The explosion of a Japanese anchor mine that thundered at 9 hours 43 minutes on March 31, 1904 deprived the 1st Pacific Squadron of its flagship battleship Petropavlovsk, 650 officers and sailors, commander Vice-Admiral S. O. Makarov. Russia lost not only the ship and its sailors, but also the famous battle painter Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin. Much has been written about the death of Stepan Osipovich and the significance of this loss for the Russian fleet, and against the background of the generally unfavorable course of hostilities, Vereshchagin's death remained in the shadows. Although Vasily Vasilyevich did a lot for Russian history, culture and art.
Studies. Comprehension of mastery
V. V. Vereshchagin at work
The future artist was born on October 14, 1842 in Cherepovets, Novgorod province. His parents were middle-class landowners, living on the income from the estate. The family was large. Vasily had three brothers, and like many offspring of poor noble families, his father sent his children to military schools. At the age of 8, the boy was sent to the Alexander Cadet Corps, and later to the St. Petersburg Naval Corps. Being assiduous, capable and ambitious, Vereshchagin set himself the goal not to play the fool with regard to science and study, but to be among the best. In 1858-1859. on the training frigate "Kamchatka", among other students, he made training trips to England, France and Denmark. He graduated from the Marine Corps in 1860 with honors, gaining the highest possible grade, and was promoted to midshipmen.
During this period of his life, a young military man makes, in naval terminology, a turn of the overstag and changes its direction. Since childhood, Vereshchagin has been fond of painting, and while studying at the Marine Corps, since 1858 he regularly attended the drawing school of the Society for the Encouragement of Artists, where he showed impressive results for a beginner. It was here that the cadet formed the idea of preferring the artistic field to a military career. He is going to leave the service and enter the Academy of Arts. Such a decisive step caused some bewilderment among the parents, to put it mildly. The father, the leader of the nobility, unambiguously threatened his son with the introduction of strict economic sanctions, that is, as it was said then, "to deprive of funds." Mother appealed to the moral side of the matter, emphasizing that a representative of an old noble family should not be engaged in some kind of "frivolous arts." Another in his place would have thought hard - in such a young age, dependence on one's home is still felt very sharply, but Vereshchagin had already made a decision, he was generally firm in them. Perhaps in his person Russia has lost a good naval officer, but it has acquired an excellent artist. The Naval Department also did not want to lose the best graduate of the Naval Corps, but he was persistent and consistent.
In 1860, not having served even a year, Vereshchagin retired and became a student at the Academy of Arts. The father did not throw words to the wind, and the son found himself in a rather difficult financial situation, and even in the capital. The leadership of the Academy, we must pay tribute to him, went to meet the persistent and talented young man and assigned him a small scholarship, which allowed him to live and study, though very modestly. Creativity was gaining momentum - his work received awards and accolades. In the process of comprehending the art of painting, the aspiring artist began to increasingly face restrictions on creativity. In their works, students were encouraged to refer to mythological subjects of the ancient period. Vereshchagin, who gravitated towards realism and naturalness, was more and more cramped in this very narrow and strict fairway. And Vasily Vasilyevich would be just a good draftsman of portraits of stately princes and ruddy landowners, if not for his difficult character. Relations with the art bosses are not easy and continue to deteriorate. In the end, in 1863 Vereshchagin left the Academy of Arts and went to the Caucasus to paint pictures from nature, widely using the local flavor for inspiration. On the Georgian Military Highway, he reached Tiflis, where he spent more than a year. In fact, it was the life of a free artist - the source of income was drawing lessons and custom drawings. Realizing that he still lacks skill, Vereshchagin worked at that time more with a pencil than with oil paints.
Just then, the artist inherits an inheritance from his deceased uncle, and he, unlike many nobles, decides to invest it in further education. Vereshchagin went to Paris, where he entered the local Academy of Arts, training with the famous master J. L. Jerome. There he studied the technique of working with oil paints. But even here Vereshchagin is faced, in his opinion, with an excessive enthusiasm for classicism - Jerome constantly recommended that he redraw the paintings of famous classics of European painting. Vereshchagin gravitated towards realism and work from nature, he, like in St. Petersburg, felt himself locked in a certain framework. In March 1865 he returned to the Caucasus, where he worked intensively for six months. The young man had money, and it was now possible to apply the Parisian experience in practice. In the fall of 1865 Vereshchagin returned to Paris, where his Caucasian achievements made the most favorable impression on the teachers of the Academy. He continued his studies. He worked 14-15 hours a day, not tempted to visit theaters and other entertainment establishments. In the spring of 1866 Vereshchagin returned to his homeland. Thus ended his training.
