Overview of the Aivazovsky Museum in Feodosia

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

However, among a series of big names there are those who during life were not just accepted, but respected in every way, commercially successful and recognized by colleagues and fans of painting. One of these artists is Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky.

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

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

The museum lives: every year many tourists seek to visit the most famous marine painter. Pleased with high-quality lighting of exhibition halls. The mansion has many windows, and ancient chandeliers hang from the ceilings.

The tour will lead you through the main hall, the painter’s workshop, the building of his sister’s house. And the museum has a secret room, you can go there for a fee. Aivazovsky’s personal belongings are stored there: a real easel, a personal notebook, and so on.

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

300,000 visitors pass through the museum annually. On the basis of the gallery major scientific conferences and classical music festivals are regularly held. The museum is located at: st. Galerennaya, house 2. It is very close to the railway station.

The exhibition complex is structured so that the visitor sees the paintings in the order they are written. This shows not just the creative path of the artist, but the evolution of his skill. From canvas to canvas, the marine painter became more precise in the details, in the ways of transmitting light, working with color and composition. This structure of the exhibition is useful for aspiring artists.who can likewise find a better illustration of theoretical knowledge.

The gallery is also a place where the work of followers and students of Aivazovsky is carefully stored. Here you can see the paintings of Arkhip Kuindzhi, Adolf Fessler, Mikhail Latry.

There are museums, the semantic center of which is two or three famous works, for which tourists travel from afar. But in the gallery of Aivazovsky, despite the outstanding, not needing to be introduced to art lovers "St. George Monastery", "Sea. Koktebel "," Sevastopol Raid " and the unfinished "Explosion of the Ship", there are many less famous works. And they cannot be called secondary.

12,000 pieces of exhibits in the collection of the museum complex are truly the property of the gallery. Some tourists are disappointed that the notorious "Ninth Wall" is absent in the museum. But they can partially compensate for this. art experiments of Maximilian Voloshin and Lev Lagorio, as well as picturesque, noteworthy canvases of the West European school of marinists.

The full exposition of the museum shows Aivazovsky as an enthusiastic, energetic person who managed to realize many initiatives during his long and fruitful life. But even if you will be surprised by his work outside the status of a marine painter, if the atmosphere of the house itself will delight you, exhibits talking about the artist’s way of life, sea landscapes still remain in the foreground.

Those who previously saw only reproductions of famous paintings will certainly be impressed. Live, they look even larger, more epic. Decorated in heavy frames, they convey the power of the elements: inexorable and victorious, demolishing everything in its path.

It is impossible to compare even with an outstanding art photograph: it seems that the famous marine painter set his visual analyzer to the utmost clarity - the shades of water change with an amazing variation in color. From the pure, almost innocent sky blue to the open black mouth of the deep sea. AND each landscape has its own mood, its message.

Some reproductions seem gloomy to the viewer, but when you see them live, you are no longer evaluating gloom and in any case not uniformity, but the smallest details of the nature specimen snatched by the eye and heart of the artist. To write like this, you need not only to be careful, to be able to work with nature, you need to be born in these parts. Individual works are huge in size and in emotional charge.

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

In a spacious two-story house where the Marine Museum is located, an architectural Italian style is guessed. This house, Ivan Konstantinovich, as you might guess, built on his own project. The State Museum, this art gallery, bequeathed to the city, became in 1920. But the history of the museum is not the most even and prosperous. During the years of the change of the country's system, the headquarters of the Cheka, the divisions of the Red Army and Navy were located here.

As a visitor to the museum, you will surely find yourself in the house of Ekaterina Konstantinovna Aivazovskaya. This is not just an addition to the main exposition, it is an important part of it. In Armenian families, it was so established - to settle in the neighborhood with close relatives. Because next to the brother’s house is Catherine’s mansion.

If you want to see how the classic worked on biblical and mythical subjects in painting, be sure to check here. In the mansion of Aivazovsky’s sister, the organizers of the museum decided to exhibit the artist’s canvases abstracted from the marine theme. These are paintings that combine religious themes, biblical subjects.

From school, probably, everyone remembers that Aivazovsky is an artist who incredibly accurately conveyed sea landscapes on canvases. In addition to the great paintings devoted to the water element, Ivan Konstantinovich also wrote large battle scenes, biblical subjects, and even portraits. And the artist could call himself a collector and philanthropist.

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

The outstanding artist was patronized by Nicholas the First. Aivazovsky was fortunate enough to work in the south of Italy - these creative years were especially fruitful. The enthusiasm of the critics and commercial success did not bypass the marine painter. For his work, Ivan Konstantinovich was awarded gold medal of the Paris Academy of Arts.

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

Aivazovsky managed to live in many places: he studied in St. Petersburg, was seconded in Italy, was in Paris, Portugal, Spain, Egypt, Constantinople, and the Caucasus. By the way, the master had the rank of real secret adviser, which was equal to the rank of admiral, and in 1864 the artist received hereditary nobility.

Despite such an extensive range of travels, Ivan Konstantinovich said: "My address is always in Feodosia." And these were not just words. Aivazovsky was engaged in the affairs of his native city with all the zeal, a sincere desire to equip his homeland, to improve the place of his eternal love.

In the city, the master opened an art school and an art gallery. Theodosius is still center of pictorial culture in the south of Russia. Thanks to Ivan Konstantinovich, a concert hall appeared in the city, a library was built. With his own money, the painter erected a fountain in memory of Kaznacheev, who at that time was the mayor of Feodosia.

The artist was also actively interested in issues of archeology, he personally supervised the mound excavations, and some objects found during these excavations are now in the Hermitage. Besides, Aivazovsky initiated construction of the Feodosia-Dzhankoy railway, he argued for the expansion of the Feodosia seaport, and the largest trading port in Crimea was really in Feodosia.

20 years before the end of the 19th century, the artist opened an exhibition hall in his own house. There he exhibited paintings that, by his decision, should never leave the borders of Theodosius. Completed the exhibition and unfinished work.

It is curious that although not in the most enthusiastic tones, Chekhov wrote about Aivazovsky, it follows that these two classics had a chance to get to know each other. It surprised Anton Pavlovich that, when he personally met Pushkin, Aivazovsky did not read any of his books. I didn’t read books at all. But even memoirs say that Ivan Konstantinovich was an interesting person, lively, active, with his own opinion, very energetic for his venerable age.

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

In the next video, see an overview of the Aivazovsky Museum in Feodosia.