Even those masterpieces of painting that seem familiar to us have their secrets.
Recently, a strange and unusual discovery was made in art history - an American student deciphered a musical notation depicted on the buttocks of a sinner from a painting by Bosch. The resulting melody has become one of the Internet sensations of recent times.
We believe that in almost every significant work of art there is a mystery, a “double bottom” or a secret story that you want to uncover. Today we will share a few of them.
Music on the buttocks
Hieronymus Bosch, The Garden of Earthly Delights, 1500-1510.
Fragment of the right side of the triptych.
Disputes about the meanings and hidden meanings of the most famous work of the Dutch artist have not subsided since its appearance. On the right wing of the triptych called "Musical Hell" sinners are depicted who are tortured in the underworld with the help of musical instruments. One of them has notes imprinted on his buttocks. Oklahoma Christian University student Amelia Hamrick, who studied the painting, adapted the 16th-century notation to a modern twist and recorded "a 500-year-old ass-song from hell."
Nude Mona Lisa
The famous "Gioconda" exists in two versions: the nude version is called "Monna Vanna", it was painted by the little-known artist Salai, who was a student and sitter of the great Leonardo da Vinci. Many art critics are sure that it was he who was the model for Leonardo's paintings "John the Baptist" and "Bacchus". There are also versions that dressed in a woman's dress, Salai served as the image of the Mona Lisa herself.
Old Fisherman
In 1902, the Hungarian artist Tivadar Kostka Chontvari painted the painting "Old Fisherman". It would seem that there is nothing unusual in the picture, but Tivadar laid a subtext in it, which was never revealed during the life of the artist.
Few people thought of putting a mirror in the middle of the picture. In each person there can be both God (the right shoulder of the Old Man is duplicated) and the Devil (the left shoulder of the old man is duplicated).
Twins at the Last Supper
Leonardo da Vinci, The Last Supper, 1495-1498.
When Leonardo da Vinci wrote The Last Supper, he attached particular importance to two figures: Christ and Judas. He was looking for sitters for them for a very long time. Finally, he managed to find a model for the image of Christ among the young singers. Leonardo failed to find a sitter for Judas for three years. But one day he came across a drunkard lying in the gutter on the street. He was a young man who had been aged by heavy drinking. Leonardo invited him to a tavern, where he immediately began to write Judas from him. When the drunkard came to his senses, he told the artist that he had already posed for him once. It was a few years ago, when he sang in the church choir, Leonardo wrote Christ from him.
Innocent story "Gothic"
Grant Wood, American Gothic, 1930.
Grant Wood's work is considered one of the strangest and most depressing in the history of American painting. The picture with a gloomy father and daughter is overflowing with details that indicate the severity, puritanism and retrogradeness of the people depicted. In fact, the artist did not intend to depict any horrors: during a trip to Iowa, he noticed a small house in the Gothic style and decided to depict those people who, in his opinion, would be ideally suited as inhabitants. Grant's sister and his dentist are immortalized in the form of characters that the people of Iowa were so offended by.
"Night Watch" or "Day Watch"?
Rembrandt, The Night Watch, 1642.
One of Rembrandt’s most famous paintings, “The Performance of the Rifle Company of Captain Frans Banning Cock and Lieutenant Willem van Ruytenbürg,” hung in different halls for about two hundred years and was discovered by art historians only in the 19th century. Since the figures seemed to stand out against a dark background, it was called the Night Watch, and under this name it entered the treasury of world art. And only during the restoration, carried out in 1947, it turned out that in the hall the picture had managed to become covered with a layer of soot, which distorted its color. After clearing the original painting, it was finally revealed that the scene presented by Rembrandt actually takes place during the day. The position of the shadow from the left hand of Captain Kok shows that the duration of the action is no more than 14 hours.
capsized boat
Henri Matisse, The Boat, 1937.
In the New York Museum of Modern Art in 1961, Henri Matisse's painting "The Boat" was exhibited. Only after 47 days did someone notice that the painting was hanging upside down. The canvas depicts 10 purple lines and two blue sails on a white background. The artist painted two sails for a reason, the second sail is a reflection of the first one on the surface of the water. In order not to be mistaken in how the picture should hang, you need to pay attention to the details. The larger sail should be at the top of the painting, and the peak of the sail of the painting should be directed to the upper right corner.
Deception in a self-portrait
Vincent van Gogh, Self Portrait with a Pipe, 1889.
There are legends that Van Gogh allegedly cut off his own ear. Now the most reliable version is that Van Gogh's ear was damaged in a small scuffle with the participation of another artist, Paul Gauguin. The self-portrait is interesting because it reflects reality in a distorted form: the artist is depicted with a bandaged right ear, because he used a mirror when working. In fact, the left ear was damaged.
Two "Breakfasts on the Grass"
Édouard Manet, Luncheon on the Grass, 1863.
Claude Monet, Breakfast on the Grass, 1865.
Artists Edouard Manet and Claude Monet are sometimes confused - after all, they were both French, lived at the same time and worked in the style of impressionism. Even the name of one of Manet's most famous paintings, "Breakfast on the Grass", Monet borrowed and wrote his "Breakfast on the Grass".
alien bears
Ivan Shishkin, "Morning in the Pine Forest", 1889.