Turkestan
Parliamentarians. "Go to hell!"
All the nearest time Vereshchagin spends in the estate of his late uncle. With money, the artist who has spent money on studies and travels becomes sparse, so he interrupts with odd jobs and portraits to order. An unexpected proposal from the Turkestan Governor-General Karl Petrovich von Kaufman to be an artist with him came in handy. Vereshchagin was identified as a warrant officer with the right to wear civilian clothes and free movement. In August 1867, his long journey to Central Asia began. Vereshchagin arrived in Samarkand on May 2, 1868, the day after he was taken by Russian troops. It was then that the position of Russia in Central Asia was strengthened, where, until recently, there were archaic feudal despotisms, the largest of which were the Kokand and Khiva Khanates and the Bukhara Emirate. One of the ways of existence of these state formations was an active slave trade, including Russian prisoners. Neighborhood with the baiy who specifically understood diplomacy was a troublesome business, and also unsafe - cases of raids on the southern borders of the empire were far from rare, rather, it would be appropriate to say, regular. The Bukhara emir behaved emphatically insolently - not only demanded that Russia withdraw its troops from Central Asia and confiscated the property of all Russian merchants, but also insulted the diplomatic mission that had arrived to resolve the conflict. Soon, the expected rupture occurred, which smoothly spilled over into hostilities.
On May 1, 1868, near Samarkand, a 3, 5-thousandth Russian expeditionary detachment under the command of Kaufman scattered almost 25-thousand Bukhara troops, taking trophies (21 guns and many guns). On May 2, the city opened its gates. Since the emir himself escaped safely, and several large detachments of Bukharians operated nearby, on May 30, Kaufman left Samarkand with the main forces, leaving a small garrison in the city. Four infantry companies, a sapper company, two field guns and two mortars remained in the city. A total of 658 people. Vereshchagin, absorbed in the study of one of the most ancient centers of Asia and inspired by the amazing views of the buildings, remained with the garrison commanded by Major Shtempel. While the artist was painting a generous oriental flavor from nature, the mullahs and other agitators did not waste time. Seeing that there were few Russians left, they began to incite the local population to revolt, relying on the weakness and small number of the garrison.
On the morning of June 1, crowds began to gather at the local bazaar and make fiery speeches. Rocks were thrown at the soldiers, and it became unsafe to move around the city. Realizing that the available forces are not enough to maintain control over all of Samarkand, Shtempel orders to retreat to the citadel. Russian merchants took refuge there. By the morning of June 2, unrest had already engulfed the entire city, and soon a large crowd came to storm the citadel. The attackers were armed and actively tried to break through the perimeter of the walls. They managed to set fire to one of the gates with pots of gunpowder, and then to make a gap in them. The further advance of the rioters was stopped by such a serious obstacle as a cannon, mounted for direct fire and working with quick grape-shot fire directly along the breach. The incessant attacks continued throughout the day and ceased only after dark. Considering the very difficult situation in which the besieged found themselves, Shtempel sent a messenger for help to Kaufman. The messenger, for greater persuasiveness, was disguised as a beggar, and he managed to slip out of the citadel unnoticed.
The next day, the attacks resumed with the same force. The besieged began to prepare the palace, located in the citadel, for the last line of defense. By general agreement, there could be no talk of any surrender in captivity - in the most extreme case, it was decided to blow up the palace and die with the storming people. For this purpose, almost the entire supply of gunpowder was transferred there. The wounded and sick did not leave their positions - among the garrison there were many soldiers and officers who, for health reasons or because of injury, were unable to make foot marches. Now they took the most effective part in the defense. The attacks continued on 4, 5 and 6 June, albeit with less intensity. A handful of defenders were too tough for the huge but insufficiently organized crowd, and its enthusiasm, faced with such an insurmountable obstacle, began to cool down. On June 7, a messenger made his way to the citadel, who, to the great joy of the defenders, announced that Kaufman was going to the rescue with a forced march. On June 8, Russian troops entered Samarkand and finally dispersed the enemy. The garrison lost about a third of its personnel.
