Odessa in paintings, or the urban landscape of Odessa

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Odesa State Academy of Construction and Architecture

ODESSA IN PAINTINGS, OR THE URBAN LANDSCAPE OF ODESSA

Olga Savytska, Olena Liubimova,

Anastasiia Iniakina, Larysa Mikhova

Odesa

Abstract

painting school odessa strelbitsky

The article explores the peculiarities of the Odessa plein air painting school in the works of the prominent Odessa artist A.V. Strelbitsky. The influence of Odessa's architecture, history, and southern climate on the formation of a unique, unparalleled painting school, with a special place belonging to the urban landscape, is demonstrated. The historical aspects of the formation of the urban landscape are analyzed. The main stages of the formation of the Odessa plein air school are outlined and analyzed. The main direction of the Odessa plein air school, which consists of a consistent continuation and development of the traditions of the urban landscape of the late XIX - early XX centuries in plein air painting from the second half of the XX to the beginning of the XXI century, is indicated.

Keywords - architecture of Odessa, painting, plein air, urban landscape, Odessa plein air painting school.

Анотація

Одеська державна академія будівництва та архітектури, Одеса, Україна

ОДЕСА НА КАРТИНАХ, АБО МІСЬКИЙ ОДЕСЬКИЙ ПЕЙЗАЖ

Савицъка О. С., Любимова О.Д., ІнякінаА. А., Михова Л.М.

У статті розглядаються особливості одеської пленерної школи живопису у творчості видатного одеського художника А.В. Стрельбицького. Показано вплив архітектури, історії та південного клімату Одеси на формування неповторної, унікальної живописної школи, особливе місце в якій належить міському пейзажу. Проаналізовано історичні аспекти формування міського пейзажу. Визначено і проаналізовано основні етапи формування одеської пленерної школи. Вказано основне напрямок одеської пленерної школи, яке полягає у послідовному продовженні та розвитку традицій міського пейзажу кінця XIX - початку XX ст. у пленерному живописі другої половини XX - початку XXI ст.

Ключові слова: архітектура Одеси, живопис, пленер, міський пейзаж, одеська пленерна школа живопису.

Relevance of the study

The times set new requirements for the analysis of national artistic traditions of Ukrainian culture and art. This primarily involves a comprehensive approach to studying both new and traditional aspects of harmoniously conveying the surrounding reality based on the artistic experience of predecessors, reflecting in artistic works the artistic-philosophical position through the means of visual art. One of the leading genres of visual art is landscape. Studying the development of landscape painting allows understanding its origins and analyzing it.

Statement of the problem in general terms

Despite strong trends of globalization that have dominated the artistic culture of Ukraine since the second half of the 20th century and significantly influenced the development of contemporary art, Ukrainian artistic culture retains a strong symbolic foundation. In Odessa, there has been a continuous tradition of plein air painting for over a hundred years, which serves as the basis for contemporary artists. Its main principles were formed by the masters of the Southern Russian Artists' Society (TYURH) in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In their work, there was a fusion of academic tradition and the painting achievements of French Impressionism and PostImpressionism. Plein air painting primarily developed in the genre of landscape.

Analysis of recent research and publications

The main principles of the Odessa plein air painting school were formed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. All conditions in Odessa were conducive to the emergence of a unique, unparalleled painting school. A special place in it belongs to the landscape. In 1890, the independent creative association "Southern Russian Artists' Society" was founded in the city. Its founders and active members included K.K. Kostandi, P.A. Nilus, G.S. Golovkov, N.D. Kuznetsov, T.Ya. Dvornikov, E.I. Bukovetsky, G.A. Ladyzhensky, and others. The development of plein air painting traditions, particularly in the genre of lyrical landscape, is associated with the names of these masters.

