L. Osipova
Alexander Bryullov. Self-portrait. 1830.
“Karl, just imagine – eighteen centuries ago everything was exactly the same: the sun shone dazzlingly, pine trees turned black along the edges of the road and donkeys loaded with luggage stumbled over stones. We are on the main road leading to Pompeii. These are the ruins Vacation home rich Diomedes, excavations are still underway here, further - Cicero's villa. Further on, a hotel, here they found a lot of pottery, marble mortars, on a stone board there was a trace of a liquid that seemed to have just been spilled, and wheat grains in the cellars. If crushed and baked, one could taste the most classic bread that is in our romantic era, I think it would impress many with its taste. Bah, don't you think that everything is very animated. Crowds of people rush to the city. Here they are carrying some important gentleman on a stretcher. He is in a tunic of dazzling white, pinned at the shoulder with a gold buckle, in knee-length sandals adorned with diamonds, and behind him is a whole procession of servants. Do you hear the screams of the black? Chariots have appeared, but it is so difficult for them to move, the narrow streets are all crowded with people. Everything is clear - everyone is in a hurry to the amphitheater. Today, gladiator battles with wild beasts are scheduled. Or maybe the judges sentenced one of the guilty to end their lives in the arena in a fight with lions that had just been brought from Africa? Oh, of course, no Pompeian can miss such a sight. 
Karl Bryullov. Self-portrait. OK. 1833.
“Calm down, your imagination is starting to bite!” Togo and look, these convicts will turn out to be ourselves. - The Bryullov brothers laugh and, sitting on a roadside stone, plunge into silence, broken only by the rustling of lizards and the rustle of thorny grasses ...
Alexander gets up and, finding a comfortable place on the dilapidated steps, opens a large album and begins to draw. A little later, Carl joins him. But they draw differently. Alexander, as an architect, is interested in the ratio of parts, the proportions that the builders of Pompeii adopted from the Greeks. Every now and then he runs up to Karl, asking him to pay attention to this simplicity and elegance of lines, combined with the richness and even sophistication of decorations - the capitals near the columns are either in the form of twined dolphins, or these are groups of fauns, one of which teaches another to play the flute, that weaving of fantastic fruits and leaves... Sophistication, an overabundance of imagination - this is already a phenomenon of the new time, the influence of Rome. And so it is with the Pompeians in everything: in the richest houses, all rooms, even banquet halls, are very small according to the Greek model - after all, the number of guests should correspond to the number of graces (three) or the number of muses (nine). Meanwhile, it is known that Pompey was not famous for moderation in food and pleasures. Vice versa. At feasts, they served sirloin parts of an African lion, smoked camel legs, foxes fattened with grapes, aromatic rabbits, ostrich brain sauce, earthen spiders, not to mention iced wines flavored with aromatic herbs ... No, our imagination is powerless all this imagine ... Yes, Greece and Rome met in Pompeii so that after the eruption of Vesuvius in August 79 after the birth of Christ, they would be buried by ash and stones for many centuries ...
Carl listens to his brother half aloud. He sketches in an album with a pencil sketch, regretting that he did not capture the colors. He is already in the power of living beauty, he enjoys.
How striking here is the effect of light, piercing and soft! And the throughness of marble - the eye leaves an impression of tenderness. The torso of Venus, the statue of an athlete, recently dug out, cleared of the earth, seem more authentic, natural than living people - these are the best people. Here it is - this world, which he began to comprehend from childhood.
Father - Pavel Ivanovich Bryullov, academician of ornamental sculpture, forced children to draw from antiques, as soon as they learned to hold a pencil in their hands. At the age of ten, Karl was admitted to the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, at fourteen he received a silver medal for a drawing in which, according to general assurance, he revived the times of Phidias and Polikleitos. IN dead world marble, he felt like his own, because with his whole being he felt the laws by which this world was created. Oh, how he believed now in his own strength! Embrace all objects, clothe in harmony, turn all the feelings of the viewer into a calm and endless enjoyment of beauty. To create art that would penetrate everywhere: into the poor man's hut, marbled columns, into the square, seething with people - as it was in this city, as it was in distant bright Greece ...
