Studio: international art (79.1920)

A RUSSIAN PAINTER : N. K. ROERICH

or school, although some compare him
to Gaugin, Blake, or Vroubel, others see
the spirit of the Far East and Byzantium
in his mural decorations and ikons. But
he devotedly follows his own path, linking
up for him humanity with the spirit of
the Cosmos. One without the other is
impossible to him. 000

A profound study of the Stone Age
and his own excavations in Russia, have
given Roerich a complete grasp of the
inner spirit of ancient life. The old Rus-
sian churches, cities, and homesteads on
his canvases breathe of their intimacy with
their mother-soil. Russia has lived through
so many turmoils that people who have had
to defend themselves have held on to that
soil fast and firm. Outside, there unfolded
itself the vast beloved land, to grow corn
on it, or to fight for it, or to gaze at the
passing foreign caravans. Inside, within

the thick walls beset with the turrets and
porches of the younger generations, there
lurked the naive life where the seclusion
of women, the wise old men's predominant
place, the ideals of hermit life, the hiding
of treasures, and the fascinations of the
Byzantine church nestled side by side.
Roerich loves the simple atmosphere of
that life and its legends : it forms a natural
setting for the truth-throbbing vision which
inflames his art. ** Inspiration is abso-
lutely real. All art creations exist before
we sense and materialize them," says he.

N. K. Roerich is descended from a
Scandinavian family that came over and
settled in Russia in Peter the Great's
time. Now, no one could be more Rus-
sian—in the knowledge of, and love for,
all essentially Russian conceptions of
Spirit, Art, and Beauty. Roerich is a
writer and a poet too. The titles of his

“ WELCOME TO THE SUN ”
BY NICOLAS ROERICH

(Skidelski Collection)

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