The repressions against the local population were limited to the burning of the city bazaar, as a place where the rebellion broke out. Vereshchagin, who took the most effective part in the defense of the citadel, and by no means with an easel and a brush in his hands, on August 14, 1868, for the courage and courage shown by him during the siege, was awarded the Order of St. George of the 4th degree, which he was proud of until the end of his life … This is how Vereshchagin's baptism of fire took place, which influenced not only his character, but also his work. In 1869, in St. Petersburg, with the assistance of Kaufman, who arrived there, within the framework of a complex exhibition dedicated to Turkestan, where samples of flora and fauna, minerals, household items and antiques were demonstrated, some of the artist's drawings and sketches were shown. This event was a success, and the name of Vereshchagin flashed in the newspapers. After the exhibition was closed, the artist again, already through Siberia, returned to Turkestan. Having settled in Tashkent, Vereshchagin travels a lot: he visited Kokand, again visited Samarkand. Several times, being part of small cavalry detachments, he was attacked by robbers, invariably demonstrating that he was good not only with a brush, but also with a weapon. Eyewitnesses recalled that Vereshchagin always behaved bravely in business and was not shy.
Attack by surprise
A trip to Central Asia provided a huge material for creativity, which needed to be processed. Having settled at the beginning of 1871 in Munich, he began a large series of paintings dedicated to his stay in Turkestan. Vereshchagin worked tirelessly. Among others, he creates his famous series "Barbarians", consisting of seven canvases dedicated to the military operations of the Russian army in Turkestan ("Looking out", "Attack by surprise" and others). In the same 1871, under the impression of the legends about Tamerlane, the artist created one of his most famous paintings - "The Apotheosis of War" - depicting a pile of skulls. Few were admitted to his Munich workshop. One of the first who saw the new paintings with his own eyes was the famous Russian merchant and philanthropist, founder of the gallery, V. I. Tretyakov. They made a strong impression on the collector, and he offers to buy them. However, the author did not just want to profitably sell his work, but certainly wanted to show it to the public. In 1873 Vereshchagin opened his first solo exhibition at the Crystal Palace in London. The catalogs specifically indicated that the paintings are not for sale, and this only increased the interest of the public. The exhibition was a success - the canvases were striking in their realism.
In the spring of 1874 it also took place in St. Petersburg. Wishing to make the visit as accessible as possible even for the poorest strata of the population, Vereshchagin organized so that several days a week the entrance to the exhibition was free. Her catalog cost five kopecks. If the public enthusiastically welcomed the artist's works (for example, the composer M. P. Mussorgsky even composed the ballad "Forgotten" on the subject of the painting of the same name), then the entourage of Emperor Alexander II and some of the generals had a different opinion on this matter. Vereshchagin was accused of anti-patriotic, defeatist sentiments, that he impartially portrays Russian soldiers, showing them not as pretentious victors, but "dead and defeated." Vereshchagin painted the war as it is: without a dapper ceremonial uniform, and not everyone liked that. Death, blood and dirt, and not the academic ideal "Napoleon on the Arkolsky Bridge" - that was what was in the artist's works. A corresponding campaign began in the press: they say, such an interpretation humiliates the Russian army. The censorship banned the ballad of Mussorgsky. All these events had a negative effect on Vereshchagin. Offended by the accusations of "antipatriotism", in a nervous fit he destroys several of his paintings: "Forgotten", "At the Fortress Wall. We entered”,“Surrounded. They are persecuting. " The artist goes on a trip to India, entrusting a trusted person with the sale of the Turkestan collection. Two indispensable conditions were put forward: all paintings had to remain in their homeland and be sold together, in a comprehensive manner. In the end, the disgraced collection was acquired and exhibited in his gallery by V. I. Tretyakov.
In India, the artist visited many different places, cities and temples. I even visited Tibet. Despite the distance, his conflict with the authorities continued. In 1874, he renounced the title of professor assigned to him by the Academy of Arts, stating that, in his opinion, there should be no titles and awards in art. The conflict resonated. Still, the Academy, which existed under the patronage of members of the ruling dynasty, was actually a court institution. Vereshchagin was reminded of both leaving the service and falling out with venerable teachers. After two years in India, the artist returned to Paris in the spring of 1876, where he traditionally selflessly worked on his Indian sketches.
Balkans
In April 1877, a war with Turkey begins - the Russian army crosses the Danube. Upon learning of this, Vereshchagin leaves his Paris workshop and serves in the army. There he is defined as the adjutant of the commander-in-chief of the Danube army, Prince Nikolai Nikolaevich (senior), with the right of free movement. Vereshchagin personally participates in several battles. According to him, only after visiting the very thick of them, it is possible to convey to society the picture of a real and genuine war, which looks so colorful through the eyepiece of a telescope.
