Gerasimov, Alexander Mikhailovich (1881-1963)

Art education AMGerasimov got MUZHVZ (1903-15), where his teachers were the great Russian painters of XIX and XX centuries. - AE Arkhipov , N. Kasatkin , K. Korovin . They borrowed it wide sketchy manner, a bold stroke, juicy (though often rough) color.

After graduating in 1910, painting department, he has to continue his studies at Korovin , he entered the architecture. After years of working in the home of Kozlov, where he spent his childhood years, the artist in 1925, returned to Moscow. Here he joined the AHRR - Artists' Association, who combined the novelty of Soviet politicized subjects with traditional painting techniques, which is why artists AHRR only call themselves "realists", all the same points - "formalist" and "aesthetes" incomprehensible to the people.

Gerasimov had the gift of easy to grasp portrait likeness and felt first and foremost portrait painter, though often appealed to landscape painting, creating a series of subtle and lyrical landscapes in mood ("March in Kozlov," 1914 "After the Rain. Wet deck", 1935, etc.). Among his portraits, individual and group, over time, begin to dominate the high-level pictures of people, heads of state and party. His large canvases are not without pathos of poster - "Lenin on the podium" (1930), "Stalin and Voroshilov to the Kremlin" (1938), "Hymn to October" (1942) and others . - are examples of the official style of Soviet art.

Since the late 1930s. Gerasimov not only a painter, but also the official head of the artistic life of the country, a hard boss, who led the major arts organizations: the chairman of the Moscow branch of the Union of Artists (1938-40), chairman of the organizing committee of the Union of Soviet Artists (1939-54). In these positions, he was an energetic conductor and, partly, the creator of the artistic policy of the Stalinist decades.

 In 1949-1960 headed the creative workshop of painting at the Academy of the USSR.
 in 1947-1957 - President of the USSR Academy of Arts.
, People's Artist of the USSR, member of the USSR Academy of Arts, winner of the USSR State Prize, awarded VI Lenin, Doctor of Arts. He received many state awards.   

Of particular prominence AM Gerasimov as the author of numerous portraits VI Lenin and JV Stalin. Occupying official positions in major art institutions of the USSR in the years of the most reactionary, took a hard line against any deviation from the method of socialist realism. In 1950, AM Gerasimov said: "Why should I consider the tastes of artists-formalist up my taste? [...] All my gut I knew it was some kind of death, I was sick of it all and caused hatred, which is still not done less [...]. " At the same time, the artist was creating intimate, lyrical works, preferring landscapes and still lifes. In these works he performed supporter of his painting teacher KA Korovin .