...Several years have passed. Alexander went to Paris to improve his knowledge and talent. He also had another intention, which he soon successfully carried out. He published a book about the excavations in Pompeii - on luxurious paper, with his own drawings and drawings. The merits of the book were so highly valued that, after a very short time, its author was elected a member of the Royal Institute of Architecture in London, a member of the Milan Academy of Arts. Alexander was not so much reveling in fame as rejoicing - finally, he has something to report to the Society for the Encouragement of Artists, which seven years ago, in 1822, sent him and his brother abroad after they graduated from the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts. But Karl... My God, what rumors about him did not reach here from Rome! He managed to pass for a wonderful portrait painter, and every eminent Russian gentleman who came to Italy hurried to order his portrait from him. But the trouble is, if this person began to inspire antipathy in Karl. He could receive him (as was the case with Count Orlov-Davydov) in the most careless suit and the most careless pose and calmly declare that he was not in the mood to work today. Scandal!.. 
One of the sketches of the painting "The Last Day of Pompeii".
However, news reached Alexander that in Lately Karl makes sketches for a large canvas, which he proposes to call "The Last Day of Pompeii." This pleased him so much that he immediately sat down to write a letter in which he greedily asked whether his brother was going to use historical sources or whether it would be his fruit. free fantasy; doesn’t he think that the death of Pompeii was predetermined from above: the Pompeians wallowed in luxury and amusements, frivolously neglecting all signs and predictions, languishing in prison the first Christians; where he suggests the scene of the picture; and most importantly - let, for God's sake, not be distracted from great work, which, perhaps, is destined for him to show his genius to the whole world.
The brother's letter caught Karl at an evil moment. He has already moved from sketches to canvas. It was of enormous size - 29 square meters. He worked drunkenly, almost without interruption, reached complete exhaustion, so that he was often taken out of the workshop. And then the owner came with a request to pay the bills ...
Of course, everyone already doubts that he is capable of creating anything worthwhile. The Society for the Encouragement of Artists has not paid him a pension for the second year. They only gossip around about his frivolous and careless disposition. But a brother must know that if he works out of passion, then even if you put a shroud on him, he will not stop working.
K. P. Bryullov "The Last Day of Pompeii", 1830-1833. State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg.
For pen and ink, Karl was taken in extreme cases. And then he decided: he would write now - both to the brothers (brother Fyodor, also an artist, lived in St. Petersburg), and to the Encouragement Society. "The scenery ... I took everything 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 the main reason - without which would it look like a fire? By right side I place groups of mother with two daughters on her knees (these skeletons were found in such a position); Behind this group one can see crowding groups on the stairs ... covering their heads with stools, vases (the things they save are all taken by me from the museum). Near this group is a fleeing family, thinking of finding refuge in the city: a husband, covering himself with a cloak and his wife holding baby, covering with the other hand the eldest son, lying at the feet of his father; in the middle of the picture is a fallen woman, devoid of feelings; the baby on her breast, no longer supported by the mother's hand, clutching at her clothes, calmly looks at the living scene of death ... "
Dozens of sketches and sketches, several years of hard work. No, he wrote not the horror of doom, not the proximity of death. “Passion, true, fiery feelings are expressed in such a beautiful appearance, in such a beautiful person that you enjoy to the point of intoxication,” Gogol said when he saw the picture. The death of the world of sensually beautiful, irrevocable. Yes, glory came to the artist. Triumph accompanied his appearance on the streets, in the theater. In St. Petersburg, a wreath of laurels was placed on his head, in magazines they wrote that his works were the first that an artist who has a higher development of taste and who does not know what art can understand can understand.
Well, Bryullov treated fame for granted, as a burden, not at all burdensome. He laughed nonchalantly when Alexander, tearfully embracing him, insisted that he had done more for Pompeii than any archaeologist or scientist...
In Italy, the great painter Bryullov painted a grandiose canvas - “The Last Day of Pompeii”. Description of the picture will be presented in our article. Contemporaries gave the work the most enthusiastic reviews, and the artist himself began to be called the Great Charles.