The most significant carrier of the tradition of the Odessa plein air school is Albin Stanislavovich Gavdzinsky. The problems of the evolution of the landscape genre are considered in the works of N. Aseyeva, M. Bazhan, R. Bashchenko, K. Bohemska, K. Clark, Z. Lillio-Otkovich, V. Stasevich, A. Yagodovska, and others. Historical and stylistic features of regional schools of landscape painting in Ukraine are the subject of research by N. Bondarchuk, A. Gorbienko, O. Kotova, M. Osadtsa, M. Syrokhoman, O. Tsugorka, and others.

In the dissertation "Artistic Practices in the Formation of Cultural Values of Society" by Yu. Tarasenko, the results of a comprehensive study of the influence of art criticism practices on the processes of forming cultural values of society are presented. The work defines that one of the most important components of art criticism as a theoretical discourse is the formation of spiritual culture, as well as the enhancement of the intellectual-emotional potential of a person.

In the dissertation by A. Nosenko, "Plein Air in Odessa Painting from the Second Half of the 20th to the Beginning of the 21st Century," plein air painting in Odessa from the second half of the 20th to the beginning of the 21st century is comprehensively investigated. The main typological directions of the Odessa plein air school are identified and studied: lyrical chamber landscape and landscape painting.

Research goal

Studying plein air painting is necessary to preserve cultural tradition. It is important to comprehend the uniqueness of the Odessa plein air school and determine the creative contribution of its masters to the history of Ukrainian fine arts. The aim of the research is to identify the role of plein air painting in Odessa from the second half of the 20th to the beginning of the 21st century.

Research objectives

To demonstrate the significance of Odessa's architecture in shaping the Odessa plein air school, to explore the origins and traditions of the Odessa plein air painting school; to examine the features of individual creative methods of artists working en plein air.

Exposition of the main material

Odessa is the largest historical city, the centuries-old culture of which is reflected in its unique heritage - monuments of history, culture, and architecture, valuable historical buildings that create a bright and unique image of the city. Contemporary life in Odessa and its comprehensive development prospects are unthinkable without cultural heritage. Heritage constitutes one of the main spheres of Odessa's life, largely shaping the special mentality of Odessans and creating the city's global image.

Odessa is represented in a large number of works of art of all kinds, both classical and contemporary. The city has inspired many artists, writers, poets, and composers to create beautiful artistic works, where the image of the city occupies a central place. A beautiful city with exquisite architecture and an interesting history, without which neither its present nor future would be possible. The views of Odessa have inspired many artists.

The talented master of painting, Anatoly Vasilievich Strelbitsky, paints magnificent views of Odessa. With extraordinary precision, the artist transfers onto canvas the appearance of the city, its squares and streets, palaces, churches, residential buildings, and public structures. The focus is on train stations and market squares, boulevards and bridges, cozy old streets, and new residential quarters. Roofs, hotels, theaters, nightclubs, cafes, columns with advertising posters--all of these are depicted with meticulous attention to detail by the artist, celebrating the beauty of Odessa's architecture. The main direction of the artist's work is the urban landscape of Odessa.

The main subject of canvases painted in the genre of urban landscape is the depiction of the city-- individual houses, streets and squares, panoramic views. The city in the paintings of artists, or urban landscape, is streets and buildings, people and transport, trees and benches. Regardless of the painting's plot, the city in the works of famous artists impresses with its harmony and realism.

Urban landscape as an independent genre began to take shape at the turn of the 15th and 16th centuries, in the early Middle Ages. Artists used it as a background for biblical scenes. The art of urban landscape originated in ancient Rome. One of the earliest depictions of a cityscape from above dates back to the 1st century, preserved on the surfaces of Emperor Trajan's baths and executed through fresco painting. This is the first urban landscape in the history of visual arts. Later, the Early Netherlandish masters of painting gave urban landscape a prominent place in their works.

