Studio: international art (51.1911)

Studio- Talk

self to the new tendencies. It was a time of
earnest thought and experiment. A collective ex-
hibition of his works at the National Salon some
two or three years ago showed that during the
four years of his abstention from the exhibitions
he was patiently working and pondering over the
problems of his art; and it showed, too, that in the
end Mark’s strong individuality asserted itself.
Since then he has been making steady and con-
sistent progress. R. M.

MOSCOW.—The death of Michael Vroubel
has robbed Russian art of one of its
most brilliant and most original
' personalities. He was only 54 years
of age, but for some years past he had suffered
from an incurable complaint which incapacitated
him for work. It is proposed to hold a posthumous
exhibition of his works this autumn, which will
afford an opportunity for making an estimate of
his achievements, although one of the most
important aspects of his art will not be represented
-—I mean his monumental paintings, in which the
diverse emanations of his genius were
perhaps most completely focussed. His
oeuvre comprehends practically every
branch of the plastic arts. We have
easel pictures of his in various mediums,
and large mural paintings with religious
as well as secular motives; he was an
illustrator and painted theatre decora-
tions ; he occupied himself with applied
art, and left behind a whole series of
sculptural works. And in every one
of these directions he achieved much
that was beautiful and original, and
often great Joined with a fertile imagi-
nation, he possessed an unerring sense
of the decoratively effective and an
uncommonly fine feeling for colour. In
his works are to be found, side by side
with purely Russian motives, reminis-
cences of Classic, Gothic, and Renais-
sance art, as well as that of the Orient,
especially India, but every composition
bears unmistakably the impress of a
strongly-marked individuality and an
entirely subjective facture. Vroubel
had no disciples in the strict sense of
the word, but his art has had a con-
siderable influence on the younger
generation of Russian artists. 'The pre-
eminently decorative value of his crea-
tions, the romantic strain in his fantasy
80

—inherited, perhaps, from his Polish ancestors—
exercised, in conjunction with his oft-times masterly
technique, an invigorating and fruitful influence
after a long period during which realistic painting
was predominant in Russian art. The ridicule
and sarcasm with which Vroubel’s works were
greeted on their first appearance, gave place by
degrees to recognition and frank admiration on
the part of all with a genuine love of art. And,
in particular, the new romanticists and the deco-
rative painters of the modem Russian school, look
up to Michael Vroubel as a master and a pioneer.

Yet a further loss to Russian art has to be re-
corded this year in the death from heart failure of
Sergei Vassilievitch Ivanoff, at the age of forty-six.
Unlike Vroubel, however, who had for years ceased
his activity as an artist, death overtook Ivanoff
when he was at the height of his powers. The
deceased artist received his early training at the
Ecole des Beaux-Arts in this city, and for the last
decade discharged the function of professor in this
institution. He belonged to the group of Moscow