A little about K. I. Bryullov
The painter was born in 1799 into a family that, starting from his great-grandfather, was associated with art. After graduating from the Academy of Arts with a gold medal, he, along with his brother Alexander, a gifted architect, went to Rome. In the Eternal City, he works fruitfully, paints portraits and paintings that delight the public, critics and crowned persons. For six years, Karl Bryullov worked on the monumental dense. “The Last Day of Pompeii” (the description of the painting and its perception by Italians can be expressed in one word - triumph) has become a masterpiece for the inhabitants of the country. They believed that the artist's canvas evokes thoughts about the heroic past of their homeland at a time when the whole country is engulfed in the struggle for freedom.
Historical facts
The description of Bryullov’s painting “The Last Day of Pompeii” must begin with an interesting fact: the master visited the excavations under Vesuvius in 1827. This sight simply stunned him. It was evident that life was interrupted in the city suddenly.
The ruts on the pavement were fresh, the colors of the inscriptions were bright, which announced the rental of premises and the upcoming entertainment. In taverns, where only sellers were missing, there were traces of goblets and bowls on the tables.
Beginning of work
We begin the description of Bryullov’s painting “The Last Day of Pompeii” with a story about the artist’s many years of preparatory work, which went on for three years. First, a compositional sketch was made based on a fresh impression.
After that, the artist began to study historical documents. The artist found the information he needed in the letters of a witness to this natural disaster and the famous Roman historian Tacitus. They describe a day covered in mist, crowds of rushing people who do not know where to run, screams, groans ... Someone mourned their inevitable death, others mourned the death of loved ones. Above the rushing figures is a dark sky with zigzags of lightning. In addition, the artist created more and more new sketches, painted various groups of people, changed the composition. This is the preliminary description of Bryullov's painting "The Last Day of Pompeii". The place where the action takes place was immediately clear to him - the intersection of the Street of the Tombs. As soon as Bryullov imagined a rolling, heartbreaking thunderclap, he vividly imagined how all people froze ... A new feeling was added to their fear - the inevitability of tragedy. This was reflected in last track artist and draws up a description of Bryullov's painting "The Last Day of Pompeii". materials archaeological sites gave the artist household items for his canvas. The voids that formed in the lava preserved the contours of some bodies: here a woman fell from a chariot, here are daughters and a mother, here are young spouses. From Pliny, the artist borrowed the image of a mother and a young man.
selfless labor
For three years, work was carried out on a huge canvas. Raphael had a huge influence on the compositional and plastic solution, on the characteristics and description of Bryullov's painting "The Last Day of Pompeii". The artist previously studied with him, copying the frescoes "Fire in Borgo" and "The School of Athens", where about forty characters act. How many heroes are depicted on Bryullov's multi-figured canvas? It was very important in the work on the picture to introduce his contemporaries into it, bringing together distant eras. This is how the portrait of the athlete Marini appeared on the canvas - the figure of the father in the family group.
Under the artist's brush, the image of his favorite model appears either in the form of a girl, or in the form of a mother. Yu. Samoilova was the embodiment of his ideal, which was blazing with the power and passion of beauty. Her image filled the artist's imagination, and all the women on his canvas acquired features that the master loved.
The composition of the picture: a combination of romanticism and classicism
Romanticism and classicism are boldly combined on the canvas by Bryullov (“The Last Day of Pompeii”). The description of the painting can be briefly described in such a way that in the composition the master did not seek to enclose everything in classic triangles. In addition, listening to the voice of romanticism, he depicted a massive folk scene, violating the classical principle of bas-relief. The action develops, going deep into the canvas: a man fell from the chariot, who was carried away by frightened horses. The viewer's gaze involuntarily rushes after him into the abyss, into the cycle of events.
But the painter did not leave all the passionless ideas of classicism. His characters are beautiful externally and internally. The horror of their situation is drowned out by the ideal beauty of the characters. This softens the tragedy of their condition for the viewer. In addition, the composition uses a contrast between panic and calmness.