Two cities become the main subjects depicted in the paintings of artists of that time: the Heavenly Jerusalem, symbolizing all that is sublime, spiritual, and divine, and its opposite--the Tower of Babel, a symbol of pride, sin, and evil. Dutch painters portrayed images of their surrounding reality on their canvases. The Limbourg brothers created miniatures depicting castles in Ile-de-France. Rogier van der Weyden used the city as part of the landscape background for his painting of Saint Luke. During the Middle Ages, artists depicted hell as a round or square city.

The emergence of oil painting and increased interest among artists in perspective as a technique of visual art contributed to the emergence of the urban landscape as a separate genre. Following the Dutch painters, German and French artists also turned to urban landscapes. Paintings in the genre of urban landscape from the 15th to the 16th centuries are characterized by carefully crafted compositions, adhering to the laws of perspective with detailed rendering of architectural elements. Examples include Albrecht Durer's "Courtyard of the Castle in Innsbruck," Raphael's "The Betrothal of the Virgin," and Mantegna's "Christ on the Mount of Olives."

In the 17th century, the genre of urban landscape became popular among Dutch painters. Vermeer, Berckheyde, Heda, Ruisdael, Govert, and other artists created true masterpieces, depicting everyday scenes framed by urban landscapes. Thanks to them, today we can see what Amsterdam, Delft, Haarlem, and other cities looked like over four hundred years ago. As a separate direction of visual art, the urban landscape formed in the mid-17th century. Jan Vermeer's "View of Delft" is considered the first painting of this genre. Peter Jans Saenredam, a Dutch artist, gained fame for his concise architectural landscapes. The painter Jan van der Heyden depicted views of Amsterdam with extraordinary precision, capturing the city's squares, canals, palaces, churches, residential buildings, and public structures on canvas. Following the Dutch, paintings of urban landscapes by English, German, and French artists appeared. Among them was the British artist William Turner, who painted the watercolor "The Pantheon, Morning after the Fire."

The city in the paintings of 18th-century artists is a meticulously drawn veduta, characterized by almost photographic accuracy in depiction. Veduta, a landscape in its pure form, emerged in the 18th century in the form of drawings, engravings, and paintings with detailed representations of cities. Artists captured the slightest nuances of streets, buildings, squares, parks, and sculptures, extolling the beauty and grandeur of the capitals of Europe and small provincial towns. In contrast to the veduta, urban landscapes with city ruins emerged. The Veduta style comprises engravings, paintings, and drawings depicting famous architectural landmarks and urban landscapes. The pioneers of veduta are considered to be the Dutch artist Paul Brill and the German painter Joseph Heinz the Younger, who worked in the 16th and 17th centuries. They painted so-called proto-vedute. The style originated in Italy thanks to the Dutch artist Gaspar van Wittel, who worked in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. He popularized large-scale, intricately detailed urban landscapes of the late Middle Ages.

Other representatives of veduta in the Venetian school of painting in the 18th century were Francesco Guardi and Giovanni Antonio Canal.

Architectural urban landscape was extremely popular in the 18th century. Painters paid a lot of attention to architectural landmarks and graphics, harmoniously complementing nature. Representatives include Giovanni Battista Piranesi, Sylvester Feodosievich Shchedrin, and Johan Christian Clausen Dahl.

Capriccio, derived from the Italian word "capriccio," meaning whim or caprice, was popular in the 17th and 18th centuries among Italian artists. It represented a fantasy landscape depicting the ruins of imaginary ancient cities in Italy, Greece, and France. Representatives include Marco Ricci, Giovanni Paolo Panini, Hubert Robert, Friedrich Caspar David.

Urban landscape is a modern genre of urban painting. These paintings depict metropolises with their skyscrapers and other technological innovations. Representatives include Isaac Israels, Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro, Edouard Leon Cortes, and George Hendrik Breitner.

Linear landscape is a cityscape where all boulevards and roads converge at one point. Park landscape includes simple depictions of city park areas in different seasons.

Industrial landscape consists of paintings depicting factories, buildings, towers, bridges, dams, etc. The main goal of such canvases is to convey the beauty of industrial structures and romanticize the process of their construction. The pioneer in this direction was the French impressionist Claude Monet with his painting "Gare Saint-Lazare."