The famous painting belongs not only to the pen of Shishkin. Many artists who were friends with each other often resorted to "the help of a friend", and Ivan Ivanovich, who had been painting landscapes all his life, was afraid that touching bears would not turn out the way he needed. Therefore, Shishkin turned to a familiar animal painter Konstantin Savitsky.
Savitsky painted perhaps the best bears in the history of Russian painting, and Tretyakov ordered his name to be washed off the canvas, since everything in the picture “beginning from the idea and ending with the execution, everything speaks of the manner of painting, of the creative method peculiar to Shishkin.”
While admiring still lifes, we can hardly imagine what was depicted in the first paintings painted in this genre. And on them, in fact, decay products were painted: rotting fruits, withering flowers. Very often such works were decorated with a human skull. The artists once again wanted to remind that we are all just guests in this world...
The Massacre of the Innocents by Rubens is considered the most expensive painting in the world. The painting wanders from one rich man to another, and its price is steadily growing. The last time it was bought for more than 73 million euros. No wonder the buyer wished to remain anonymous...
The artist most offended by "grateful" fans can be called Henri Matisse. In 1961, the Museum of Modern Art, located in New York, presented his painting "The Boat" to the public. And only after almost a month and a half, a casual art connoisseur noticed that the masterpiece was not hanging as it should be for a masterpiece, but upside down. The confusion was terrible...
Even during the life of Ilya Repin, an attempt was made on his famous Ivan the Terrible, who had just killed his son. The insane icon painter, unable to bear the terrible look of the king, cut the canvas with a knife. Not only the best restorers were involved in the restoration, but also Repin himself. But the master did not want to return to the original Ivan the Terrible, who appeared 20 years ago, and painted the face of the king in a new way. As a result, it turned purple. Secretly from Repin, the restorers restored the face of Ivan IV to its former color. When the picture was shown to the artist, he did not pay attention to such "arbitrariness".
Can Christ and Judas have the same face? Maybe if it's the face of the sitter. The painting "The Last Supper" cost Leonardo da Vinci a titanic effort. The artist found the person who posed for him as "Christ" quite quickly - a church choir singer perfectly suited his role. But the search for "Judas" took three years. One day, walking down the street, the master saw a drunkard who could not get out of the cesspool. The lover of the green serpent was still young, but due to regular drinking, he looked much older than his years. Leonardo led him to the nearest drinking establishment, seated him at the table and began to draw. What was the astonishment of the artist when the sober drunkard said that he had already posed for him several years ago! It was the same singer...
Manet and Monet are confused not only by modern art lovers - they were also confused by contemporaries. Artists not only lived at the same time and had similar surnames, but also borrowed ideas from each other. After Manet presented the painting “Breakfast on the Grass” to the public, Monet, without thinking twice, wrote his own, and under the same name.
Many of Vasnetsov's "colleagues" disliked neither himself nor the paintings he painted. The battlefield strewn with corpses, which remained after the battle between Prince Igor and the Polovtsy, they called nothing more than "Dead". Another picture of the master - "Flying Carpet" - received an even more malicious name: "Carpet with Ears".
Today, in every museum you can listen to wonderful guides who will tell you in detail about the collection and the artists represented in it. At the same time, many parents know that it is difficult for most children to spend even an hour in a museum, and stories about the history of painting tire them rather quickly. So that children in the museum do not get bored, we offer a "cheat sheet" for parents - ten entertaining stories about paintings from the Tretyakov Gallery, which will be of interest to both children and adults.
1. Ivan Kramskoy. Mermaids, 1871
Ivan Kramskoy is primarily known as the author of the painting "Unknown" (she is often mistakenly called "The Stranger"), as well as a number of beautiful portraits: Leo Tolstoy, Ivan Shishkin, Dmitry Mendeleev. But it’s better for children to start getting acquainted with his work from the magical painting “Mermaids”, with which this story is connected.
In August 1871, the artist Ivan Kramskoy was visiting the country estate of his acquaintance, art lover and famous philanthropist Pavel Stroganov. Walking in the evenings, he admired the moon and admired its magical light. During these walks, the artist decided to paint a night landscape and try to convey all the charm, all the magic of a moonlit night, "catch the moon" - in his own words.
Kramskoy began work on the painting. A river bank appeared on a moonlit night, a hillock and a house on it, surrounded by poplars. The landscape was beautiful, but something was missing - the magic was not born on the canvas. Nikolai Gogol's book "Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka" came to the aid of the artist, or rather the story called "May Night, or the Drowned Woman" is fabulous and a little creepy. And then the mermaid girls appeared in the picture, illuminated by moonlight.
The artist worked so carefully on the picture that he began to dream about it and he constantly wanted to finish something in it. A year after it was bought by the founder of the Tretyakov Gallery, Pavel Tretyakov, Kramskoy once again wanted to change something in it and made minor changes right in the exhibition hall.
Kramskoy's canvas was the first "fabulous" painting in the history of Russian painting.
2. Vasily Vereshchagin. "Apotheosis of War", 1871
It so happened that people always fought. From time immemorial, brave leaders and powerful rulers equipped their armies and sent them to war. Of course, they wanted distant descendants to know about their military exploits, so poets composed poems and songs, and artists created beautiful paintings and sculptures. In these paintings, the war usually looked like a holiday - bright colors, fearless warriors going into battle ...