On June 8, 1877 Vereshchagin volunteered to take part in the attack of the "Joke" mine boat against the Turkish wheeled military steamer "Erekli", which prevented mine laying. The Joke was a modern boat built by the English firm Thornycroft. It was made as a walk for the heir to the crown prince (the future emperor Alexander III) and had a steel case. Lieutenant Skrydlov commanded the "Joke". Armed with a pole mine and a stern towed winged mine, the boat was in ambush in thick reeds. The second ship "Mina", intended for the attack, is also located there. Having discovered the enemy steamer, "Joke" and "Mina" jumped out of their secret and went towards rapprochement at full speed. The Turks, already having some idea of what a mine weapon was (on May 14, Russian mine boats sunk the Seyfi monitor), opened heavy fire on the approaching Russians. Due to the accident in the car, "Mina" fell behind and did not take part in the further attack. Just in case, everyone took off their shoes to make it easier to stay on the water in the worst case scenario.
Due to close ruptures, the hull of the boat often shuddered, the sailors took refuge under the steel deck. Skrydlov, despite the fact that he was hit by two bullets one after the other, leaned on the steering wheel and led the "Joke" to the target. A pole mine hit the Erekli side, but there was no explosion. A later inspection showed that the bullets had interrupted the electrical wires that were supposed to trigger the mine. Having received a hole, the boat began to drift with the current - fortunately, the Turks did not finish off the Joke, apparently believing that it would sink anyway. During the attack, Vereshchagin was wounded in the thigh, which at first seemed insignificant to him. From the Turkish coast, another Turkish steamer began to move towards the boat, intending to seize the damaged "Joke", but the wounded Skrydlov managed to hide his ship in a shallow arm.
The attack, albeit unsuccessful in its results, showed great courage and bravery of the minion boat team, had a significant resonance in newspapers and in society. Skrydlov and Vereshchagin (whose wound actually turned out to be quite painful) in a military hospital in Bucharest was visited by Emperor Alexander II himself, who handed the commander of the boat the St. George Cross. Vereshchagin's injury turned out to be dangerous - due to improper care and treatment, he began to show signs of gangrene. Only due to timely surgical intervention was it possible to avoid amputation.
Winners
Barely recovered, Vereshchagin departed for Plevna, where Russian troops led a protracted siege of a blockaded group of Turkish troops under the command of Osman Pasha. The impressions received here formed the basis for a number of very striking works dedicated to the Russian-Turkish war. Subsequently, when some military officers accused Vereshchagin of excessively "thickening the colors", showing everything through, in their opinion, a too tragic prism, the artist objected that on his canvases he did not show even a tenth of what he saw and survived in reality. War of 1877-1878painfully reflected not only on the painter himself, leaving a mark in the form of a deep scar, these events affected his entire family. His younger brother Sergei was killed, another, Alexander, was wounded. Some of the sketches, painted literally under bullets, were lost due to the fault of irresponsible persons, whom the artist entrusted to send them to Russia. At the end of the hostilities, the officers of the headquarters asked what order he would like to receive for his actual participation in the war, to which the artist responded with an angry tirade. When information reached him that they were going to be awarded the golden sword, Vereshchagin immediately left for Paris.
Defeated
In addition to many sketches and sketches, he brought to his Paris workshop weapons, household items, costumes and ammunition. All this provided invaluable assistance in the creation of paintings. The first exhibitions dedicated to the war of 1877–1878. took place already in the early 80s. in Russia, and then in Europe. What they saw did not leave the audience indifferent: some were amazed and shocked, some were jarred and made to frown. Vereshchagin was again accused of denigrating the image of the Russian army, lack of patriotism and other sins. The fact that he portrayed the war as it was, and not in the form of commanders rushing pompously in the rays of glory on white horses, overshadowed by banners, was not to everyone's liking. But the audience went to the exhibitions. In Europe, Vereshchagin's canvases also caused noise and excitement. For example, in Germany, it was forbidden to take soldiers and children to his exhibitions. Field Marshal Helmut von Moltke, himself a great admirer of Vereshchagin's work and always one of the first to visit his exhibitions in Germany, ordered that only officers be allowed there. A similar situation has developed in the United States, where a ban was also introduced on visiting the artist's exhibitions by children. When Vereshchagin tried to find out why, he was told that his paintings turn young people away from the war, and this is undesirable. Probably, at that time, Vereshchagin's canvases were akin to modern military photography, capturing the everyday life of the war with an eye to preserving the inexorable evidence of war crimes.