By the 19th century, images of ancient temples and sketches of city views had become fashionable. By the end of the 19th century, impressionists made a vivid impact on the creation of urban landscapes. Among them were renowned French artists Camille Pissarro and Paul Signac. Railway stations, market squares, boulevards, bridges, cozy old streets, and new residential quarters were at the center of attention. Roofs, hotels, theaters, nightclubs, cafes, and columns with advertising posters...

Odessa is depicted in paintings on canvas, created at different times and by different masters in various styles. These include vibrant oil or watercolor paintings, mysterious grisaille works, strict gouache paintings, and many others.

Odessa, the Southern Palmyra, is the city's other name. Its beauty has been captured by many painters of the Southern Russian school, in paintings, postcards, engravings, and artistic illustrations. The unique architecture, whimsical ships, gentle sea, and original Odessa characters, both real and fictional, have all found their reflection in the works of various painters, starting from Maxim Vorobiev, the court landscape painter of the 19th century. His painting "View from the Military Harbor" tells us about Odessa as it was seen in 1821, during Alexander Pushkin's southern exile. This famous canvas from Pushkin's time was painted by Vorobiev in the late 1820s. It was commissioned by Count M.S. Vorontsov, depicting only the then-under-construction Primorsky Boulevard. There is no giant staircase to the sea yet, but in the distance, the quarantine harbor with sailing ships is clearly visible.

In the second half of the 19th century, the famous marine artist Ivan Aivazovsky worked a lot in Odessa. He painted a series of Pushkin-themed paintings: "Pushkin on the Black Sea coast," "The Poet's Farewell to the Sea," created jointly with Ilya Repin. Aivazovsky painted many corners of Odessa. The painting "View of Odessa on a Moonlit Night" in several authorial interpretations is now exhibited in the largest museums of Ukraine.

Interesting military events of the Crimean War period are depicted in engravings by M. Pikovsky. They show the heroic resistance of the Russian battery against the Anglo-French squadron off the coast of Odessa.

In the 20th century, artists like V. Dunaevsky, G. Lukomsky, P. Konovsky, Kostandi, and many others worked in Odessa, and reproductions of their paintings can be seen today in leading museums around the world.

Special mention goes to the architectural beauty of Odessa in the works of the talented painter Anatoly Vasilievich Strelbitsky.

Anatoly Vasilievich Strelbitsky was born in Odessa in 1942 (the Podolsk branch of the family, descendants of Joseph Strelbitsky, a priest of the Podolsk diocese). The future artist spent his childhood and school years in the house of his great-grandfather, Academician of Painting Alexander Andreevich Popov (1852-1919). The atmosphere of the old house, filled with paintings and antiques, and the stories of his grandmother Olga Alexandrovna awakened the boy's interest in drawing. Already in the lower grades of school, he drew well, and in the eighth grade, he independently tried to paint still lifes in oil.

After graduating from school in 1966, Anatoly entered the Odessa Art School, which he graduated from with honors in 1970. The first art institution in modern Ukraine was the Odessa School of Drawing, which later became an art school. Founded on May 30, 1865, the school was directed by F. F. Malman, who also developed the school's rules. For a long time, the school existed on voluntary donations and did not have a permanent address. For 30 years, resolving the issue of the school's location was the concern of the vicepresident of the Odessa Society of Fine Arts, Franz Osipovich Morandi, who found time and energy to arrange the drawing school. The first plaster casts, engravings, and mannequins were ordered by him from the Milan Academy of Fine Arts, with which he had good relations.

