggle of life with death, about the triumph of reason over the blind forces of the elements, about the birth of a new world on the crumbling ruins of the old.
It is no coincidence that next to central figure of the murdered woman, the artist depicted a beautiful baby as a symbol of the inexhaustible power of life; it is no coincidence that the images of youth and old age are contrasted in the groups of Pliny with his mother and sons carrying their aged father; Finally, the accentuated contrast between the "pagan", in an antique beautiful crowd on the steps of the tomb and the majestically calm "family of Christians" is not accidental. IN picture there is both a pagan priest and a Christian priest, as if personifying the departing ancient world and the Christian civilization emerging on its ruins.
The images of the priest and the priest, perhaps, are not deep enough, their spiritual world is not shown in picture and the characterization remained, to a large extent, external; this subsequently gave rise to V.V. Stasov to severely reproach Bryullov for the fact that he did not use the opportunity to sharply contrast decrepit, dying Rome and young Christianity. But the thought of these two worlds is undoubtedly present in picture. With simultaneous and complete perception paintings the organic connection of its constituent episodes clearly emerges. The shades of feelings expressed in them and various mental states, acts of valor and self-sacrifice next to manifestations of despair and fear are given in " The last day of Pompeii to a harmonious, harmonious and artistically integral unity.
Wonderful canvases. L., 1966. P.107
Restoration of the painting The Last Day of Pompeii
An exceptional event in the life of the Russian Museum was K. P. Bryullova"". Numerous previous restorations only delayed the start of fundamental work on the canvas - the canvas of the painting “burned out”, became fragile; there were 42 plasters at the places where the canvas had been torn, which appeared on the front side; the loss of the paint layer was tinted with an approach to the author's painting; the lacquer has changed a lot in color. After strengthening the painting was transferred to a new canvas. Have done this wonderful work restorers I. N. Kornyakova, A. V. Minin, E. S. Soldatenkov; consulted S. F. Konenkov.
Painting by K. P. Bryullov “The Last Day of Pompeii” entered the Russian Museum from the Hermitage in 1897. After a major restoration in 1995, the painting was stretched on a pre-repaired author's stretcher and returned to the exhibition.
The decision to start the restoration of the painting was made at a meeting of the extended Restoration Council of the State Russian Museum on March 15, 1995.
At the beginning of the work, it was strengthened with a prophylactic paper seal and then the canvas was removed from the author's stretcher. After that, the painting was stretched by the edges on a marble floor with a colorful surface down and the back side was cleaned of surface contamination. From the back, two layers of ancient restoration duplicating edges were removed, which caused severe deformations of the canvas along the edges, and more than 40 restoration patches that stood in the places of old canvas breaks. Places of more than hundreds of losses of the author's canvas, especially numerous along the edges, were repaired with inserts from a new canvas. After that, the painting was duplicated on a new canvas, identical in character and quality to the author's, ordered in Germany. The places where the paint layer was lost were filled with restoration primer and tinted with watercolors. Author's varnish is completely restored by regeneration with alcohol vapor.
In the process of work, methods of strengthening the paint layer and soil in a large space were worked out. An important result of the work was the development of new devices that facilitate and simplify the process of technical restoration. By special project a durable duralumin stretcher was created with a system of special fasteners for stretching the duplicating canvas. This system made it possible to repeatedly tighten the canvas to the desired tension in the process of work.
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IN picture frame or in photo frame cutting and pasting glass is easy. If the glass is to be inserted into frame with a sample (rebate), then the size of the glass should be a few millimeters smaller than the measured size of the sample. If the sample sizes are constant across the entire width and height framework, then an allowance of 2 mm is sufficient. Baguette glass order. Anti-reflective baguette glass Can order And buy V baguette workshop.
Picture stretchers
Stretcher protects against breakage. Manufacturing subframes to order. Framing Workshop manufactures subframes For paintings. Durable wood is used to make the subframe. A well-made stretcher eliminates the "sagging" of the canvas and thereby prolongs the life picture. Craftsmen stretch embroideries, batik and canvases on stretchers.
