He was not a cell artist, living only inworld of his images, and actively participated in the life of his country. S.V. Gerasimov for a long time led the Union of Artists of the USSR, and therefore, participated in the implementation of the leadership role of the Communist Party in the field of fine arts. He is remembered as a skilled administrator with a reputation as a moderate liberal, he was an attentive and skilled teacher who left many students. But his main legacy is paintings, watercolors and graphics, marked by the seal of tremendous talent and delicate feelings of the soul.
Small homeland
In 1885, in the suburban Mozhaysk in a poorfamily was born Sergey Vasilyevich Gerasimov. The artist’s biography states that his life has been associated with these places for a very long time. Subsequently, already occupying important positions in Moscow, he came to his Mozhaisk house, where a small workshop was located, and used every opportunity to paint pictures, trying to express the dim beauty of the surroundings in landscapes.
The son of an artisan-tanner, he managed to getan excellent education, graduating from two leading metropolitan art schools: the Stroganov Art Industrial School and the School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. He was also lucky with the teachers, among whom were Konstantin Korovin and Sergey Ivanov. In addition to the masterly painting technique of oil painting, Sergey Vasilyevich mastered watercolor, lithography, etching and other types of graphics, which expanded his creative possibilities.
Style search
Октябрьскую революцию он встретил состоявшимся the master. S. V. Gerasimov was known for his works created in various materials and in various genres: “At the cart” (1906), “Wedding in a tavern” (1909), “Portrait of I. D. Sytin” (1912), “In the North (1913). The genre scenes, portraits and especially the landscapes of that time are filled with subtle poetic feeling, expressed in a free pictorial manner, close to impressionism.
The search for new forms in the painting, whichthe beginning of the 20th century was marked, they could not pass by the young, but very educated Gerasimov. Subsequently, the artist will go through a period of fascination with Cézanne and the early Cubists (“Front-line” (1926)). There was a time when primitivists seemed close to him. But the opinion of a large number of critics who attribute Gerasimov to the outstanding masters of Russian impressionism seems to be the most justified. Even his mechanical assignment to the founders of socialist realism in painting is more related to his high position in the official hierarchy.
New Times
After a long break caused by the FirstWorld War and the hardships of the revolutionary time, SV Gerasimov is involved in the active artistic life of the young country. He participates in the work of such creative associations as Makovets, the Society of Moscow Artists and the Association of Artists of Revolutionary Russia (AHRR), which became the forerunner of the USSR Union of Artists.
He is trying to master the revolutionary propagandaGenre: “The Oath of the Siberian Partisans” (1933), “V. I. Lenin at the Second Congress of Soviets among delegates – peasants ”(1931),“ Collective farm holiday ”(1937). S. V. Gerasimov successfully worked in the illustration genre, creating graphic sheets for the Artamonov Case, The Captain's Daughter, Nekrasov, Tolstoy, Ostrovsky's dramas, and other classic and contemporary books. His watercolors, in which the techniques of working with pasty, oil paints were guessed, were recognized as innovative by many domestic and foreign connoisseurs. But the landscape remained a favorite genre.
Midland Singer
The artist traveled a lot.Sergey Vasilievich Gerasimov, whose biography contains information about a tour of European countries, has left a series of masterly natural sketches made in Italy, France, in the Caucasus. During the Great Patriotic War, he fell into evacuation to Central Asia. There in his paintings "settled" a hot oriental flavor, with bright colors and blinding light. But there was a land where he was always drawn, where he always returned - the Moscow region, his native Mozhaisk.
In small sketches depicting his surroundingsnative town, and in more elaborate canvases the talent of the master is especially harmonious. Sergey Gerasimov is a Russian artist who continued the traditions of Levitan, Vasilyev, Kuindzhi. The main features of his landscape paintings are “Winter” (1939), “Plotina” (1929), “Spring Spill” (1935), a series of Mozhaisk species (1940–1950) and many others - amazing emotional content, harmony and freshness of color, virtuoso painterly craftsmanship.
1943, Mother of Partisan
Его творчество по-настоящему многогранно.The master of subtle poetic nuances, the artist Sergei Gerasimov during the war years creates a canvas that has become a symbol of the resilience of the people, shown in opposing the formidable and cruel enemy.
The image of an elderly peasant woman whose son is being taken awayon execution, tells of spiritual power, which has become an insurmountable barrier to the invaders. This picture spoke to foreign viewers about the Russian character more than the volume of ideologically consistent literature. She explained a lot, telling about the reasons for the invincibility of our people. What prompted Gerasimov to write this picture? To see here only the desire to meet ideological criteria is incorrect. “Mother of a Partisan” is a work of a truly Russian artist, whose soul is inseparable from the people, from the land and nature, who raised him.
Sergey Gerasimov, artist. short biography
Time and place of birth - September 14, 1885, Mozhaisk.
1901–1907 - study in Stroganovka.
1907–1912 - studied at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture.
1912–1914 - participation in exhibitions, teaching at an art school at the printing house of I. D. Sytin.
In 1914 he was called up for military service.
1917 - return to Moscow, participation in creative art associations.
Teaching activity:Public School of Printing at the People's Commissariat of Education (1918–1923), Higher Art and Technical Workshops (1920–1929), Moscow Polygraphic Institute (1930–1936), Institute. Surikov (1937–1950), Moscow State Academy of Art and Industry named after SG Stroganov (1950–1954).
1958–1964 - First Secretary of the Union of Artists of the USSR.
He died on April 20, 1964.