The artist Vasily Vereshchagin knew firsthand about the war - he took part in the battles more than once - and painted many paintings in which he depicted what he saw with his own eyes: not only brave soldiers and their commanders, but also blood, pain and suffering.
Once he thought about how to show all the horrors of war in one picture, how to let the audience understand that war is always grief and death, how to let others look at its disgusting details? He realized that it was not enough to paint a picture with a battlefield dotted with dead soldiers - such canvases were before. Vereshchagin came up with a symbol of war, an image, just by looking at which, everyone can imagine how terrible any war is. He painted a scorched desert, in the middle of which rises a pyramid of human skulls. Around - only dry, lifeless trees, and only crows flock to their feast. A dilapidated city can be seen in the distance, and the viewer can easily guess that there is no more life there.
3. Alexey Savrasov. "The Rooks Have Arrived", 1871
Everyone has known the picture “The Rooks Have Arrived” since childhood, and for sure everyone wrote school essays on it. And today, teachers will definitely tell the children about Savrasov's lyrical landscapes and about the fact that already in the very title of this picture one can hear a joyful harbinger of the morning of the year and everything in it is full of deep, close to the heart meaning. Meanwhile, few people know that the famous "Rooks ...", as well as all the other works of Savrasov, could not exist at all.
Alexei Savrasov was the son of a petty Moscow haberdasher. The boy's desire to paint did not cause delight in the parent, but nevertheless, Kondrat Savrasov let his son go to the Moscow School of Painting and Sculpture. Both teachers and classmates recognized the talent of the young artist and predicted a great future for him. But it so happened that, without having studied for even a year, Alexei, apparently due to his mother's illness, was forced to stop his studies. His teacher Karl Rabus turned for help to the chief police chief of Moscow, Major General Ivan Luzhin, who helped the talented young man get an art education.
If Luzhin had not taken part in the fate of the young artist, one of the most famous paintings in the history of Russian art would never have been born.
4. Vasily Polenov. "Moscow courtyard", 1878
Sometimes, in order to paint a beautiful picture, the artist travels a lot, looking for the most beautiful views for a long time and meticulously, in the end, he finds the cherished place and comes there again and again with a sketchbook. And it also happens that in order to create a wonderful work, he just needs to go to his own window, look at a completely ordinary Moscow courtyard - and a miracle happens, an amazing landscape filled with light and air appears.
It was precisely such a miracle that happened to the artist Vasily Polenov, who looked out of the window of his apartment in the early summer of 1878 and quickly wrote what he saw. Clouds glide easily across the sky, the sun rises higher and higher, heating the earth with its warmth, lighting up the domes of churches with brilliance, shortening thick shadows ... It would seem that a plain picture, which the artist himself did not take seriously at first: he painted and almost forgot about it. But then he was invited to take part in the exhibition. He did not have anything significant, and Polenov decided to exhibit "Moscow Courtyard".
Oddly enough, it was this “insignificant picture” that brought Vasily Polenov fame and glory - both the public and critics loved it: it has both warmth and bright colors, and its characters can be considered endlessly, inventing a story about each of them.
5. Ivan Shishkin. "Morning in a pine forest", 1889
“Morning in a Pine Forest” by Ivan Shishkin is probably the most famous painting from the collection of the Tretyakov Gallery. In our country, everyone knows her, thanks to reproductions in school textbooks, or maybe thanks to the Mishka kosolapy chocolates.
But not everyone knows that Shishkin himself painted only a morning forest in a foggy haze, and has nothing to do with bears. This picture is the fruit of the joint work of Shishkin and his friend, the artist Konstantin Savitsky.
Ivan Shishkin was an unsurpassed master of depicting all sorts of botanical subtleties - the critic Alexander Benois pretty much scolded him for his addiction to photographic accuracy, called his paintings lifeless and cold. But the artist was not friends with zoology. They say that this is why Shishkin turned to Savitsky with a request to help him with the bears. Savitsky did not refuse his friend, but he did not take his work seriously - and did not sign it.
Later, Pavel Tretyakov purchased this painting from Shishkin, and the artist suggested that Savitsky leave a signature on the painting - after all, they worked on it together. Savitsky did just that, but Tretyakov did not like it. Declaring that he bought the painting from Shishkin, and did not want to know anything about Savitsky, he demanded a solvent and removed the “extra” signature with his own hands. And so it happened that today in the Tretyakov Gallery indicate the authorship of only one artist.
6. Viktor Vasnetsov. "Bogatyrs", 1898
Viktor Vasnetsov is considered the most “fabulous” artist in the history of Russian painting - it is his brushes that such famous works as Alyonushka, The Knight at the Crossroads, Bogatyrsky Skok and many others belong to. But his most famous painting is "Bogatyrs", which depicts the main characters of Russian epics.
The artist himself described the picture as follows: “Bogatyrs Dobrynya, Ilya and Alyosha Popovich at the heroic exit - they notice in the field, is there a thief somewhere, are they offending anyone somewhere?”
