Vsevolod
Andreevich Filippov

The history of Russia, Russian architecture and Russian nature are the main topics of the art of the artist Vsevolod Andreevich Filippov. He is Russian with all his soul, with all his thoughts.

For many years, Filippov was known for his work in the printing industry as an artist of type, drawn heading, and cover art. And only at the first solo exhibition of Filippov (1955) for the first time his paintings, drawings and sketches were fully presented. They made it possible to recognize in the artist, first of all, a subtle landscape painter and a kind of master who created works on themes from Russian history. Native, Russian, familiar and close to all of us - forests and fields near Moscow, monuments of ancient architecture - are captured in his canvases, sketches, sketches.

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Vsevolod Andreevich (09/17/1893 - 05/20/1976) - a native Muscovite, he was born in Moscow and lived in it almost his whole life.

Vsevolod received his first professional art education after graduating from a real school in the studio of a wonderful artist-teacher Peter Ivanovich Kelin. Kelin was able to instill in his students a consciousness of the artist’s high calling, instilled an understanding of art. This year of studies in the studio determined the whole future of Filippov, here the craving for art acquired a complete form from Vsevolod, and in 1914 he entered the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture.

At the School, the teachers and closest mentors of Filippov becameA. M. Vasnetsov and A. E. Arkhipov. He taught at that time at the School and K. A. Korovin, about the "method" and the bright personality of which Vsevolod retained colorful memories for life. The "company" of fellow student Filippov was remarkable at that time: B.V. Johanson, A. A. Plastov, V.V. Mayakovsky, V.F. Shtranikh,M. A. Markov and others who later became famous Soviet artists. With B.V. Johanson, V.F. Stranich,C. F. Yuon Filippov maintained friendly relations for many years, and jointly completed a number of artistic orders. And with the sculptorS. T. Konyonkov and one of the founders and future dean of the Stroganov Institute, M. A. Markov, hunted together at Filippov’s dacha.

Watercolors on the theme of Pushkin's “Golden Cockerel”, performed in 1915-1916, Filippov considered the beginning of his creative life. They were marked by the seal (the newspaper "Russian Word" for 1916), and purchased in a private collection. Another of his paintings - “The Bazaar in the Old Russian City”, was also performed at the School, and was awarded the P. M. Tretyakov Prize in 1917. The painting was included in the collection of the museum of the city of Yegoryevsk. Filippov exhibited sketches, small paintings and historical compositions at that time at each exhibition of the School. Countless sketches from ancient manuscripts, the study of Russian ornaments, Russian architecture, Russian fonts, from which he filled out his albums, speaks of the seriousness and depth of the artist’s approach to the whole historical topic that captured him. Already at that time he strove to feel and convey the spirit of a bygone historical era. Filippov also studied books on Russian history, plans of Russian cities left by Russian contemporaries and invaders, for example, the Polish Sigismund plan of Moscow of the 17th century, on the basis of which compositions of sketches and paintings by Filippov were built.

A.M. Vasnetsov led the landscape class at the School (after A.K. Savrasov, V.D. Polenov, I.I. Levitan). Like his predecessors, Apollinar Mikhailovich sought to instill in his students a sincere love of nature, the ability to see and portray the most important thing. Considering the sketch from nature as a means of studying the surrounding nature by the artist, he advised working on it as thoroughly as possible. He recommended developing visual memory, which the artist especially needs to work on the painting. On this occasion, Vasnetsov wrote: “My paintings are not a reproduction of sketches; when painting, I don’t use them; sometimes only "make inquiries." The main thing in creativity is the power of representing the integrity of an image, based on visual memory and impressionability, the ability to generalize ”(“ How I Became an Artist ”- M: Glavyskusstvo, 1929). Vasnetsov demanded clarity in composition, clarity in drawing, fidelity to convey the general tone, color, and a detailed study of the foreground from his students. With special perseverance, he demanded the impression of space in the landscape. V.A. Filippov followed these precepts of his teacher in his work all his life.


A.M. Vasnetsov was a very kind and sympathetic person, often helped his pupils not only with advice, but also with funds, when he found out that one of the students needed. The artist assigned a special role to his work in the open air in his teaching methodology. In spring and summer, the School of Painting rented a summer house near Moscow, where future landscape painters lived and painted sketches from nature. Many talented artists passed the landscape school in Vasnetsov’s workshop: A. M. Gerasimov, G. V. Gerasimov, V. V. Krainev, A. M. Kuznetsov, V. V. Meshkov, N. B. Terpsikhorov, I. D. Chashnikov, V.A. Filippov, V.F. Shtranikh, B.N. Yakovlev.

When Apollinaris Mikhailovich was forced to leave teaching at the School, Filippov went to the workshop with A.E. Arkhipov. In the works and pedagogical activities of such Russian artists as A. E. Arkhipov, N. A. Kasatkin, D. N. Kardovsky, the traditions of realistic art were invariably preserved.