Action composition
In a canvas filled with movement, the rhythm of hand gestures and body movements is very important. Hands protect, protect, hug, with anger stretch to the sky and fall helplessly. Like sculptures, their forms are voluminous. I want to walk around them to take a closer look. The outline clearly encloses each figure. This classic technique was not rejected by the romantics.
The color of the canvas
Tragically gloomy is the day of the catastrophe. Darkness, completely impenetrable, hung over the people in distress. These black puffs of smoke and ash are pierced by sharp, bright lightning. The horizon is filled with the blood-red light of a fire. Its reflections fall on falling buildings and columns, on people - men, women, children - giving even more tragedy to the situation and showing the inevitable threat of death. Bryullov strives for natural lighting, violating the requirements of classicism. He subtly captures the reflexes of light and combines them with distinct chiaroscuro.
Characters of the canvas characters
The description and analysis of Bryullov's painting "The Last Day of Pompeii" will be incomplete if you do not consider all the people acting in the picture. For them, the day of the Last Judgment has come: stone monumental buildings collapse, like paper, from tremors. There is a roar all around, cries for help, prayers to the gods who abandoned the unfortunate. Essence human soul completely naked in the face of death. All groups, which are essentially a portrait, face the viewer.
Right side
Among the nobility there are base faces: a greedy thief who carries jewelry in the hope that he will survive. A pagan priest who runs away and tries to save himself, forgetting that he must pray to the gods for mercy. Fear and confusion in the composition of the family covered with a veil... Such is the description of Bryullov's painting "The Last Day of Pompeii". The photo of the masterpiece in the article shows in detail how the young father raises his hand to the sky in prayer.
The children hugging their mother knelt down. They are motionless and just waiting for a terrible inevitable fate. They have no one to help. A Christian with a bare chest and a cross on it believes in a future resurrection.
Only one figure is calm - the artist.
His task is to rise above the fear of death and capture the tragedy forever. Bryullov, introducing his portrait into the picture, shows the master as a witness to the drama that has played out.
Center and left side of the canvas
In the center - a young mother who has broken down tightly, who is hugged by a child who does not understand anything. This is a very tragic episode. The deceased symbolizes the death of the ancient world.
Self-sacrificing sons carry a powerless old father. They are filled with love for him and do not think at all about their own salvation.
The young man persuades the exhausted mother to get up and go to save herself. Together it is difficult, but nobility does not allow the young young man leave the old lady.
The young guy peers into the face of the tender bride, who has completely lost her strength of mind from the roar standing around, the sight of death, the fiery glow that promises them death.
He does not leave his beloved, although death can overtake them at any moment.
The key picture in the history of art was destined to become the masterpiece "The Last Day of Pompeii" by K. Bryullov. He caught the spirit of the time and created a canvas about those who know how to sacrifice everything for the sake of their loved ones. About ordinary people, whose moral concepts are immeasurably high during severe trials. The spectacle of how courageously they endure the heavy burden that has fallen to their lot should serve as an example of how, in any era and in any place, true love to a person.
Plot
On the canvas - one of the most powerful volcanic eruptions in the history of mankind. In 79, Vesuvius, who had been silent for so long before that it had long been considered extinct, suddenly “woke up” and forced all living things in the area to fall asleep forever.
It is known that Bryullov read the memoirs of Pliny the Younger, who witnessed the events in Mizena, which survived during the disaster: scenes. The chariots, which we dared to take out, shook so violently back and forth, although they stood on the ground, that we could not hold them, even by placing large stones under the wheels. The sea seemed to roll back and be pulled away from the shores by the convulsive movements of the Earth; certainly the land expanded considerably, and some sea animals were on the sand ... Finally, the terrible darkness began to dissipate little by little, like a cloud of smoke; daylight reappeared, and even the sun came out, although its light was gloomy, as it happens before an approaching eclipse. Every object that appeared before our eyes (which were extremely weakened) seemed to have changed, covered with a thick layer of ash, as if with snow.
