Schedule. Member of the Union of artists of the USSR.
People's artist of the RSFSR.
(1903, St. Petersburg – 1982, Leningrad)
Soviet painter and graphic artist.
In 1921 he enrolled in the Central artistic and industrial College, where he studied under Vladimir Fyodorovich and Mikhail Avilov.
First professional experience Boris Ermolaev was associated with the work in Leningrad Newspapers and magazines ("Lenin's sparks", "Red panorama", "Cutter"). The artist's first experiences in painting were marked rare sense of monumental form, but the small format of his works reminds of the usual amount of family photos. Early figure compositions Boris Ermolaev – it's kind of portraits, close in style to the provincial portrait, with his usual directness and undisguised posing.
After being seriously wounded in 1943, Boris Yermolayev to painting almost never returned. Created in the late 1940's-early 1950-ies watercolors are straightforward and rough treatment of forms. Working out in the experimental lithographic workshop of the Leningrad Union of artists, Boris Ermolaev creates its own original decorative-plastic system of coloured lithographs.
(1903, St. Petersburg - 1982, Leningrad)
Born in the family of an employee. Art attracted him since childhood, since age fourteen he was drawing constantly. From 1921 to 1925 Ermolaev studied in art-industrial College of V. N. F. and M. I. Avilov. After serving in the army he was engaged in design work and illustration for a number of Newspapers and magazines. In 1928, the artist staged a solo exhibition in the artists ' colony and became a member. He worked on heavy drawing (landscapes, portraits, street scenes), and at the turn of the 1920s and 1930s turned to painting. Ermolaev was "clean" painting in a decade — in the 1930s His art is based on live impressions from the surrounding the artist's life and at the same time, the artist turns to the conventional language of plastic forms that are close to folk art and primitive. Affected organisations in a purely pictorial sense, and Nico Pirosmanashvili whose work he saw at an exhibition in the state Russian Museum in 1930. Throughout his creative way Ermolaev kept clear and calm view of man and nature, optimistic acceptance of life, the ability to see beyond the little things of everyday life picture of the life, the eternal values of life. His first paintings — figured compositions — marked sense of monumentality of form ("the GIRL IN the YELLOW COAT", 1930; "GIRL WITH GUITAR"; "the WOMAN IN BLACK", 1931; "TIME", 1932; "chain of COMMAND", 1934; "the DOCTRINE of SAILORS", 1934). In the mid-1930s, the "sea" theme is displaced from Ermolaeva landscape. Using full-scale sketches, the artist became his main in 1935-1936 greenish, that cover color key wrote the streets of industrial neighborhoods, lively figures of passers-by and cars. In the same brownish-green tones written and street scenes: selling vegetables, localnici, unloading potatoes. As with landscapes, there's inherent in the whole stages of creativity Ermolaeva (and not only in painting) simplicity in the choice of topics - "FRUIT SELLER", 1935; "PROSPECT STACHEK", 1935; "SELLING VEGETABLES", 1936). In 1936-1937 Yermolaev, first came to the South, where the bright colors transformed his palette. There were two series of canvases, as always Ermolaeva small in size, dedicated to the village of Aksay near Rostov-on-don and Berdichev. Purity red, blue, lemon yellow colors that are dominant in the Aksai landscapes, almost a lurid interpretation of the houses with high porches and roofs, before which, frankly posing, are "in the foreground" the villagers, the frontal flatness of the composition indicate a deliberate appeal to the artist's tradition of a truly popular art "YELLOW HOUSE", 1937; "TEATIME ON the BALCONY", 1937.
In 1939-1948, the artist tried to find a new creative way. They were written — tight and bright — a number of rural landscapes and portraits, which clearly felt the impact of van Gogh's art. The great Patriotic war interrupted the work of the artist. After being wounded and returning from the front, Yermolayev worked on watercolors, and later used colored pencils. He wrote not from life but from memory and small sketches. However, the main for the artist in this period of creativity was a color lithograph, a first-class master of which was Yermolaev in 1950-1970-x (cycles "Village", "Russian girls", "Youth", "Friends", "Family", "Motherhood", "Symbols of life"). In his illustration, the artist not only preserved, but also greatly developed the best qualities of his art — the integrity and optimistic attitude, belief in the possibility of harmony between man and the surrounding world, the desire to bring to the hearts of the audience the belief in the beauty of the work, love, friendship. All this allows to consider Ermolaeva one of the most significant artists of the Leningrad-Petersburg, combining in his work the characteristic features of rigor, clarity, and sensitivity to the beauty of the world.
Literature:
Rusakov Yu. Boris Ermolaev. Exhibition of works. Directory. L., 1980.