On May 22, 1883, with the blessing of the bishop of Elizavetgrad Neophyte, the first stone of the future building of the art school was laid at 14 Preobrazhenskaya Street. By 1885, the school had already moved to its own premises. On December 30, 1899, the charter and staff of the Art School were approved. In 1909, Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich, who subsidized the school for 25 years, passed away. In gratitude to him, the school was named after Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich. It bore this name until 1917. As early as 1919, the Art School was reorganized into Higher and Secondary Art Schools, the director of which was Academician Boris Edwards. And from 1921, the educational institution was called the Academy of Fine Arts. Later, this name was transformed, and the educational institution became the Institute of Fine Arts, and later the College. In the 1923-1924 academic year, the Institute of Fine Arts had three faculties: architectural; painting-sculptural; faculty of applied art with a workshop for decorativemonumental (fresco) painting, theater-decorative workshop, workshop for polygraphic production, ceramic workshop, and experimental workshop for the study of artistic paints and materials. In 1924, the school was renamed the Polytechnic of Fine Arts, which trained monumental artists, polygraphists, ceramists, then, in 1930, the Odessa Polytechnic of Fine Arts was renamed the Art Institute, but in 1934, the Odessa Art Institute again became a secondary educational institution.

In honor of the 100th anniversary of its founding, in 1965, the school was named after its former student - M. B. Grekov. Anatoly Vasilievich remains in his native Odessa, which is so closely connected with his creative work. The quiet green surroundings of the French Boulevard, the narrow streets of the old center, and the famous architectural ensembles of Odessa, the courtyards of Moldavanka, views of the Odessa port and coastline - all of this is represented in the artist's works. Still lifes with flowers, which he always paints only from life, enjoy wide public recognition. A special theme is the depiction of domestic animals - dogs, cats, horses, in which the author's kind attitude towards our smaller brothers is so palpable. Anatoly Vasilievich has repeatedly participated in republican and all-Union exhibitions, his works have been presented at an exhibition in Germany. The artist has been on creative assignments several times - in Turkmenistan, in the Vladimir-Suzdal architectural reserve, and elsewhere. Paintings by A.V. Strelbitsky are in private collections of painting enthusiasts in various countries around the world - in Germany, Israel, Turkey, Russia, and others. In 1999, the artist completed a major commission for the decoration of a hotel in Antalya. The Greek company acquired 42 canvases for the decoration of the Odessa-San cruise ship. The paintings of A.V. Strelbitsky resonate in the hearts of different people - ordinary Odessites, nostalgic emigrants, and guests of Odessa. Currently, the master is at the peak of his creative powers, working a lot and successfully.

Conclusions and Perspectives for Further Research

The article is dedicated to the analysis of the peculiarities of the Odessa plein-air painting school in the creative work of the outstanding Odessa artist A.V. Strelbitsky. It demonstrates the influence of architecture and history on the formation of a unique and unparalleled painting school, with a special emphasis on urban landscape. The main principles of the Odessa plein-air painting school were established in the late 19th to early 20th centuries. Studying the works of prominent artists of the Odessa plein-air painting school, such as Anatoly Vasilievich Strelbitsky, is important for the development of contemporary Ukrainian art. Exploring the development of landscape painting in the Odessa Art School allows for the analysis and understanding of its origins for further development.

References

1. Nosenko, A.I. "The Problem of Impressionism in the Painting of Odessa in the Last Third of the 20th Century." A.S. Gavdzinsky. Southern Ukrainian Pedagogical University named after K.D. Ushinsky, Odessa.

2. Timofeenko, V.I. "Odessa: Architectural and Historical Essay." Kyiv: Budivelnik, 1984. - 160 p.

3. Tarasenko, Yu. "Artistic Practices in the Formation of Cultural Values of Society" (2023).

4. Nosenko, Anna Ivanovna. "Plein Air in the Painting of Odessa from the Second Half of the 20th to the Beginning of the 21st Century." Candidate of Science Thesis, Specialization 17.00.05, 2006.

5. Internet source. "Urban Landscape." Available at: https://artchive.ru/genres/urban_landscape 6.Internet source. "Paintings on Canvas in Odessa." Available at: https://artfactor.com.ua/kartiny-v-odesse

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