The biography of Mikhail Aleksandrovich Vrubel is a tangle of genius talent, outstanding works of various types of fine art, non-recognition, blows of fate, loss, moments of hope and happiness, an eccentric personality, instantly flared love, a terrible family tragedy, catastrophic illness and death. And life after life: the eternal memory of him and admiration for his masterpieces.
Ancestors of Mikhail Aleksandrovich Vrubel abroad and in the Russian Empire
Vrubel's distant roots lie outside of Russia. Mikhail's great-grandfather, Anton Antonovich, was the first Vrubel to become a citizen of the Russian Empire. He served as a judge in Bialystok, a Polish city that was part of East Prussia. In 1807, according to the Peace of Tilsit, Bialystok was transferred to Russia and became the center of the Bialystok district of the Grodno region.
His son Mikhail Antonovich, the artist's namesake and grandfather, became the first Russian nobleman of this kind. He was in the military and on duty ended up in the Astrakhan province. Here one of his sons, Alexander Mikhailovich, also an officer, married Anna Grigorievna Basargina, daughter of the Astrakhan governor. The bride was from a more aristocratic and noble family, the origins of which go back to the Horde and Danish ancestors.
Vrubel's childhood
The future parents of the artist Alexander Mikhailovich and Anna Grigorievna got married in Astrakhan. But Mikhail was born in Siberia at the place of his father's new service in the city of Omsk on March 17, 1856. He was the second child of four, whom Anna gave birth to in 6 years. Misha was only 3 years old when his mother died. The father was transferred back to Astrakhan, closer to relatives who could help with the care of young children.
Such a bitter beginning of Vrubel's life seemed to set the tone for everything that followed. In addition, from birth he was of poor health, and by nature a quiet, taciturn and thoughtful child. At the age of seven he received the domestic nickname "the silent man and the philosopher." He loved looking at book illustrations. Fortunately, a part of the German library of the Bialystok great-grandfather has been preserved for a long time.
Due to the movement of his father in the service, the family changed their place of residence several times. Astrakhan, Omsk, Saratov, Petersburg, Kharkov, Odessa - moving to some cities was repeated. Vrubel's biography is replete with geographical names since childhood. In 1863, in Kharkov, the children had a stepmother Elizaveta Khristianovna Wessel. According to the recollections of his sister Anna, seven-year-old Mikhail was fascinated by the sounds of music while playing Elizaveta Khristianovna, who was a good pianist.
Education and the place of painting in the childhood and youth biography of Mikhail Vrubel
At first, drawing attracted Mikhail on the same level as other arts. Abilities were manifested, but a particularly ardent desire to only paint in the child was not observed.
In Saratov, since 1864, the boy received primary education lessons from the political exiled Nikolai Peskov. He took Misha to study natural sciences in nature in the vicinity of the city. And Andrei Sergeevich Godin gave him private lessons in drawing from nature.
The elder sister Anna recalled her brother: "He sketched scenes from family life with great vividness." In 1865, an amazing event happened to him:
With the move of the Vrubel family to St. Petersburg in 1867, Misha began his studies at the Fifth Gymnasium and the Drawing School of the Society for the Encouragement of Artists.
In 1870, another move to the place of his father's new appointment. This time to southern Odessa. Mikhail continued his general education at the Richelieu Lyceum. And art in the Odessa drawing school. He studied successfully everywhere, was fond of theater, reading Latin classics, music.
1874 - the year of graduation from the gymnasium with a gold medal. Then the family moved from Odessa to Vilno. And Mikhail entered the law faculty of St. Petersburg University. In the evenings he studies in the classes of the Academy of Arts. Graduated from university in January 1880.
Finally, at the age of 24, the future brilliant painter switched from amateur painting to professional training: in the fall of 1880, Mikhail Vrubel entered the Academy of Arts. He gets to Pavel Chistyakov, who has his own method of creating volume on the canvas, just like architects do. On Sundays, Vrubel takes watercolor lessons from Ilya Repin.
The Kiev-Italian stage in the biography of Vrubel
Art critic Professor Adrian Prakhov needed a specialist for art work to restore the Church of St. Cyril. Pavel Chistyakov offers Vrubel. And he went to Kiev in 1884, where an important stage begins not only in his biography as an artist, but also in his personal life. According to some contemporaries, he was in love with the wife of his customer, Emilia Lvovna Prakhova.