In the middle, on a black horse, Ilya Muromets, looks into the distance from under his palm, in one hand the hero has a spear, in the other a damask club. On the left, on a white horse, Dobrynya Nikitich, takes out a sword from its scabbard. On the right, Alyosha Popovich, on a red-colored horse, holds a bow with arrows in his hands. A curious story is connected with the heroes of this picture - more precisely, with their prototypes.
Viktor Vasnetsov thought for a long time what Ilya Muromets should look like, and for a long time he could not find the “right” face - bold, honest, expressing strength and kindness at the same time. But one day, quite by chance, he met with the peasant Ivan Petrov, who came to Moscow to work. The artist was amazed - on the Moscow street he saw the real Ilya Muromets. The peasant agreed to pose for Vasnetsov and ... remained for centuries.
In the epics, Dobrynya Nikitich is quite young, but for some reason Vasnetsov's painting depicts a middle-aged man. Why did the artist decide to act so freely with folk tales? The answer is simple: in the image of Dobrynya, Vasnetsov portrayed himself, it is enough to compare the picture with portraits and photographs of the artist.
7. Valentin Serov. "Girl with peaches. Portrait of V. S. Mamontova, 1887
“Girl with Peaches” is one of the most famous portraits in the history of Russian painting, painted by the artist Valentin Serov.
The girl in the portrait is Verochka, the daughter of the philanthropist Savva Mamontov, in whose house the artist often visited. It is interesting that the peaches lying on the table were not brought from warm regions, but grew up not far from Moscow, right in the Abramtsevo estate, which was quite unusual in the 19th century. A magic gardener worked for Mamontov - in his skillful hands, fruit trees bloomed even in February, and the harvest was already harvested at the beginning of summer.
Thanks to Serov's portrait, Vera Mamontova went down in history, but the artist himself recalled how difficult it was for him to persuade a 12-year-old girl to pose, who was distinguished by an extremely restless character. Serov worked on the painting for almost a month, and every day Vera sat quietly in the dining room for several hours.
The work was not in vain: when the artist presented the portrait at the exhibition, the public liked the picture very much. And today, more than a hundred years later, The Girl with Peaches delights visitors to the Tretyakov Gallery.
8. Ilya Repin. "Ivan the Terrible and his son Ivan on November 16, 1581", 1883-1885
Looking at this or that picture, you often wonder what was the source of inspiration for the artist, what prompted him to write just such a work? In the case of Ilya Repin's painting "Ivan the Terrible and his son Ivan on November 16, 1581", it is not at all easy to guess the true reasons.
The painting depicts a legendary episode from the life of Ivan the Terrible, when in a fit of anger he dealt a mortal blow to his son Tsarevich Ivan. However, many historians believe that in fact there was no murder and the prince died of illness, and not at all at the hands of his father. It would seem that what can make an artist turn to such a historical episode?
As the artist himself recalled, the idea to paint the painting "Ivan the Terrible and his son Ivan" came to him after ... a concert at which he heard the music of the composer Rimsky-Korsakov. It was the symphonic suite "Antar". The sounds of music took possession of the artist, and he wanted to embody in painting the mood that he created under the influence of this work.
But not only music has become a source of inspiration. Traveling through Europe in 1883, Repin attended a bullfight. The sight of this bloody spectacle impressed the artist, who wrote that, “infected ... with this bloodiness, upon arrival home, he immediately set to the bloody scene“ Ivan the Terrible with his son ”. And the picture of blood was a great success.”
9. Mikhail Vrubel. "Seated Demon", 1890
Sometimes the title of a picture means a lot. What does the viewer see at the first glance at Mikhail Vrubel's painting "Seated Demon"? A muscular young man sits on a rock and looks sadly at the sunset. But as soon as we pronounce the word "demon", the image of a magical unkind creature immediately arises. Meanwhile, the demon of Mikhail Vrubel is not an evil spirit at all. The artist himself said more than once that the demon is a spirit "not so much evil as suffering and mournful, but for all that, an imperious spirit, ... majestic."
This painting is interesting for its pictorial technique. The artist applies paint to the canvas not with the usual brush, but with a thin steel plate - a palette knife. This technique allows you to combine the techniques of a painter and a sculptor, literally “sculpt” a picture with the help of paints. This is how a “mosaic” effect is achieved - it seems that the sky, the rocks, and the hero’s body itself are not painted with paint, but are lined with carefully polished, perhaps even precious stones.
10. Alexander Ivanov. "The Appearance of Christ to the People (The Appearance of the Messiah)", 1837-1857
Alexander Ivanov's painting "The Appearance of Christ to the People" is a unique event in the history of Russian painting. It is not easy to talk about it with children, especially 6-7-year-olds, but they must see this monumental canvas, on which the artist has been working for more than 20 years and which has become the work of his whole life.
The plot of the picture is based on the third chapter of the Gospel of Matthew: John the Baptist, baptizing the Jewish people on the banks of the Jordan in the name of the expected Savior, suddenly sees the One walking in whose name he baptizes people. Children will learn about the compositional features of the picture, its symbols and artistic language later. During the first meeting, it is worth talking about how one painting became the work of the artist’s whole life.