Hanging pictures
Framing Workshop offers new method picture pendants by using suspension system Nielsen. Barbell from metal profile Nielsen attached to the wall with plastic washers. Perlon line is fixed inside the rod profile with sliding hooks or bushings and can be moved along metallic rods. Durable nylon line 2 mm thick is almost invisible against the background of the wall. Paintings hung up on the line with metal hooks with screws that can be fixed at the desired height. Reliable fixation at the required height requires some effort when screwing the screw. metal profile easy to mount under the ceiling and allows you to easily and hassle-free outweigh the pictures.
picture frames
Gold baguette for pictures. Large picture frames. Framing Workshop draws up V baguette paintings, watercolor, drawings, photos, posters, mirrors etc. Artists place great value on choice framing for their paintings. Many great artists sketched the elements baguette and even himself made. picture frames Can order And buy V baguette workshop.
Frames for watercolor paintings
In engineering watercolor painting you can create paintings in the genre of landscape, still life, portrait. Transparency and softness of the thinnest paint layer paintings are characteristic properties of watercolor painting. For framing watercolors it is advisable to use a passe-partout and a not very wide baguette. framing V wooden baguette. Framework For watercolor paintings.
Picture frames
Drawings are created by artists in the process of studying nature (sketches, studies), while searching for compositional solutions graphic, pictorial and sculptural works (sketches, cardboards), when marking picturesque paintings (preparatory drawing for painting). Professional decor graphics, photographs, documents using wooden baguette And passe-partout. Framework collected from baguette made from tropical woods. We have in workshop you can choose one of the options decoration for graphics and order passe-partout And baguette for frame. The artistic value of a baguette depends on the profile and relief pattern. Depending on the width baguette called narrow(up to 4 cm) and wide, and depending on the thickness - low and high. Pencil drawings look better in a modest narrow baguette ( metallic or wooden). Large frames from golden baguette For drawings And charts. A3 metal frames For drawings.
Metal photo frames
Traditionally the most interesting And commemorative photos
insert V framework that can be put on the table or hang on the wall. Important right pick up a frame, it must match photos and harmonize with the interior of the room. Photographs can be taken in the workshop. View baguette depends on the type of images on photographs(portrait, landscape, children's photos). Passepartout for photo. At photo framing can be used passe-partout. TO passe-partout a slip can be offered (edging along the edge of the window).
Buy photo frames possible in baguette workshop.
Plastic photo frames practical, light and cheap. They are great for all types. photos And imitate
metal And wooden framework. Brilliance and nobility metal. Very popular silvery matte metal frames.
Metal photo frames cost a lot cheap, because the material for them manufacturing serves inexpensive aluminum. At small price metal frames have a lot of advantages. Elegance of forms and bewitching beauty metal sometimes forces herself frame"compete" with photography. Therefore, it is important that the content is worthy of the form. Such framework professionally taken portrait photographs will look most harmonious.
Document frames
Registration of documents, diplomas, certificates
Big choice framework For documents.Plastic frames A3 and A4 Plastic frames A4 for certificates, diplomas, diplomas. Ready-made frames of standard sizes for certificates, diplomas, posters, photos. golden frames For diplomas. Gold frames A3. A3 poster frames. For diplomas, certificates and cards in baguette workshop You can order lamination.
Card frames
Frequently found cards large sizes. In cases where increased strength is required, metal baguette- the best choice. In frames from metallic baguette You can put various cards, posters, posters. In the office you can hang up old geographical maps. An old map in an expensive office interior, requires an appropriate framing to emphasize the taste and stylistic preferences of the one who is her in this office hung up.
Frames for embroidered pictures
Frames for embroidered pictures . If you embroider paintings, then sooner or later you will have to pick up for her frame.
