Painting. Russian artists. Isaac Levitan (1860-1900)

Levitan's landscapes, which had a profound influence on Russian landscape painting, are noted for their symbolic romance. In his landscapes Levitan introduced a sense of unity of mankind, nature, and a spiritual power of the Russian countryside.
Isaac Il'ich Levitan studied at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. He was taught by Vassily Perov, Alexsey Savrasov, and Vassily Polenov. Levitan's early paintings show simple, modest landscape motifs in a manner of Savrasov.

By 1879 in the painting Autumn Day, Levitan's individuality was obvious. The painting with a path in the park and the lonely female figure achieves unity of nature and humanity unknown in Russian art. This work of art won him immediate acclaim from the general public.
Levitan's paintings from the mid-1880s, such as the First Shoots: May, of 1883-8, the Little Bridge: Savvinskaya, of 1884, and the Birch Grove, of 1885-9 were created under the influence of Polenov. They mark a new stage in Levitan's style with the use of bright colours and bolder contrasts of light and shade.
In 1884 Levitan took part in the Abramtsevo Artistic circle. He exercised stage designs for a series of productions such as Dargomizhsky's Rusalka (Mermaid), Glinka's Life for the Tsar.

In the 1890s he went to Europe and there he became familiar with the recent movements in French art. Levitan's hopes and disappointments are reflected in his mature works of art from the early 1890s. By the Pond gives a sense of enigma and melancholy to dominate a realistically presented motif through the treatment of evening life.
In the painting At Eternal Rest, of 1894, the grandeur of the setting takes on the character of a symbol of the might of the universe, revealing by contrast the transience of men's life. The great sweep of the water surface, the expanse of barren land all around, and the huge, swirling clouds contrast with an old wooden church, sheltering in the foreground, with a faint light in the window and a half-hidden cemetery church yard. The picture also has a strong decorative effect. Levitan considered it to be his most important work-in the Vladimirka, of 1892, a symbolic image has a more precise meaning. The road running under a low grey sky through fields and woods, and eventually disappearing in the distance, is the Vladimir road leading to Siberia, the road taken by political exiles.
In the mid and late 1890s Levitan created a number of paintings which depict the beauty of the Russian landscape in various seasons: the bright sun on the snow is in the March, of 1895, a dazzle warm yellow and orange colours are seen in the Golden Autumn, of 1895, and a subtle study of light, water and delicate plan forms are found in the Spring - the Large Pool, of 1897.

Levitan's paintings of the last years suggest two distinct aims: the simplicity of themes and expression to convey the greatest poignancy. Such work as Dusk: a Hayrack, of 1899, achieves the effect by these means. Levitan was interested in monumental lofty subjects to synthesise his impressions, ideas and emotions.
The Lake, of 1899-1900, called Rus by Levitan, is the artist's interpretation of the subject as the embodiment of Russia, with its landscape, people, and history.

Levitan's premature death cut short a career of the national and international promise. In 1897 he was made a full member of the Munich Secession, he took part in the exhibitions of the group in 1898 and 1899. At the same time he started to show his works of art in St. Petersburg at the exhibition organised by the editors of the journal Mir Iskusstva (World of Art). In 1898 Levitan was given the title of Academician by the St. Petersburg Academy of Art, and began to teach at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture.
 

Literature: Book "Russian art" A.P. Minyar-Belorucheva