After graduating from the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, Alexander Ivanov was sent "for an internship" to Italy. "The Appearance of Christ to the People" was supposed to be a reporting work. But the artist takes his work very seriously: he carefully studies the Holy Scriptures, history, spends months in search of the right landscape, an endless amount of time looking for an image for each character in the picture. The money that was allocated to him for work is running out, Ivanov leads a beggarly existence. Painstaking work on the picture led to the fact that the artist spoiled his eyesight and had to be treated for a long time.
When Ivanov completed his work, the Italian public enthusiastically accepted the picture, this was one of the first cases of European recognition of a Russian artist. In Russia, it was not immediately appreciated - only after the death of the artist did real fame come to him.
While working on the painting, Ivanov created more than 600 sketches. In the hall where it is exhibited, you can see some of them. It is interesting to use these examples to trace how the artist worked on the composition, landscape, and images of the characters in the picture.
Post selection
In almost every significant work of art there is a mystery, a double bottom or a secret story that you want to uncover.
Music on the buttocks
Hieronymus Bosch, The Garden of Earthly Delights, 1500-1510.
Fragment of a triptych
Disputes about the meanings and hidden meanings of the most famous work of the Dutch artist have not subsided since its appearance. On the right wing of the triptych called "Musical Hell" sinners are depicted who are tortured in the underworld with the help of musical instruments. One of them has notes imprinted on his buttocks. Oklahoma Christian University student Amelia Hamrick, who studied the painting, transposed the 16th-century notation into a modern twist and recorded "a 500-year-old ass song from hell."
Nude Mona Lisa
The famous "Gioconda" exists in two versions: the nude version is called "Monna Vanna", it was painted by the little-known artist Salai, who was a student and sitter of the great Leonardo da Vinci. Many art critics are sure that it was he who was the model for Leonardo's paintings "John the Baptist" and "Bacchus". There are also versions that dressed in a woman's dress, Salai served as the image of the Mona Lisa herself.
Old Fisherman
In 1902, the Hungarian artist Tivadar Kostka Chontvari painted the painting "Old Fisherman". It would seem that there is nothing unusual in the picture, but Tivadar laid a subtext in it, which was never revealed during the life of the artist.
Few people thought of putting a mirror in the middle of the picture. In each person there can be both God (the right shoulder of the Old Man is duplicated) and the Devil (the left shoulder of the old man is duplicated).
Was there a whale?
Hendrik van Antonissen "Scene on the Shore".
It seemed like an ordinary landscape. Boats, people on the shore and the desert sea. And only an X-ray study showed that people gathered on the shore for a reason - in the original, they examined the carcass of a whale washed ashore.
However, the artist decided that no one would want to look at a dead whale and repainted the painting.
Two "Breakfasts on the Grass"
Edouard Manet, Breakfast on the Grass, 1863.
Claude Monet, Breakfast on the Grass, 1865.
Artists Edouard Manet and Claude Monet are sometimes confused - after all, they were both French, lived at the same time and worked in the style of impressionism. Even the name of one of Manet's most famous paintings, "Breakfast on the Grass", Monet borrowed and wrote his "Breakfast on the Grass".
Twins at the Last Supper
Leonardo da Vinci, The Last Supper, 1495-1498.
When Leonardo da Vinci wrote The Last Supper, he attached particular importance to two figures: Christ and Judas. He was looking for sitters for them for a very long time. Finally, he managed to find a model for the image of Christ among the young singers. Leonardo failed to find a sitter for Judas for three years. But one day he came across a drunkard lying in the gutter on the street. He was a young man who had been aged by heavy drinking. Leonardo invited him to a tavern, where he immediately began to write Judas from him. When the drunkard came to his senses, he told the artist that he had already posed for him once. It was a few years ago, when he sang in the church choir, Leonardo wrote Christ from him.
"Night Watch" or "Day Watch"?
Rembrandt, Night Watch, 1642.
One of Rembrandt’s most famous paintings, “The Performance of the Rifle Company of Captain Frans Banning Cock and Lieutenant Willem van Ruytenbürg,” hung in different halls for about two hundred years and was discovered by art historians only in the 19th century. Since the figures seemed to stand out against a dark background, it was called the Night Watch, and under this name it entered the treasury of world art.
And only during the restoration, carried out in 1947, it turned out that in the hall the picture had managed to become covered with a layer of soot, which distorted its color. After clearing the original painting, it was finally revealed that the scene presented by Rembrandt actually takes place during the day. The position of the shadow from the left hand of Captain Kok shows that the duration of the action is no more than 14 hours.
capsized boat
Henri Matisse, "The Boat", 1937.
In the New York Museum of Modern Art in 1961, Henri Matisse's painting "The Boat" was exhibited. Only after 47 days did someone notice that the painting was hanging upside down. The canvas depicts 10 purple lines and two blue sails on a white background. The artist painted two sails for a reason, the second sail is a reflection of the first one on the surface of the water.
In order not to be mistaken in how the picture should hang, you need to pay attention to the details. The larger sail should be at the top of the painting, and the peak of the sail of the painting should be directed to the upper right corner.
Deception in a self-portrait
Vincent van Gogh, Self Portrait with a Pipe, 1889.
There are legends that Van Gogh allegedly cut off his own ear. Now the most reliable version is that van Gogh's ear was damaged in a small scuffle with the participation of another artist, Paul Gauguin.
