The Four Seasons in the Russian Art

Los 88 cuadros presentados en la muestra no sólo representan las cuatro estaciones, sino también las variaciones estilísticas, la riqueza de motivos y visiones individuales que constituyeron la cultura plástica de la Rusia de los siglos XIX y XX.

In Europe, where the paintings of the "small Dutch" was very present, the process of legitimizing the landscape occurred during Romanticism: in the paintings of John Constable, England; Caspar David Friedrich, Germany; Théodore Rousseau and other members of the Barbizon School in France. In Russian art, national landscape is set during the second half of the nineteenth century, at a time when the prevailing critical of the existing reality. This does not mean that there were images of nature in Russian painting before. Even in the paintings of icons of XIV-XVII centuries often it placed the characters of the Holy Scriptures in a natural or urban environment. In the eighteenth and early nineteenth century also they abounded paintings, prints and drawings in which urban scenes but their authors largely were foreigners working in Russia were represented. In the first half of the nineteenth century, some Russian painters, however, became famous in Europe for its scenery, leaving a deep impression, especially with his paintings on Italy (Silvestr Shchedrin, Aleksandr Ivanov).

The flowering of the related landscape genre with Russia takes place precisely in the second half of the nineteenth century. At this time, painters, like writers, poets or musicians, were not limited to represent nature, but expressed through this, his attitude towards life and social problems.

The Four Seasons is one of the main themes of literature, music and painting roller. The snowstorm raging in penetrating Aleksandr Pushkin novella is seen in the pictures of Nikolai Sverchkov and Aleksandr Gerasimov, which can be seen in this exhibition. Meanwhile, Nikolai and Alexei Savrasov Dubovskói reflected the cruel and burning snow, as Fyodor Dostoevsky described in his novel The Insulted and Injured . The forest covered by a blanket of snow appears majestic in Winter Ivan Shishkin.

But winter in Russia is not only synonymous with cold. In the unusual days of sun, snow and tornasola flashes in different colors, allowing everyone a beautiful walk in sleigh pulled by horses or play with snowballs, like the characters of Boris Kustodiev or Konstantin Yuon.

Spring is a time of hope. For some painters spring is associated with new life. "The trees were already awake and smiling amiably, and above them is going God knows where, the unfathomable, boundless blue sky," Chekhov wrote. The trees, which slowly come to life with their towering trunks and branches into the sky, rivers and lakes are thawed and the smell of earth soaked spring landscapes Alexei Savrasov, Isaac Levitan, Igor Grabar and others painters.

Summer is the time of year usually preferred, when at last it is possible to warm in the sun, swim and enjoy the variety of colors that nature exhibits. When summer is dedicated countless works of artists from different periods and styles, who painted both joyful moments as the sad, the days of work and rest.

Autumn is the time when nature is plunged into lethargy, it sleeps. But the wisdom of maturity is also not shed its beauty. Autumnal landscapes unmoved Chekhov, Turgenev and many others, who stopped moving verses about the autumn season, authentic "spell to look" (Pushkin). Artists, writers, poets and musicians found inspiration both in the autumn roads, mired in thick fog (Arjip Kuindzhi) and in the gold trees that adorn the forests (Isaac Levitan, Stanislav Zhukovsky, aristarkh lentulov and others).

The paintings presented in this exhibition not only represent the four seasons succeed each other. The stylistic variations, the wealth of motifs and individual visions that formed the artistic culture of Russia in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries are admirably expressed in the paintings dedicated to the seasons, as did Pyotr Tchaikovsky with his suite for piano stations .