At the School, Abram Efimovich enjoyed popularity and authority. In his workshop, the largest number of students was listed. A master of color, a painting spot, Arkhipov demanded that his students first of all draw. He made them draw everything, and then only write. Arkhipov's remarks and advice were brief, laconic, but substantial and accurate. He taught to look in kind, first of all, for the most important, character, features of movement, relationship of tones. He did not like to correct the work done by students with his own hand, and he almost never touched any of them. The artist was very careful about the “talent” inherent in each student, which, as he believed, should be helped to develop without exerting pressure on him.

In the workshop of Arkhipov, Vsevolod Andreevich mastered the school of realistic craftsmanship, learned to compose his sketches, learned dense, material, weighty and subject painting, acquired a free, laid-back style of writing - qualities that he improved further on over the years of working from nature. V. A. Filippov used the pedagogical methods of Arkhipov in his future work with young artists, to whom he transferred his experience and knowledge, consulted, and prepared for admission to the Union of Artists.

In 1918, the School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture was transformed into the State Free Art Workshops, then - Higher Art and Technical Workshops - Vhutemas. Continuing to work with A. E. Arkhipov in Vhutemas, Filippov entered the etching workshopV. D. Falileeva.
In 1919, Filippov made one of his farthest business trips - to Bryansk, where he was involved in the work as an artist at the Agitation Department and led the garrison studio and the club of the Red Army. Not only artistic professional qualities were useful here, but also a passion for music. According to the memoirs of Vsevolod Andreevich, he voiced silent films that were shown in the club, playing his improvisations on the piano mounted behind the screen, and watching “from the inside” what is happening on the plot of the movie. It is difficult to imagine now what else Vsevolod Andreevich had not yet to deal with in Bryansk. He organized a club, wrote scenery and made a props for the theater, headed the library and the school for literacy, replaced the missing drummer in the orchestra, etc. But this work of the “director and taper” did not last long - a serious lung disease forced Filippov to leave Bryansk.

Returning to Moscow and recovering from a serious illness, Filippov returned to the graphic workshop of Vhutemas. The director of the workshop, V. D. Falileev, was the third artist after A. M. Vasnetsov and A. E. Arkhipov, to whom Vsevolod Andreevich owed his education. Falileev’s teaching method was to familiarize students with the previous art culture and teach them all kinds of techniques and techniques of graphic art, so that later, when their own artistic ideals are formed and formed, they can easily use the “technical” side of graphics in their individual work.

The school of Falileev owes Filippov a huge and versatile artistic erudition. Under the leadership of Falileev, Filippov studied all types of engraving techniques: aquatint, soft varnish, etching, lithography, woodcut, linocut. This school of graphics was later reflected not only in graphic work, but also in the methods of painting by Filippov.

From the beginning of the 1920s, Filippov began to systematically work in the printing industry. In those years, various publications began to appear, for the most part they were very cheap books and magazines for the general public. Masters of pre-revolutionary art — M.V. Dobuzhinsky, D.I. Mitrokhin, B. M. Kustodiev — continued to work in book graphics, and at the same time, the creative face of the young artists of the book was developing, among them were N. V. Ilyin, I. F. Rerberg, A. D. Goncharov, who created the new Soviet book graphics. Among them was V.A. Filippov.

Cubism, futurism, and indifference settled in the magazine graphics of those years. Representatives of these movements even tried to theoretically substantiate their program in the collection October in a Cube. Suprematist dry geometric ornaments and vignettes, common in those years, were always alien to V.A. Filippov, which consisted of intersecting lines and unconnected geometric figures. Filippov brought to the printing industry a realistic understanding of form, a genuine sense of style, clarity, and, most importantly, he systematically began to introduce motifs of Russian ornament and Russian landscape into his work. Alien to modernist stylization, V. A. Filippov built his fonts, screensavers, and ornaments on a deep study and understanding of the nature of Russian art. A feature of his work is the frequent introduction of the landscape, in which decorative tasks are always closely linked to the desire to convey the national identity of Russian nature.

In the 1920s, Filippov worked on the creation of new fonts and illustrations for Rabochaya Gazeta, magazines Art and Industry, For Industrialization, Worker, Machine Gun, Electricity, World Illustration, Worker "," I want to know everything "," Screen "," On land and at sea "," Evening Moscow "," Physical education and sport "," Murzilka ". For Murzilka, the artist performed many illustrations for children's stories and poems, and the Soviet Sport newspaper is still published with the title of V. A. Filippov. He designed the editions of the Central Administration of Industry, Theakino Publishing House, and the All-Union Book Publishing House. He worked on a poster in the field of promoting cooperation in the city and the village together with V.V. Mayakovsky and made a number of posters for the Moscow Society of Friends of the Air Fleet.