The self-portrait is interesting because it reflects reality in a distorted form: the artist is depicted with a bandaged right ear, because he used a mirror when working. In fact, the left ear was damaged.
alien bears
Ivan Shishkin, "Morning in the Pine Forest", 1889.
The famous painting belongs not only to the brush of Shishkin. Many artists who were friends with each other often resorted to "the help of a friend", and Ivan Ivanovich, who had been painting landscapes all his life, was afraid that touching bears would not turn out the way he needed. Therefore, Shishkin turned to a familiar animal painter Konstantin Savitsky.
Savitsky painted perhaps the best bears in the history of Russian painting, and Tretyakov ordered his name to be washed off the canvas, since everything in the picture “beginning from the idea and ending with the execution, everything speaks of the manner of painting, of the creative method peculiar to Shishkin.”
Innocent story "Gothic"
Grant Wood, "American Gothic", 1930.
Grant Wood's work is considered one of the strangest and most depressing in the history of American painting. The picture with a gloomy father and daughter is overflowing with details that indicate the severity, puritanism and retrogradeness of the people depicted.
In fact, the artist did not intend to depict any horrors: during a trip to Iowa, he noticed a small house in the Gothic style and decided to depict those people who, in his opinion, would be ideally suited as inhabitants. Grant's sister and his dentist are immortalized in the form of characters that the people of Iowa were so offended by.
Revenge of Salvador Dali
The painting "Figure at the Window" was painted in 1925, when Dali was 21 years old. Then Gala had not yet entered the life of the artist, and his sister Ana Maria was his muse. The relationship between brother and sister deteriorated when he wrote on one of the paintings "sometimes I spit on a portrait of my own mother, and it gives me pleasure." Ana Maria could not forgive such shocking.
In her 1949 book Salvador Dali Through the Eyes of a Sister, she writes about her brother without any praise. The book infuriated El Salvador. For another ten years after that, he angrily remembered her at every opportunity. And so, in 1954, the picture "A young virgin indulging in Sodomy sin with the help of the horns of her own chastity" appears. The pose of the woman, her curls, the landscape outside the window and the color scheme of the painting clearly echo the Figure at the Window. There is a version that this is how Dali took revenge on his sister for her book.
Two-faced Danae
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn, Danae, 1636-1647.
Many secrets of one of Rembrandt's most famous paintings were revealed only in the 60s of the twentieth century, when the canvas was illuminated with x-rays. For example, the shooting showed that in the early version, the face of the princess, who entered into a love affair with Zeus, looked like the face of Saskia, the wife of the painter, who died in 1642. In the final version of the painting, it began to resemble the face of Gertier Dirks, Rembrandt's mistress, with whom the artist lived after the death of his wife.
Van Gogh's yellow bedroom
Vincent van Gogh, "Bedroom in Arles", 1888 - 1889.
In May 1888, Van Gogh acquired a small workshop in Arles, in the south of France, where he fled from the Parisian artists and critics who did not understand him. In one of the four rooms, Vincent sets up a bedroom. In October, everything is ready, and he decides to paint Van Gogh's Bedroom in Arles. For the artist, the color, the comfort of the room was very important: everything had to suggest thoughts of relaxation. At the same time, the picture is sustained in disturbing yellow tones.
Researchers of Van Gogh's creativity explain this by the fact that the artist took foxglove, a remedy for epilepsy, which causes serious changes in the patient's perception of color: the whole surrounding reality is painted in green-yellow tones.
Toothless perfection
Leonardo da Vinci, "Portrait of Mrs. Lisa del Giocondo", 1503 - 1519.
The generally accepted opinion is that Mona Lisa is perfection and her smile is beautiful in its mysteriousness. However, the American art critic (and part-time dentist) Joseph Borkowski believes that, judging by the expression on her face, the heroine has lost a lot of her teeth. While examining enlarged photographs of the masterpiece, Borkowski also found scars around her mouth. “She smiles so much precisely because of what happened to her,” the expert believes. “Her facial expression is typical of people who have lost their front teeth.”
Major on face control
Pavel Fedotov, Major's Matchmaking, 1848.
The public, who first saw the painting "Major's Matchmaking", laughed heartily: the artist Fedotov filled it with ironic details that were understandable to viewers of that time. For example, the major is clearly not familiar with the rules of noble etiquette: he appeared without the proper bouquets for the bride and her mother. And the bride herself was discharged by her merchant parents into an evening ball gown, although it was daytime (all the lamps in the room were extinguished). The girl obviously tried on a low-cut dress for the first time, is embarrassed and tries to run away to her room.
Why Freedom is naked
Ferdinand Victor Eugene Delacroix, Liberty at the Barricades, 1830.
According to the art historian Etienne Julie, Delacroix painted the face of a woman from the famous Parisian revolutionary - the laundress Anna-Charlotte, who went to the barricades after the death of her brother at the hands of royal soldiers and killed nine guards. The artist depicted her bare-chested. According to his plan, this is a symbol of fearlessness and selflessness, as well as the triumph of democracy: naked breasts show that Svoboda, like a commoner, does not wear a corset.
non-square square
Kazimir Malevich, Black Suprematist Square, 1915.
