A. Franz Roubaud (1856-1928)

A. Franz Roubaud was born June 15, 1856 in Odessa. His father - who had moved to the Russian French bookseller, a native of Marseille, Roubaix Alex and his mother - Madeleine Seneca kept her fashion house. From an early age Franz Roubaud apparent penchant for drawing. At 9 years old he entered the Odessa school of painting and drawing, and in 1878 he joined the Bavarian Royal Academy of Arts. His teacher was Joseph Brandt. During the holidays, the young man came to Russia each year, traveled through the Caucasus, Ukraine, Central Asia. Caucasus has become one of the most favorite subjects. In 1886 he was commissioned to write the 19 paintings on the theme of the Caucasian wars to Tiflis. To complete the order, the painter studied historical events, new to the place of battle. In the Caucasus, the artist has created a gallery of colorful images of the Highlanders. studies and sketches were the basis of large paintings created for the temple of Fame in Tiflis. The complexity of the work was that it was a government order and creativity of the artist holds down certain requirements. For each picture Roubaud was "obliged to pre-prepare a sketch and submit it to the Commission and the approval of the chief of the Main Caucasus region." In 1889, in the halls of the Imperial Society for the Encouragement of Artists opened the first exhibition of F. Roubaud. It was the heyday of the Roubaix as masters of painting. He participated in an academic painter and exhibitions in 1896 and 1898. Especially for them, created several paintings, including the "Living Bridge", "caucasian intelligence", "crossing a mountain river." True to the realistic ideal of art, trying to convey the breadth of the heroic past of the Russian people, Roubaud elect to implement their plans a kind of fine art as panorama. He was the founder of the Russian school of battle panoramas. This kind of art has attracted the master that made ​​it possible to create monumental works in vivid form resurrects the important events in the history of Russia. Even while working on the film "Storm Ahulgo village" (1888) for the Temple of Glory Roubaud conceived and soon established a pan on the same topic. In 1891, after exposure to the panorama in Munich, the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts awarded an honorary professorship Roubaud. The artist was also awarded the Order of St. Michael. Then panorama marched in Paris, where she was a great success. In 1896, at the Nizhny Novgorod-Russia Exhibition of Art and Design for a Panorama "Storm Ahulgo village" built a special building. Artist N. Karazin wrote: "How much knowledge, talent and taste ... came to the central site panoramas rather large group of artists enthusiastically looked at all these wonders of art and a sense of respect for their author, humble and quiet Roubaud, as if inadvertently confused and even seriously afraid for the success of their offspring. " Roubaud, who spent the creation of panoramas 35,000 rubles, addressed to Nicholas II with a request to buy it from him for 15,000. "Although this work and enjoyed universal success - he wrote in the petition - but tangible result of this enterprise was a deficit of 11 thousand rubles." Lenders had threatened him with an artist selling works in Munich with a hammer. Panorama was acquired by the War Office in 1897 to Tiflis. However, the visitors were able to see it only in 1909, but not in Tiflis, and in Sevastopol, in the building of Panorama 'Defense of Sevastopol ". Sevastopol Panorama at this time exhibited in St. Petersburg on the Champ de Mars. In 1924, the panorama of the "Storm of the aul Ahulgo" is stored on the shaft of the Artillery Historical Museum in Leningrad, suffered during the floods. In poor condition in 1928 it was transferred to the Dagestan regional museum. Currently, four pieces of the panorama stored in Makhachkala. Already a mature master, in the summer of 1901 the artist received the official order for the creation of panoramas, on the 50th anniversary of the heroic defense of Sevastopol during the Crimean War of 1853-1856. "The challenge to convey a grand plot defense of Sevastopol - said F. Roubaud - had himself predecessors, and its resolution is enormous difficulties for the artist. Easy to write an artist, where the historical material gives ready and noble motives, but quite another to depict Canvas heroic defense. artist must always be truthful. "