Pompeii today
A crushing blow to the cities occurred 18-20 hours after the start of the eruption - people had enough time to escape. However, not everyone was prudent. And although set exact number the dead did not succeed, the number goes to thousands. Among them are mostly slaves, whom the owners left to guard the property, as well as the elderly and the sick, who did not have time to leave. There were also those who hoped to wait out the elements at home. In fact, they are still there.
As a child, Bryullov became deaf in one ear after being slapped by his father.
On the canvas, people are in a panic, the elements will not spare either the rich or the poor. And what is remarkable is that Bryullov used one model to write people of different classes. We are talking about Yulia Samoilova, her face is found on the canvas four times: a woman with a jug on her head on the left side of the canvas; a dead woman in the center; a mother attracting her daughters to her, in the left corner of the picture; a woman covering her children and saving with her husband. The artist was looking for faces for the rest of the heroes on the Roman streets.
It is surprising in this picture and how the issue of light is resolved. “An ordinary artist, of course, would not fail to take advantage of the eruption of Vesuvius to illuminate his picture; but Mr. Bryullov neglected this remedy. Genius inspired him with a bold idea, as happy as it was inimitable: to illuminate the entire front of the picture with a quick, minute and whitish brilliance of lightning, cutting through a thick cloud of ash that enveloped the city, while the light from the eruption, with difficulty breaking through the deep darkness, casts reddish penumbra into the background, ”the newspapers wrote then.
Context
By the time Bryullov decided to write the death of the Pompeii, he was considered talented, but still promising. For approval in the status of a master, serious work was needed.
At that time in Italy, the theme of Pompeii was popular. Firstly, excavations were carried out very actively, and secondly, there were a couple more eruptions of Vesuvius. This could not but be reflected in culture: on the stages of many Italian theaters, Pacchini's opera L "Ultimo giorno di Pompeia" was successfully staged. There is no doubt that the artist saw her, and maybe more than once.
The idea to write the death of the city came in Pompeii itself, which Bryullov visited in 1827 at the initiative of his brother, the architect Alexander. It took 6 years to collect the material. The artist was scrupulous in details. So, things that fell out of the box, jewelry and other various items in the picture were copied from those found by archaeologists during excavations.
Bryullov's watercolors were the most popular souvenir from Italy
Let's say a few words about Yulia Samoilova, whose face, as mentioned above, is found four times on the canvas. For the picture, Bryullov was looking for Italian types. And although Samoilova was Russian, her appearance corresponded to Bryullov's ideas about how Italian women should look.
"Portrait of Yu. P. Samoilova with Giovanina Pacini and a black boy." Bryullov, 1832-1834
They met in Italy in 1827. Bryullov adopted the experience of senior masters there and looked for inspiration, while Samoilova burned through her life. In Russia, she had already managed to get a divorce, she had no children, and for an overly stormy bohemian life, Nicholas I asked her to move away from the court.
When the work on the painting was completed and the Italian public saw the canvas, a boom began on Bryullov. It was a success! Everyone at a meeting with the artist considered it an honor to say hello; when he appeared in theaters, everyone stood up, and at the door of the house where he lived, or the restaurant where he dined, many people always gathered to greet him. Since the Renaissance, not a single artist in Italy has been the object of such worship as Karl Bryullov.
In the homeland of the painter, a triumph also awaited. The general euphoria about the picture becomes clear after reading the lines of Baratynsky:
He brought peaceful trophies
With you in the father's shade.
And there was "The Last Day of Pompeii"
For the Russian brush, the first day.
Karl Bryullov spent half of his conscious creative life in Europe. For the first time he went abroad after graduation Imperial Academy arts in St. Petersburg to improve skills. And where, if not in Italy, to do this ?! At first, Bryullov mainly painted Italian aristocrats, as well as watercolors with scenes from life. The latter have become a very popular souvenir from Italy. These were small-sized pictures with small-figured compositions, without psychological portraits. Such watercolors mainly glorified Italy with its beautiful nature and represented the Italians as a people who genetically preserved the ancient beauty of their ancestors.
An interrupted date (Water is already running over the edge). 1827
Bryullov wrote simultaneously with Delacroix and Ingres. It was a time when the theme of the fate of huge human masses came to the fore in painting. Therefore, it is not surprising that Bryullov chose the story of the death of Pompeii for his program canvas.