In fact, the "Black Square" is not at all black and not at all square: none of the sides of the quadrangle is parallel to any of its other sides, and none of the sides of the square frame that frames the picture. And the dark color is the result of mixing various colors, among which there was no black. It is believed that this was not the negligence of the author, but a principled position, the desire to create a dynamic, mobile form.
Specialists of the Tretyakov Gallery have discovered the author's inscription on a famous painting by Malevich. The inscription reads: "Battle of the Negroes in a dark cave." This phrase refers to the name of the playful painting by the French journalist, writer and artist Alphonse Allais “Battle of the Negroes in a Dark Cave in the Dead of Night”, which was an absolutely black rectangle.
Melodrama of the Austrian Mona Lisa
Gustav Klimt, "Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer", 1907.
One of Klimt's most significant paintings depicts the wife of the Austrian sugar magnate Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer. All Vienna discussed the stormy romance between Adele and the famous artist. The wounded husband wanted to take revenge on his lovers, but chose a very unusual way: he decided to order a portrait of Adele from Klimt and force him to make hundreds of sketches until the artist starts to turn away from her.
Bloch-Bauer wanted the work to last several years, and the model could see how Klimt's feelings fade away. He made a generous offer to the artist, which he could not refuse, and everything turned out according to the scenario of the deceived husband: the work was completed in 4 years, the lovers had long cooled off towards each other. Adele Bloch-Bauer never found out that her husband was aware of her relationship with Klimt.
The painting that brought Gauguin back to life
Paul Gauguin, "Where do we come from? Who are we? Where are we going?", 1897-1898.
Gauguin's most famous canvas has one feature: it is "read" not from left to right, but from right to left, like Kabbalistic texts that the artist was interested in. It is in this order that the allegory of the spiritual and physical life of a person unfolds: from the birth of the soul (a sleeping child in the lower right corner) to the inevitability of the hour of death (a bird with a lizard in its claws in the lower left corner).
The painting was painted by Gauguin in Tahiti, where the artist fled from civilization several times. But this time life on the island did not work out: total poverty led him to depression. Having finished the canvas, which was to become his spiritual testament, Gauguin took a box of arsenic and went to the mountains to die. However, he did not calculate the dose, and the suicide failed. The next morning, he staggered to his hut and fell asleep, and when he woke up, he felt a forgotten thirst for life. And in 1898, his affairs went uphill, and a brighter period began in his work.
112 proverbs in one picture
Pieter Brueghel the Elder, "Netherlands Proverbs", 1559
Pieter Brueghel the Elder depicted a land inhabited by literal images of the Dutch proverbs of those days. There are approximately 112 recognizable idioms in the painted picture. Some of them are still used today, such as "swim against the current", "bang your head against the wall", "armed to the teeth" and "big fish eats small ones".
Other proverbs reflect human stupidity.
Subjectivity of art
Paul Gauguin, Breton village under the snow, 1894
Gauguin's painting "Breton Village in the Snow" was sold after the death of the author for only seven francs and, moreover, under the name "Niagara Falls". The auctioneer accidentally hung the painting upside down after seeing a waterfall in it.
hidden picture
Pablo Picasso, The Blue Room, 1901
In 2008, infrared showed that another image was hidden under the "Blue Room" - a portrait of a man dressed in a suit with a butterfly and resting his head on his hand. “As soon as Picasso had a new idea, he took up the brush and embodied it. But he did not have the opportunity to buy a new canvas every time the muse visited him, ”art historian Patricia Favero explains the possible reason for this.
Inaccessible Moroccan women
Zinaida Serebryakova, Naked, 1928
One day, Zinaida Serebryakova received a tempting offer - to go on a creative journey to portray the naked figures of oriental maidens. But it turned out that it was simply impossible to find models in those places. An interpreter for Zinaida came to the rescue - he brought his sisters and his bride to her. No one before and after that was able to capture the closed oriental women naked.
Spontaneous insight
Valentin Serov, "Portrait of Nicholas II in a jacket", 1900
For a long time Serov could not paint a portrait of the king. When the artist completely gave up, he apologized to Nikolai. Nikolai was a little upset, sat down at the table, stretching out his hands in front of him ... And then it dawned on the artist - here he is! A simple military man in an officer's jacket with clear and sad eyes. This portrait is considered the best depiction of the last emperor.
Again deuce
© Fedor Reshetnikov
The famous painting "Again deuce" is just the second part of the artistic trilogy.
The first part is "Arrived for the holidays." Obviously a well-to-do family, winter holidays, a joyful excellent student.
The second part is "Again the deuce." A poor family from the outskirts of the working class, the height of the school year, a dull stunner who again grabbed a deuce. In the upper left corner you can see the picture "Arrived for the holidays."
The third part is "Re-examination". Rural house, summer, everyone is walking, one malicious ignoramus who failed the annual exam is forced to sit within four walls and cramming. In the upper left corner you can see the picture "Again deuce".
How masterpieces are born
Joseph Turner, Rain, Steam and Speed, 1844
In 1842, Mrs. Simon traveled by train in England. Suddenly, a heavy downpour began. The elderly gentleman sitting across from her got up, opened the window, stuck his head out, and stared like that for about ten minutes. Unable to contain her curiosity, the woman also opened the window and looked ahead. A year later, she discovered the painting “Rain, Steam and Speed” at an exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts and was able to recognize in it the very episode on the train.