It is believed that she became the prototype of the icon "The Mother of God and the Child" for the altar of the Church of St. Cyril. And when Vrubel leaves for Italy to study medieval mosaics and painting of the early Renaissance, there is an active correspondence between them, which, at the request of Emilia, was destroyed by her daughter Olga, as evidenced by her granddaughter Prakhova.
In Venice, Vrubel painted three icons - "St. Cyril", "St. Athanasius" and "Christ the Savior".
In April 1885, Vrubel returned from Italy, and in May he left for Odessa. However, at the end of the year he returned to Kiev. He works actively, but lives in poverty, largely due to his inability to manage his money sensibly.
Creativity and Demons of Vrubel
In 1889, Mikhail Vrubel came to Moscow. Here he met the industrialist and generous philanthropist Savva Mamontov and became a member of his circle of artists in Abramtsevo.
He creates panels, designs operas, does majolica, paints, illustrates works of literature. Participates in the illustration of the anniversary two-volume edition of Lermontov, incl. makes drawings for the poem "The Demon". Reviewers mercilessly criticized Vrubel's illustrations.
But in the end, the Demon becomes the main theme in his work. In 1890 he created The Demon Sitting, and in 1902 The Demon Defeated. The artist did not complete the Flying Demon.
A demon in the usual sense is some kind of supernatural and evil force. But Vrubel saw in him a suffering human spirit, overwhelmed by thoughts and torn by passions, existing between heaven and earth.
In 1896, at the request of Savva Mamontov, Mikhail Vrubel performed two panels for the All-Russian Industrial and Art Exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod: Mikula Selyaninovich and Princess Dream. But they were harshly criticized by the professors of the Academy of Arts, and both panels were removed from the exhibition, and the artist was persecuted. The enterprising Mamontov built his own pavilion and exhibited Vrubel's huge canvases in them. They enjoyed great public interest, and Vrubel's name became widely known.
Love and family drama of Mikhail Vrubel
Vrubel was almost 40 years old when he was visited by deep and instant love. At first he was captivated by an unfamiliar beautiful voice. He rushed to its sound when he heard it at a rehearsal of the opera at the Panayevsky Theater in St. Petersburg. So he met his future wife, opera singer Nadezhda Zabela. This love was mutual. They were married on July 28, 1896 in Geneva. The wife became his ideal, muse, heroine of his works and devoted companion to the end of his days.
On September 1, 1901, their son Savva was born, and Nadezhda Zabela left the stage. The material well-being of the family fell heavily on Vrubel's shoulders. It was difficult for him to get his daily bread. He was nervous, worried, afraid that he would not be able to provide for his family, suffered from neurosis and insomnia. But the main suffering was that the boy was born with a defect in the face. Savvushka had a "hare lip" and Vrubel believed that it was his fault. Punishment for his sins. It threw him off balance and maddened. Increasingly, he behaved inappropriately.
The extinction and death of Vrubel
He worked obsessively on Demon Defeated. He graduated in 1902. And in the same year he ended up in a psychiatric hospital. Psychiatrist Vladimir Bekhterov gave Vrubel a disappointing diagnosis.
Vrubel's friend Vladimir von Meck invited them to rest and gain strength in his estate in the Kiev province for the whole summer. With their little son, they went on a trip. There they lost their only son. On May 3, 1903, the beloved Savvushka dies hastily from croupous pneumonia.
The mental extinction of Mikhail Vrubel is accelerating. He spends a lot of time in hospitals. Lives in a world of delirium and hallucinations. And in moments of enlightenment, he tries to write. During this difficult period, he was able to create his masterpiece "Rose in a Glass", wrote "Six-Winged Seraphim", "Pearl". But he could not finish the portrait of the poet Valery Bryusov. By the end of 1905, the painter quickly began to go blind.
He spent the last few years of his life in a psychiatric hospital. His wife Nadezhda and older sister Anna took care of him to the end.
Mikhail Alexandrovich died on April 14, 1910.
On July 4, 1913, Nadezhda Vrubel-Zabela passed away.
They rest nearby at the Novodevichy Cemetery in St. Petersburg.
Life after life
Vrubel wrote over 200 works. In 1995, in the homeland of Mikhail Aleksandrovich Vrubel, the Omsk State Museum of Fine Arts was named after him.