In the 30s, Filippov designed Intourist brochures, packaging for the perfumery and food industries. Among the best graphic works of the artist is the design of the book editions of “Muzgiz”. Filippov created a number of covers for the notes of his favorite composers: Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Lyadov, Scriabin and to the works of Soviet composers. Here, the motifs of the Russian folk ornament are widely used, a wonderful unity of decor with a font pattern is achieved, and the dynamics of the combination of letters in words and words among themselves forms a current, monolithic and always uniform form.

Despite the successes achieved by Filippov in design graphics, landscape painting always occupied a central place in his work. Even during the years of the most intensive work in editorial offices and publishing houses, when, according to the memoirs of V.A. Filippov, he had to work at night in order to hand in an urgent order for publication in the morning, the artist had built up time and energy to work on sketches from nature, in nature, under Moscow. Filippov called it "weekend creativity." A modest and demanding artist, he reluctantly, rarely, and rarely exhibited his landscapes. These small paintings and sketches were exhibited at the Moscow School of Painting, at exhibitions of young artists in 1917, at two exhibitions of the Society of Artists of the Moscow School, at the 48th traveling exhibition and at the exhibitions of the Russian Academy of Arts (Association of Artists of Revolutionary Russia), of which the artist became a member 1924 year. In the future, Filippov’s landscape works appeared from time to time at the exhibitions of the All-Artist, at the exhibition Landscape of Our Homeland, which opened at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War (1941), at exhibitions of the Moscow Artists Union.

Creating full feelings and moods of the picture of his native places, Filippov first of all followed the precepts of his beloved poets of Russian nature: I. I. Levitan, S. Yu. Zhukovsky, A. S. Stepanov, V. K. Bialynitsky-Birul. At the same time, as a student of the Moscow school, Filippov did not stand aside from coloristic searches that noted the true and subtle landscape art of K. A. Korovin and A. E. Arkhipov.

In the landscape works of Filippov, the first thing that attracts attention is the wide observation of nature, which prompts the artist to always have a fresh and peculiar solution to sketches, a variety of motifs, artistic techniques, and picturesque combinations. Moreover, almost all of his landscapes were painted near three villages near Moscow: early, until 1925, in the vicinity of Krekshino, in the Nara region, from 1925 to 1941, in the village of Papushevo near Zvenigorod, after the Great Patriotic War, near Naro-Fominsk, near Aleksandrovka village. Filippov painted his last landscapes in the late 1950s - 1960s in the village of Artists near Volokolamsk, in the country. Vsevolod Andreevich did not like to paint landscapes of places he knew little, where, in his expression, he "badly felt nature."

Filippov’s landscape art can mainly be called lyrical. However, the artist did not have once and for all acquired attitude to nature, did not impose his own mood on her. Each time Filippov in the landscape discovered a new one, never tired of wondering and admiring the diverse life of nature, its colors. At the same time, the artist approached nature creatively and always composed his sketches: he omitted certain objects that were in front of his eyes, but did not express his intentions, emphasized others, modified the third. Achieving a single color sound, the artist did not literally reproduce the colors of nature, he enhanced one color at the expense of another, softened a sharp-sounding tone. A deep understanding of the life of nature and artistic generalization always remains in the landscapes of Filippov.

In addition to chamber landscapes and sketches from nature, Filippov worked on a decorative landscape.

In the postwar years, Filippov created a number of paintings in which he posed monumental tasks. These landscapes were completely composed by the artist, only the details were painted from nature, and the rest - thanks to the absolute visual memory. Knowing exactly how, in one case or another, the sun's rays fall on the earth, how the greenery of trees changes during the summer, how the clouds swirl above the earth, and much, much more, and also easily preserving the image of nature once seen in his memory, Filippov “freely owned the landscape. " When comparing his large landscapes, paintings with field studies, one can see a significant difference both in the means of expression and in the artist's methods of work.

Unlike easel painting, there is no desire in Filippov’s panel landscapes to create the illusion of space, depth, and material tangibility of objects. The color of decorative painting is somewhat extinguished, without sharp color comparisons and contrasts, built on the strength of the tone, emphasizes the plane. In contrast to the delicate writing of sketches, where each brush stroke is expressive in itself, decorative landscapes are painted widely and freely, sometimes preserving the texture of a primed canvas and transparent glaze over the initial preparatory drawing with charcoal. In Filippov’s decorative landscapes, the same real image of nature, the same poetic content, as in studies, but everything sounds a little more muffled in color, more generalized in drawing, and at the same time more significant and stronger. “The painting of the panel should not excite, aggravate the feelings of the viewer, but, on the contrary, calm and harmonize” - this is how Philippi defined the purpose of his decorative landscapes.