Choosing frame For design embroidery, it should be remembered that style, color, width and other features baguette for frame directly depend on the plot, style decision, colors and size embroidered pictures. To each embroidered picture choose your own unique framing. Choice frames For embroidered pictures also depends on whether it will be used embroidery design passe-partout or not.
Majority embroidered pictures It looks more effective if you use a passe-partout when decorating. Passe-partout is made single, double, sometimes triple. The selection of a triple passe-partout is a complex process even for a specialist (designer). The embroidery is stretched so that the cells of the canvas run parallel to the cut of the passe-partout cardboard. Increasingly widespread are paintings, beaded.
Tapestry picture frames
The tapestry is hand-woven carpet picture. Tapestries were woven according to the drawings with colored woolen and silk threads. golden frames For tapestries. Baguette for paintings from tapestry choose, starting from the plot depicted on the tapestry. Most often, a wooden baguette of brown shades is used, sometimes - under gold, less often - under silver.
Karl Bryullov was so carried away by the tragedy of the city destroyed by Vesuvius that he personally participated in the excavations of Pompeii, and later carefully worked on the picture: instead of the three years indicated in the order of the young philanthropist Anatoly Demidov, the artist painted the picture for six whole years.
(About imitation of Raphael, plot parallels with The Bronze Horseman, tours of the work in Europe and fashion for the tragedy of Pompeii among artists.)
The eruption of Vesuvius on August 24-25 in 79 AD was the largest cataclysm ancient world. On that last day, several coastal cities lost about 5,000 people.
This story is especially well known to us from the painting by Karl Bryullov, which can be seen in the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg.
In 1834, the "presentation" of the painting took place in St. Petersburg. The poet Yevgeny Boratynsky wrote the lines: "The last day of Pompeii became the first day for the Russian brush!" The picture struck Pushkin and Gogol. Gogol captured in his inspirational article on the painting the secret of its popularity:
"His works are the first that can be understood (although not equally) by an artist who has a higher development of taste, and who does not know what art is."
Indeed, a work of genius is understandable to everyone, and at the same time, a more developed person will discover in it still other planes of a different level.
Pushkin wrote poetry and even sketched a part of the painting's composition in the margins.
Vesuvius zev opened - smoke gushed in a club - flame
Widely developed like a battle banner.
The earth worries - from staggering columns
Idols are falling! A people driven by fear
Under the stone rain, under the inflamed ashes,
Crowds, old and young, run out of the city (III, 332).
This brief retelling paintings, multi-figured and complex compositionally. Not a small piece at all. In those days, it was even the largest picture, which already amazed contemporaries: the scale of the picture, correlated with the scale of the disaster.
Our memory cannot absorb everything, its possibilities are not unlimited. Such a picture can be viewed more than once and every time you see something else.
What did Pushkin single out and remember? The researcher of his work, Yuri Lotman, identified three main thoughts: "the uprising of the elements - the statues are set in motion - the people (people) as a victim of a disaster". And he made a very reasonable conclusion:
Pushkin has just finished his " Bronze Horseman and saw what was close to him at that moment.
Indeed, a similar plot: the element (flood) is raging, the monument comes to life, frightened Eugene runs from the elements and the monument.
Lotman also writes about the direction of Pushkin's gaze:
"Comparison of the text with Bryullov's canvas reveals that Pushkin's gaze slides diagonally from the upper right corner to the lower left. This corresponds to the main compositional axis of the picture."
The researcher of diagonal compositions, artist and art theorist N. Tarabukin wrote:
Indeed, we are unusually captivated by what is happening. Bryullov managed to make the viewer involved in the events as much as possible. There is a presence effect.
Karl Bryullov graduated from the Academy of Arts in 1823 with a gold medal. By tradition, gold medalists went to Italy for an internship. There Bryullov visits the workshop Italian artist and for 4 years copies " the school of Athens"Raphael, and life-size all 50 figures. At this time, Bryullov is visited by the writer Stendhal.
There is no doubt that Bryullov learned a lot from Raphael - the ability to organize a large canvas.