Anatomy lesson from Michelangelo
Michelangelo, The Creation of Adam, 1511
A couple of American neuroanatomy experts believe that Michelangelo actually left some anatomical illustrations in one of his most famous works. They believe that a huge brain is depicted on the right side of the picture. Surprisingly, even complex components such as the cerebellum, optic nerves, and pituitary gland can be found. And the catchy green ribbon perfectly matches the location of the vertebral artery.
The Last Supper by Van Gogh
Vincent van Gogh, Café Terrace at Night, 1888
Researcher Jared Baxter believes that Van Gogh's Café Terrace at Night contains a dedication to Leonardo da Vinci's The Last Supper. In the center of the picture is a waiter with long hair and in a white tunic, reminiscent of the clothes of Christ, and around him exactly 12 cafe visitors. Baxter also draws attention to the cross, located directly behind the back of the waiter in white.
Dali's image of memory
Salvador Dali, The Persistence of Memory, 1931
It is no secret that the thoughts that visited Dali during the creation of his masterpieces were always in the form of very realistic images, which the artist then transferred to the canvas. So, according to the author himself, the painting “The Persistence of Memory” was painted as a result of associations that arose at the sight of processed cheese.
What is Munch shouting about
Edvard Munch, "The Scream", 1893.
Munch spoke about the idea of one of the most mysterious paintings in world painting: "I was walking along the path with two friends - the sun was setting - suddenly the sky turned blood red, I paused, feeling exhausted, and leaned on the fence - I looked at blood and flames over the bluish-black fjord and the city - my friends went on, and I stood, trembling with excitement, feeling the endless scream piercing nature. But what kind of sunset could scare the artist so?
There is a version that the idea of "Scream" was born by Munch in 1883, when there were several strongest eruptions of the Krakatoa volcano - so powerful that they changed the temperature of the Earth's atmosphere by one degree. A copious amount of dust and ash spread across the globe, reaching even as far as Norway. For several evenings in a row, the sunsets looked as if the apocalypse was about to come - one of them became a source of inspiration for the artist.
Writer among the people
Alexander Ivanov, "The Appearance of Christ to the People", 1837-1857.
Dozens of sitters posed for Alexander Ivanov for his main picture. One of them is known no less than the artist himself. In the background, among travelers and Roman horsemen who have not yet heard the sermon of John the Baptist, one can notice a character in a brown tunic. His Ivanov wrote with Nikolai Gogol. The writer closely communicated with the artist in Italy, in particular on religious issues, and gave him advice in the process of painting. Gogol believed that Ivanov "had long since died for the whole world, except for his work."
Michelangelo's gout
Raphael Santi, The School of Athens, 1511.
Creating the famous fresco "The School of Athens", Raphael immortalized his friends and acquaintances in the images of ancient Greek philosophers. One of them was Michelangelo Buonarroti "in the role" of Heraclitus. For several centuries, the fresco kept the secrets of Michelangelo's personal life, and modern researchers have suggested that the artist's strangely angular knee indicates that he has a joint disease.
This is quite likely, given the peculiarities of the lifestyle and working conditions of Renaissance artists and Michelangelo's chronic workaholism.
Mirror of the Arnolfinis
Jan van Eyck, "Portrait of the Arnolfinis", 1434
In the mirror behind the Arnolfinis, you can see the reflection of two more people in the room. Most likely, these are witnesses present at the conclusion of the contract. One of them is van Eyck, as evidenced by the Latin inscription placed, contrary to tradition, above the mirror in the center of the composition: "Jan van Eyck was here." This is how the contracts were usually sealed.
How a flaw turned into a talent
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn, Self-portrait at the age of 63, 1669.
The researcher Margaret Livingston studied all Rembrandt's self-portraits and found that the artist suffered from strabismus: in the images his eyes look in different directions, which is not observed in the portraits of other people by the master. The disease led to the fact that the artist could better perceive reality in two dimensions than people with normal vision. This phenomenon is called "stereo blindness" - the inability to see the world in 3D. But since the painter has to work with a two-dimensional image, it was precisely this shortcoming of Rembrandt that could be one of the explanations for his phenomenal talent.
Sinless Venus
Sandro Botticelli, The Birth of Venus, 1482-1486.
Before the advent of The Birth of Venus, the image of a naked female body in painting symbolized only the idea of original sin. Sandro Botticelli was the first European painter not to find anything sinful in him. Moreover, art historians are sure that the pagan goddess of love symbolizes the Christian image on the fresco: her appearance is an allegory of the rebirth of the soul that has undergone the rite of baptism.
Lute player or lute player?
Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, The Lute Player, 1596.
For a long time, the painting was exhibited in the Hermitage under the title "Lute Player". Only at the beginning of the 20th century, art historians agreed that the canvas still depicts a young man (probably, Caravaggio was posed by his friend artist Mario Minniti): on the notes in front of the musician, a recording of the bass part of the madrigal by Jacob Arcadelt “You know that I love you” is visible . A woman could hardly make such a choice - it's just hard for the throat. In addition, the lute, like the violin at the very edge of the picture, was considered a male instrument in the era of Caravaggio.