Lost painting "Execution of the sepoys"
The artist was painfully worried about accusations of antipatriotism and decadence. To restore emotional balance, he travels a lot: he visited the Middle East, Syria and Palestine. The result was the writing of works on a biblical topic, which led to a conflict with the Catholic Church. Two paintings "The Resurrection of Christ" and "The Holy Family" were doused with acid by an overly zealous Catholic monk. The creation of a canvas with the most mysterious fate - "Execution of the leaders of the sepoy uprising by the British", which presents the "enlightened sailors" with not the most humane characters, can also be attributed to these years. The painting was bought and disappeared without a trace. Her fate is still unknown.
Back in Russia. Cycle about the Patriotic War of 1812
Night halt of the Great Army
In 1890 Vereshchagin finally returned to his homeland. He bought a house near Moscow, built a workshop there and began work on his most significant, but, unfortunately, not fully completed cycle dedicated to the Patriotic War of 1812. The creation of the paintings was preceded by a long and painstaking research work: reading many books, visiting museums. Vereshchagin also visited the Borodino field. Even the smallest details were given a lot of attention. Working on the painting "Napoleon in Winter Dress", Vereshchagin, without stint, bought an expensive (more than 2 thousand rubles) fur coat trimmed with sable fur. He dressed up a janitor in it, in which he was supposed to sweep the yard, chop wood and perform other household duties, to the bewilderment of passers-by, surprised by the strange appearance of a worker in sables. All this was done because, according to the artist, the fur coat in which, judging by the descriptions, the Emperor was wearing, should not be new, but rather worn.
Napoleon Bonaparte in the notorious fur coat
When painting the painting "In the Assumption Cathedral", the rector of the temple was brought to a semi-faint state by a request to put horses there for a short time (during the French occupation, cavalry units were quartered in the cathedral). Vasily Vasilyevich's request was denied, he had to paint the cathedral from a photograph. The cycle contains canvases that convey the drama of the winter retreat of the Great Army from Russia. For a realistic rendering of snow-covered trees, Vereshchagin went into the frozen forest and painted with paints from nature, periodically warming his hands by a lighted fire. Having conceived a horse with a ripped belly in the foreground of the future "Night Rest of the Great Army", Vereshchagin carefully consulted a veterinarian, but his impressionable wife dissuaded the artist from excessive naturalism, and the horse was replaced by a cannon.
The appearance of the epic about the Patriotic War also caused a nervous reaction, primarily from the upper strata of society. Traditionally Francopophilized, the Russian aristocracy, against the background of a military alliance practically imposed by France, was unhappy with the way the Emperor and the French themselves were depicted in the paintings. Despite the fact that Napoleon's clothes were documented, they were called "stupid" in the official press, and the executions of Muscovites in the Kremlin and the stables in the cathedral were overly tendentious. As if the Napoleonic army arrived in Russia solely for scientific and educational purposes! Of course, the French simply could not behave, in the opinion of noble persons, who quite recently had difficulty in explaining themselves in Russian. Painted on huge canvases intended primarily for display in large rooms, paintings of the epic of the Patriotic War were not bought by patrons because of the inconvenience of their placement. Only on the eve of the anniversary of "Thunderstorm of the Twelfth Year", after the artist's death, they were acquired by Nicholas II.
At the turn of the century, the artist visited the Philippine Islands, the USA and Cuba, where, hot on the heels of the recent Spanish-American war, he created a number of works, the most famous of which were "In the Hospital", "Letter to the Homeland" and others. On the eve of the Russo-Japanese War, Vereshchagin was on a trip to Japan. Due to the rapidly deteriorating situation, in order not to be among the internees, at the end of 1903 he returned to Russia. When hostilities began, the artist, as has happened more than once, left his family and went to Port Arthur. On March 31, 1904, 62-year-old Vereshchagin was aboard the battleship Petropavlovsk together with Vice Admiral S. O. Makarov, whom he knew from the Russian-Turkish war. The famous battle painter was not among those rescued from the ship.
The war, which Vereshchagin had so long and consistently exposed and exposed in his canvases throughout his life, reached him. The canvases of the soldier and artist Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin are a reminder that “the continuation of politics by other means” is not only a victorious sound of fanfare and ceremonial uniforms with aiguillettes, that all this is preceded by blood and suffering. As forty years later, the 23-year-old poet and soldier Mikhail Kulchitsky, who is now resting in a mass grave in the Luhansk region, will write in his last poems: "War is not fireworks at all, but just hard work, when, black with sweat, the infantry is sliding up the plowing." …
