Description of the picture "February Azure" by I. Grabar

They say that the landscape is a portrait of nature. And a good artist, he is full of dynamism, a kind of mystery that opens up to the viewer only on an intuitive-sensual level. He observes an ordinary, even unremarkable sketch of nature - a lonely tree standing, a troubled sea or a mountainous terrain - and yet does not cease to admire the unusual foreshortening of the Impressionist game with flowers depicted, photographed exactly by the mood. All these features can be characterized and canvases by Igor Grabar. Let's try to give a description of the picture "February Azure".

History of creation

As a rule, evidence of the history of the creation of a particular work of art is extremely short-lived. Some time passes - and the artist himself does not remember exactly when he visited the idea to capture something on paper. Fortunately, the history of the picture "February Azure" did not sink into oblivion. It is known that a canvas was created when Grabar visited Dugino from the hospitable benefactor Nikolai Mescherin. Duginsky period is considered almost the most fruitful in the artist's work, written over 13 years of the painting with pleasure accepted museums and exhibitions.

One day on a cheerful February morning, the artist just decided to take a walk - without colors and an easel. One of the birches seemed Grabaru especially beautiful, he looked at her and ... dropped the stick. And lifting it, he looked at the tree from the bottom up. The effect was simply extraordinary! The artist rushed after his accessories and sketched what he saw, in order to begin creating a full-fledged picture in a few days. For this Grabar dug a trench in the snow, covered the canvas with an umbrella, which strengthened the effect of the presence of blue, and began to create. He worked for about two weeks, and all this time nature pampered the artist with beautiful weather.

Image subject

Description of the picture "February Azure" we start with the main thing - birches in the foreground. The tree is shrouded in the finest winter lace, which can sparkle gaily even on a cloudy day. A little further you can see the little girlfriends of the white-barrel queen, the little birches. So comes to mind the comparison with the girls who swirl in the dance, call the spring and see off February. It seems, wait a little more next to the canvas - and you will hear a song about the symbol of our country, the birch tree.

The tree is depicted against the background of a snow-white coverlet and a piercing blue sky. Therefore, its branches, which give the birch an interesting, even somewhat strange shape, look mysterious, fabulous, bewitched. Like a white-haired beauty just woke up and reaches for the sky to greet the spring, because of what it seems that the birch tree stood on its own.

Color solution

We continue the work "Description of the picture" February Azure ". It would seem that the image of the winter month requires the use of white paint. However, Grabar acted differently. On the canvas of the viewer clearly shows that the snow is not very clean, here and there are thawed patches, which means that spring is approaching. At the same time, the artist generously uses pastel and bright colors. It is believed that in the canvas he reached the limit of color saturation, drawing, in fact, pure light. We will see many shades of blue, ultramarine. All of them merge into a unique music of painting, the main purpose of which is to convey one more moment from the life of nature, invisible sometimes for the common man. By such an installation, the canvas that Grabar created - "February Azure" - draws closer to the masterpieces of French Impressionists, such as "Maki" by Claude Monet.

Dominant mood

The main ideological message of the canvas can be described as an expectation. Winter cold necessarily replaced by warm weather, the depicted birch dressed in a beautiful outfit of green leaves, and nature will begin a new spiral of its development. This explains the extraordinary, optimistic emotional background of the canvas. This description of the picture "February Azure" should take into account.

Other facts

For Grabar, the glory of the artist of the winter time was fixed. There is even an interesting parallel of the mentioned Dugin period with Pushkin's Boldinsky autumn as one of the most fruitful periods of the poet's activity. However, Grabar - "February Azure" and other "winter" paintings do not count! - Imprinted and other seasons, as well as people's faces. The artist has worked very fruitfully in his whole life: not every painter can practically create 60 years without stopping!

Initially, the artist of interest to us, the artist called "Blue winter" - an analogy with other canvases Grabar - but when he gave his offspring to the Tretyakov Gallery, renamed it. The masterpiece is still there. Visitors look at the canvas, they are surprised to find out that they can not even pass on the most skillful reproductions: smears, separate points, from which the canvas is made up. This is also a trace of one of the art trends - divisionism.

On this description of the picture "February Azure" can be considered complete.