Russian school circa 1880. A bay in Crimea, Feodosia in the moonlight.

Ivan Aivazovsky (1817-1900) entourage. The bay of Feodosia in the moonlight around 1880.

Canvas 95 cm by 67.5 cm
Frame measuring 109 cm by 82 cm.

This superb canvas from the Russian school around 1880 reproduces with numerous variations the painting painted by Aivazovski in 1875 (sold by Christie's in 2008 for approximately €350,000). We are in southern Crimea, in Feodosia, on a full moon evening. Note the traces of signature (illegible) at the bottom left. Perhaps a work by the other great Russian painter, Alexei Bogolioubov with whom he collaborated from 1853 within the navy.

Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky (1817-1900)

Born into an Armenian family on July 17, 1817, the young artist grew up in the port of Feodosia, on the Black Sea. Young Aivazovsky began working in local cafes to help support the family at a young age after the setbacks of the family business. Despite the poverty of his childhood, Aivazovsky seems to demonstrate a facility not only for language, just like his father who spoke several Middle Eastern languages, but also for music and drawing. Aivazovsky is sent to high school in Simferopol, one of the largest cities in Crimea. There he showed great promise in the field of art, and in 1833, at the age of sixteen, he was admitted to the Russian Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg. Aivazovsky focused his studies on landscape painting in particular, under the direction of Maxim Nikiforovich Vorobyov who headed the Academy's landscape workshop.
At the age of 19, he participated for the first time in training exercises for the Russian naval fleet in the Baltic Sea. One of his instructors, the painter Alexander Ivanovtich Sauerweid, suggested that he gain direct experience of marine painting, and the artist's fascination with this genre was born.
In the same year, Aivazovsky received a first gold medal for calm in the Gulf of Finland and the great roads of Kronstadt. This meant that he could benefit from financial support to study in Rome, but he did not do so and preferred to spend the next two years in Feodosia learning to paint the seascapes of his native Crimea. This period saw him painting throughout the Crimean peninsula and in the port towns of the Black Sea, and going to sea three times with the Russian navy to participate in training exercises and of course to draw extensively.
In 1840, Saint Petersburg then Rome where he quickly became part of the city's artistic community. His career as a successful marine painter also took shape there, with his work frequently featured in Italian exhibitions.
Although still a young artist, Aivazovsky asserted himself more and more with his own style, the painting representing The Bay of Naples on a moonlit night was praised by the English master of landscape painting, J. M. W. Turner who saw him in Rome.
Numerous trips across Europe followed and an abundant and much appreciated production. His 1843 submission to the Paris Salon earned him a new gold medal which would be followed by a Legion of Honor in 1857.
What distinguished Aivazovsky's paintings was not only his impeccable technique, but also his compelling emotional depictions of nature scenes. His method was based on his ability to draw quickly and frequently with pencil, then create his final paintings through his memory of the scenes. He is said to have explained his method as follows: "The movement of the elements cannot be directly captured by the brush: it is impossible to paint a flash of lightning, a gust of wind or the lapping of a wave directly from nature, to this the artist must remember. »
Aivazovsky returned to Saint Petersburg where he received the title of academician and his appointment as "Painter of the General Staff of the Ministry of the Navy", a position which allowed him to sail with the Russian fleet, and thus to paint works that will bring him glory and fortune.
Despite numerous trips, Feodosia remains Aivazovsky's home. He returned there permanently in 1846 and built his house and a workshop which would serve as his home for the rest of his life. That same year, the city paid tribute to him with an exhibition of his paintings; the following year, in 1847, he was promoted to the rank of professor at the Russian Academy of Arts in Saint Petersburg; and in 1848 he organized his first exhibition in Moscow.
In the decade after the end of the Crimean War, Aivazovsky turned inland to paint images of the Ukrainian countryside that he so often observed during his travels between Feodosia and St. Petersburg . The vast plains provided the artist with an opportunity to explore the aesthetic of realism that was beginning to emerge in Russian artistic circles.
He was a leader in his community. He opened an art school in his own workshop in 1865, and six years later he built the Feodosia Historical and Archaeological Museum. He also supplied water to the city from his own estate and helped establish the first commercial port facilities in the harbor. Today, the Aivazovsky Art Gallery remains a central attraction of the city. He died on April 19, 1900.