Bryullov got to Pompeii in 1827 together with the countess Maria Grigorievna Razumovskaya. She became the first customer of the painting. However, the rights to the paintings are bought by a sixteen-year-old Anatoly Nikolaevich Demidov, owner of the Ural mining plants, rich man and philanthropist. He had a net annual income of two million rubles.
Nikolai Demidov, father, recently deceased, was a Russian envoy and sponsored excavations in Florence in the Forum and the Capitol. Demidov will later present the painting to Nicholas the First, who will donate it to the Academy of Arts, from where it will go to the Russian Museum.
Demidov signed a contract with Bryullov for a fixed period and tried to fit the artist, but he conceived a grandiose plan and in total The painting took 6 years to complete. Bryullov makes many sketches and collects material.
Bryullov was so carried away that he himself participated in the excavations. It must be said that the excavations began formally on October 22, 1738 by decree of the Neapolitan king Charles III, they were carried out by an engineer from Andalusia, Roque Joaquín de Alcubierre, with 12 workers (and this was the first archeological systematic excavation in history when detailed records were made of everything that was found, before that there were mainly pirate methods when precious objects were snatched out, and the rest could be barbarously destroyed).
By the time Bryullov appeared, Herculaneum and Pompeii had already become not only a place of excavations, but also a place of pilgrimage for tourists. In addition, Bryullov was inspired by Paccini's opera The Last Day of Pompeii, which he saw in Italy. It is known that he dressed sitters in costumes for the play. (Gogol, by the way, compared the picture with an opera, apparently felt the "theatricality" of the mise-en-scene. She definitely lacks musical accompaniment in the spirit of "Carmina Burana".)
So, after a long work with sketches, Bryullov painted a picture and already in Italy it aroused tremendous interest. Demidov decided to take her to Paris to the Salon, where she also received a gold medal. In addition, she exhibited in Milan and London. The writer saw the painting in London Edward Bulwer-Lytton, who later wrote his novel The Last Days of Pompeii under the impression of the canvas.
It is interesting to compare the two moments of the interpretation of the plot. With Bryullov, we clearly see all the action, somewhere nearby there is fire and smoke, but in the foreground there is a clear image of the characters. When panic and mass exodus had already begun, the city was in a fair amount of smoke from the ashes. The artist's rockfall is depicted as a small Petersburg rain and pebbles scattered along the sidewalk. People are more likely to run from the fire. In fact, the city was already shrouded in smog, it was impossible to breathe...
In Bulwer-Lytton's novel, the heroes, a couple in love, are saved by a slave, blind from birth. Since she is blind, she easily finds her way in the dark. Heroes are saved and accept Christianity.
Were there Christians in Pompeii? At that time they were persecuted and it is not known whether the new faith reached the provincial resort. However, Bryullov also contrasts the Christian faith with the pagan faith and the death of the pagans. In the left corner of the picture we see a group of an old man with a cross around his neck and women under his protection. The old man turned his gaze to heaven, to his God, perhaps he would save him.
By the way, Bryullov copied some of the figures from the figures from the excavations. By that time, they began to fill the voids with plaster and got quite real figures dead residents.
Classicist teachers scolded Charles for deviating from the canons classical painting. Karl tossed between the classics absorbed at the Academy with its ideally sublime principles and the new aesthetics of romanticism.
If you look at the picture, you can distinguish several groups and individual characters, each with its own history. Something was inspired by excavations, something by historical facts.
The artist himself is present in the picture, his self-portrait is recognizable, here he is young, he is about 30 years old, on his head he takes out the most necessary and expensive - a box of paints. This is a tribute to the tradition of Renaissance artists to paint their self-portrait in a painting.
The girl next to her carries a lamp.
The son who carries his father on himself is reminiscent of the classic story about Aeneas who carried his father out of the burning Troy.
With one piece of cloth, the artist unites a family fleeing disaster into a group. During the excavations, couples who embraced before death, children together with their parents, are especially touching.