The second "creative trip" by Vsevolod Andreevich took place at the very end of the war, in 1945 - 1947, and already from the Union of Artists. Filippov had to collect and artistically draw up materials about the battle for Naro-Fominsk, and this began the summer life of the artist’s family in this area. The cottage was filmed in Aleksandrovka, the local peasant Semyon Pavlovich Muravyov, who survived that battle, was a storyteller and guide to the places of battles. And Vsevolod Andreevich with a sketchbook and a folder traveled through fields and forests that had not yet been cleared, and he witnessed a real “echo of war” when both people and domestic animals died from the explosions. However, he himself survived and recorded on the paper and cardboard fresh still trenches, dugouts, dugouts, destroyed houses, a panorama of the war-crippled Naro-Fominsk. Based on these materials and impressions, an album of drawings and watercolors “On the places of battles for Naro-Fominsk” was born, which documented the location of defensive structures, the battlefield, and the graves of the fallen, and monuments to Soviet units and formations that held the front here and threw back the enemy . This material is for the history of the Great Patriotic War, and also a kind of monument raised by the artist to the heroes who fell for the freedom and independence of our country.



Filippov exhibited his historical compositions at exhibitions at the School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, at the last 48th exhibition of the Wanderers (1923), then at the exhibitions of the Russian Academy of Arts, the All-Artist, Moscow Art Theater.

The methods and techniques of painting in the compositions of Vsevolod Andreevich differ from those used by the artists K. F. Yuon, N. M. Chernyshov, F. D. Konstantinov and others who created architectural and historical landscapes. As a rule, Filippov did not use nature, did not reproduce specific monuments of antiquity. The artist studied the designs of ancient architecture, the purpose and role of structures, the culture and life of the Russian people, and through artistic generalization he created compelling historical images. Ancient buildings live in small paintings, watercolors and drawings of their own special, harsh, stressful life, and one cannot but believe in reality, just as it is impossible not to believe in the wonderful poetic Russian landscape surrounding the architecture.

One of Filippov's favorite compositional techniques is a high point of view, sometimes from a bird's eye view. It makes it possible to simultaneously show both the wide panorama of the city surrounded by forests and the rivers that go into the distance, and look into the fortress walls, into the very thick of narrow streets filled with movement and life.
In the works of Filippov, the severe simplicity of ancient life strikes, where everything speaks of a difficult struggle for existence with the unconquered nature, with enemies besieging Russian cities. They contain Russian land, such as it looked in bygone days, when the forces of the Russian people were united, a Russian national character took shape.

Of several hundred drawings and watercolors on historical topics, a significant part of graphic and decorative-graphic works by Filippov was included in the album “Old Russian Architecture” prepared by the artist for publication. This album was the result of all the versatile experience of Filippov as an artist-decorator, polygraphist-graphic designer, painter and graphic artist, master of historical painting and soulful landscape painter.

In the best landscapes and historical compositions, Filippov created truly epic images of Russian nature and ancient Russian cities, close to Russian folklore. These paintings and drawings resemble fabulous messengers from bygone times. Vsevolod Andreevich Filippov was also a storyteller. His imagination, knowledge, skill, love for his native land reproduced for us the pictures of bygone Russia.

After the first solo exhibition of V. A. Filippov, his monograph was published by the publishing house "Soviet Artist" in 1957. All design, "design" of the book was made by Filippov himself. The author of the introductory article, art critic Alexandra Mikhailovna Amshinskaya, knew Vsevolod Andreevich well, wrote down memoirs about the events of his life and career, and gave his assessments of his works. This publication (in addition to articles about V. A. Filippov in newspapers and magazines: “Moscow Artist”, “Art”, “Soviet Culture”, “Moscow Truth”, etc.) is the only publication of the artistic heritage of Vsevolod Andreevich to date. After the first exhibition, the leadership of MOSH decided to print the album “Old Russian Architecture”, and it was even accepted into one of the art publishers, but lay there for several years, and only by fortunate accident did not die at all - the artist’s daughter M.V. Konstantinova tracked him down in the archive and "rescued" back home. The same fate, apparently, was waiting for the album “In the places of battles for Naro-Fominsk”, so they simply did not give it away. “They nominated” V. A. Filippov to receive the title “Honored Worker of Arts of the RSFSR” in 1957, and to corresponding members of the Academy of Arts of the USSR in 1958. They collected a lot of references, documents, recommendations, reviews, and reprinted in a large number of copies . Everything sank into the eternal abyss of bureaucratic procedure.

The second solo exhibition was being prepared in a hurry - the artist was already seriously ill, and passed away. This exhibition did not produce any result other than the official “help” —the purchase by the RSFSR Art Fund of several paintings (that disappeared from the storerooms and never saw the light of day).

Vsevolod Andreevich did not receive titles, positions, and awards, and did not achieve them. He was a dreamer, and dreamed with a pencil and a brush in his hands all his life.