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Lilacs in the basket ("Eroica")

Petr Petrovich Konchalovsky • Painting, 1933, 79×104 cm
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About the artwork
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Art form: Painting
Subject and objects: Still life
Style of art: Realism
Technique: Oil
Materials: Canvas
Date of creation: 1933
Size: 79×104 cm
Artwork in collection: My collection Tatyana Somova
Artwork in selections: 26 selections
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Description of the artwork «Lilacs in the basket ("Eroica")»

Lilacs in a basket, bag, bucket, and a crystal vase. Siren in dozens of variations and different interiors. Blooming lilacs and branches of lilacs on the floor. Pyotr Konchalovsky is often called the "painter of lilacs". In flowering season, the memories the artist's granddaughter Catherine, he wrote the siren every day.

Few of the students who have passed the fate to write an essay on the picture Konchalovsky "lilac..." What kind of siren is at the discretion of a school teacher. But who did not describe those shades of cream and white, purple and blue, purple and violet, pale pink and lilac, all these branches and simple Persian lilac?

Noteworthy is the second name of this bouquet – the "heroic" lilac. This is why all of a sudden? What a feat? For a better understanding it makes sense to see a biography of the artist. Pyotr Konchalovsky managed to become a classic of Soviet painting and it does not write the leaders of the world proletariat. To be in the 30-40-ies in the Soviet Union of a "pure" painter – not an easy task. Konchalovsky was a success.

"Lilac in a basket" is written in the Mounds, the artist just recently bought a house there and practically founded this family estate. The country began the era of repression, famine, denunciations. Konchalovsky writes a siren calling her "heroic." You can create paintings on topics of the day, but can not realize what is happening, being a man of intelligent and sensitive? Judging by the epithet "heroic" still life with lilacs – not. It was probably seen as an attempt of the artist available means to contribute to the strengthening of the Soviet system. But is this heroism?

Against the dark table and gray and dirty tones of the walls is a riot of colors, a celebration of life, lilac in all its glory. Heroic bloom? Yes, but it is doubtful that implied heroic triumph of Soviet reality. Before us is a celebration of life, love and spring that not even the Soviet reality stop – to the surrounding gray lilac one Shine. Maybe it's because he so loved this plant? Feature of lilac that she breaks off the branch, and she is the only benefit: for the next year even brighter, even more fun will bloom she is indestructible, burning, heroic – as human life itself.

Despite the fact that Konchalovsky was recognized and even managed to live as he wants and write what he saw fit, he felt the confusion and pain that don't understand it. Critic Ivan Aksenov recalls a meeting with the artist in 1932: "After a pause, he began with great excitement to say that no one wants, that his painting is praised out of politeness that the painting itself is not recognized". So, perhaps the "heroic" lilac is Konchalovsky and his life?

Author: Alain Esaulova
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