Vasily Surikov (1848-1916)

Vasily Surikov was born on January 12, 1848 in Krasnoyarsk, artist. Of the Cossacks. Surikov is very proud of his origins and wrote about it: "On all sides I Cossack natural ... My Cossacks more than 200 years. " In 1856 - 1861 years. studied at the Krasnoyarsk district school, where he received first artistic knowledge from Grebneva art teacher, according to his instructions, he copied prints of paintings by old masters, gradually learning the art of their time, "Grebnev taught me to paint, I almost cried over me," - later gratefully recalled Surikov.

After the death of his father served as a scribe Surikov, sometimes painted. His drawings attracted the attention of governor PN Zamyatin and rich gold-PI Kuznetsov, who helped him with the receipt of the St. Petersburg school of the Society for Encouragement of Arts and assumed the costs of the young artist. In this school, MV Dyakonova the three summer months Surikov has mastered the three-year course, and only 28 August 1869 successfully passed the entrance exams to the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts. His was a volunteer and enlisted in the main class where his teacher would subsequently P. Chistyakov . The following year, he was working on his first work "View of monument to Peter I on the Senate Square in St. Petersburg" (1870).

He studied at the Academy Surikov successfully. Brilliant achievements of the young painter was in the composition, that's why comrades called him "a composer." By the period of training at the Academy is his painting of ancient history, "Prince's Court" (1874). In April 1875 the artist began working on a large canvas, "The Apostle Paul explains the tenets of Christianity before Herod Agrippa, his sister Berenice, and the Roman proconsul Festus."

Surikov Academy ends up in the rank of artist I degree. When he was six months "as an exception" had the opportunity to go abroad to study with European masters, but instead of asking for permission to execute the order on the painting of the Moscow Cathedral of Christ the Savior. In June 1877 he moved to Moscow, where he is doing for two years the frescoes depicting the four ecumenical councils. But later Surikov will never be run on the order.

The artist became a member of the Association of Traveling Art Exhibitions, and the Union of Russian Artists. He often dropped in Siberia, visited the Don (1893), Volga (1901 - 1903), the Crimea (1913). In 1880 - 90 years visited France, Italy and several other European countries. Particular impressed by the painters of the Italian and Spanish Renaissance.

In 1878, Surikov married EA Charest, the granddaughter of the Decembrist PP Svistunova. Happy family life, and the relative material well-being allow the artist to "start a" - turn to Russian history. Impressions of the old Moscow architecture was an important stimulus to the track for the first of his historical masterpiece painting "Morning Strelets'execution." "Morning Strelets'execution" - a grand painting, completed in 1881, causing a stir. That same year, the artist became a member of the Association of Traveling Art Exhibitions, and since then constantly exposed to them.

See also: http://artsurikov.ru - site of the artist Surikov.