Russia and the Arts: The Age of Tolstoy and Tchaikovsky

Paperback / softback

Main Details

Title Russia and the Arts: The Age of Tolstoy and Tchaikovsky
Authors and Contributors      By (author) Rosalind P. Blakesley
Physical Properties
Format:Paperback / softback
Pages:176
Dimensions(mm): Height 290,Width 230
Category/GenreArt and design styles - c 1800 to c 1900
Painting and paintings
World history
ISBN/Barcode 9781855145375
ClassificationsDewey:757.094709034
Audience
General
Illustrations Illustrated in colour and black and white throughout

Publishing Details

Publisher National Portrait Gallery Publications
Imprint National Portrait Gallery Publications
Publication Date 18 March 2016
Publication Country United Kingdom

Description

Russian portraiture enjoyed a golden age between the late 1860s and the First World War. While Tolstoy and Dostoevsky were publishing masterpieces such as Anna Karenina and The Brothers Karamazov and Mussorgsky, Tchaikovsky and Rimsky-Korsakov were taking Russian music to new heights, Russian art was developing a new self-confidence. The penetrating Realism of the 1870s and 1880s was later complemented by the brighter hues of Russian Impressionism and the bold, faceted forms of Symbolist painting. In providing a context, author Rosalind P. Blakesley looks in the first and second chapters at the portrait tradition in Russia: the rise of secular portrait painting following the founding of the Academy of Arts in St Petersburg in 1757; the shifting tastes of patrons and publics; the reception of portraits in exhibitions and collections (including those of the tsars); and the role of portraiture in the cultural politics of imperial Russia. Starting with the Exposition Universelle in Paris in 1867, at which a distinct Russian school of painting was recognised for the first time, the third chapter examines developments in theatre and music, the rising Realist aesthetic and the powerful voices of wealthy patrons from the worlds of industry and commerce, such as Pavel Tretyakov. Chapter Four looks at the rise of novel forms of visual expression through experimentation, from Impressionism to Symbolism, and the World of Art Movement, with its conscious reconnection with artistic developments in the West. The last chapter charts creative responses to political turmoil and social unrest in the early twentieth century, the new artistic societies and manifestos of the avant-garde and the dialogue between figurative painting and abstraction in the twilight of imperial rule.

Reviews

Provides not only a vivid and intimate survey of an extraordinary period, but a kind of advert for the virtues of the painted portrait itself.--Mark Hudson "Daily Telegraph Online"