The two figures, the son persuading his mother to get up and run on, are taken from the letters of Pliny the Younger.
Pliny the Younger turned out to be an eyewitness who left written evidence of the death of cities. There are two letters written by him to the historian Tacitus, in which he talks about the death of his uncle Pliny the Elder, a famous naturalist, and his own misadventures.
Gaius Pliny was only 17 years old, at the time of the disaster he was studying the history of Titus Livius in order to write an essay, and therefore refused to go with his uncle to watch the volcanic eruption. Pliny the Elder was then an admiral of the local fleet, a position that he received for his scientific merits was an easy one. Curiosity killed him, in addition, a certain Rektsina sent him a letter asking for help. The only way to escape from her villa was by sea. Pliny sailed past Herculaneum, people on the shore at that moment could still be saved, but he strove to see the eruption in all its glory as soon as possible. Then the ships in the smoke with difficulty found their way to Stabia, where Pliny spent the night, but the next day he died, inhaling the sulfur-poisoned air.
Guy Pliny, who remained in Mizena, 30 kilometers from Pompeii, was forced to flee, as the disaster reached him and his mother.
Painting by a Swiss artist Angelica Kaufmann just shows this moment. A Spanish friend persuades Guy and his mother to run away, but they hesitate, thinking to wait for their uncle to return. The mother in the picture is not at all weak, but quite young.
They run, the mother asks her to leave and escape alone, but Guy helps her go on. Fortunately, they are saved.
Pliny described the horror of the disaster and described the type of eruption, after which it began to be called "Plinian". He saw the eruption from afar:
“The cloud (those who looked from afar could not determine which mountain it arose over; that it was Vesuvius, they recognized later), in its form most of all resembled a pine tree: it was as if a tall trunk rose up and from it branches seemed to diverge in all directions. I think that it was thrown out by a current of air, but then the current weakened and the cloud from its own gravity began to diverge in width; in places it was bright white, in places in dirty spots, as if from earth and ash raised upward.
The inhabitants of Pompeii had already experienced a volcanic eruption 15 years before, but did not draw conclusions. Blame - seductive sea coast and fertile land. Every gardener knows how well a crop grows on ashes. Mankind still believes in "maybe it will carry over."
Vesuvius and after that woke up more than once, almost once every 20 years. Many drawings of eruptions from different centuries have been preserved.
The last one, in 1944, was quite large-scale, at that time the American army was in Naples, the soldiers helped during the disaster. It is not known when and what will be the next.
On the Italian website, the zones of possible victims during the eruption are marked and it is easy to see that the wind rose is taken into account.
It was this that especially affected the death of cities, the wind carried a suspension of ejected particles towards the southeast, just to the cities of Herculaneum, Pompeii, Stabia and several other small villas and villages. During the day they were under a multi-meter layer of ash, but before that, many people died from a rockfall, burned alive, died of suffocation. A slight shaking did not suggest an approaching catastrophe, even when stones were already falling from the sky, many preferred to pray to the gods and hide in houses, where they were then walled up alive with a layer of ash.
Gaius Pliny, who survived all this in a light version in Mezima, describes what happened:
“It’s already the first hour of the day, and the light is wrong, as if sick. The houses around are shaking; it’s very scary in the open narrow area; they’re about to collapse. to our own; with fright it seems reasonable; we are crushed and pushed in this crowd of departing. Having gone out of the city, we stop. How amazing and how much terrible we have experienced! The wagons that were ordered to accompany us were thrown into the different sides; despite the stones placed, they could not stand in the same place. We have seen the sea recede; the earth, shaking, seemed to push him away. The coast was clearly moving forward; many marine animals stuck in dry sand. On the other hand, a terrible black cloud that broke through different places running fiery zigzags; it opened up in wide flaming stripes, similar to lightning, but large.
The agony of those whose brains exploded from the heat, their lungs turned into cement, and their teeth and bones decayed, we cannot even imagine.