Bryullov undermined his health while painting St. Isaac's Cathedral
The picture produced on Nicholas I such strong impression that he demanded that Bryullov return to his homeland and take the place of professor at the Imperial Academy of Arts. Returning to Russia, Bryullov met and became friends with Pushkin, Glinka, Krylov.
Bryullov's frescoes in St. Isaac's Cathedral
The last years the artist spent in Italy, trying to save his health, undermined during the painting of St. Isaac's Cathedral. Hours of long hard work in a damp unfinished cathedral had a bad effect on the heart and aggravated rheumatism.
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 have discovered 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 leading place V 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 did not seek historical truth, because their goal was not to recreate the past, but to embody this or that abstract idea. In their pictures historical figures took on the appearance 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 of 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 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 actors in 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. Archaeological excavations began in 1748, especially intensified in the first decades of the 19th 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 " The last days of 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 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 opportunities for depicting great feelings, passionate spiritual outbursts 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 work a special place is occupied by a sketch of 1828. 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 diverse 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 that are not plot-related to 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 antique 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, the main idea is persistently revealed. 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 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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The city was discovered quite by accident at the end of the 16th century during earthworks.
Karl Bryullov. The last day of Pompeii. 1830-1833
Archaeological excavations began here in mid-eighteenth century. They called special interest not only in Italy, but all over the world. Many travelers aspired to visit Pompeii, where literally at every step there were evidence of the suddenly cut short life of the ancient city.
And in 1827, a young Russian artist Karl Bryullov came to Pompeii. What he saw there stunned him. And this picture is most likely the result of that trip.
Before starting to paint a picture, Bryullov begins to study historical sources. He reads the letters of Pliny the Younger, an eyewitness to the events, to the Roman historian Tacitus. In search of authenticity, the artist also turns to the materials of archaeological excavations, he depicts some figures in those poses in which the skeletons of the victims of Vesuvius were found in hardened lava.
The painting is valuable in that almost all items were painted by Bryullov from authentic items stored in the Neapolitan Museum. The surviving drawings, sketches and sketches show how persistently the artist sought the most expressive composition. And even when the sketch of the future canvas was ready, Bryullov regroups the scene about a dozen times, changes gestures, movements, poses ...
The canvas depicts Countess Yulia Pavlovna Samoilova three times - a woman with a jug on her head, standing on a dais on the left side of the canvas; a woman who has crashed to death, sprawled on the pavement, and next to her a living child (both, presumably, were thrown out of a broken chariot) - in the center of the canvas; and a mother attracting her daughters to her, in the left corner of the picture.
Left in the background - a crowd of fugitives on the steps of the tomb of Skaurus. In it, we notice an artist saving the most precious thing - a box with brushes and paints. This is a self-portrait of Karl Bryullov.
In the autumn of 1833, the painting appeared at an exhibition in Milan and caused an explosion of delight and admiration. An even greater triumph awaited Bryullov at home. Exhibited in the Hermitage and then at the Academy of Arts, the painting became a subject of patriotic pride. She was enthusiastically welcomed by A.S. Pushkin:
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
Crowds, old and young, under inflamed ashes,
Under the stone rain runs out of the hail.
Bryullov was compared with the great Italian masters. Poets dedicated poems to him. He was greeted with applause in the street and in the theater. A year later, the French Academy of Arts awarded the artist a gold medal for the painting after her participation in the Paris Salon.
"And there was" The Last Day of Pompeii "for the Russian brush the first day," wrote the poet Yevgeny Baratynsky. And indeed, the picture was triumphantly greeted in Rome, where Bryullov painted it, and then in Russia, and Sir Walter Scott somewhat pompously called the picture "unusual, epic." And Nicholas I honored the artist with a personal audience and awarded Charles with a laurel wreath, after which the artist was called "Charlemagne".
Anatoly Demidov presented the painting to Nicholas I, who exhibited it at the Academy of Arts as a guide for beginner painters. After the opening of the Russian Museum in 1895, the canvas moved there, and the general public gained access to it.
