Portrait of Chaliapin (Kustodiev painting)

Portrait of Shalyapin is the painting of Boris Kustodiev. This painting was created in 1921 in Petrograd (St. Petersburg).^[1][2][3]

At this time Feodor Chaliapin was prepared for opera The Power of the Fiend (ru: «Вражья force») of A. Serov in the former Mariinsky theatre. He decided to invite Boris Kustodiev for artist of performance.

The time was hard: devastation took place after the revolution led to hunger and cold, money was worthless - no goods; but unheated theatres tried to survive - as the whole country.

Feodor Chaliapin got for one of the concerts the luxury of the rich fur coat - theatres didn't have money to pay to singer. And Soviet warehouses were full by things, retrieved from rich people.^[4]

In that coat Chaliapin came to Kustodiev to invite him to design a performance. Kustodiev was sick and couldn't walk.

When Kustodiev learned the coat’s history - stolen from someone rich, - he said that he have to draw a portrait of Chaliapin in this coat.

Thus began a double work: Feodor Chaliapin brought the artist Kustodiev to theatre for work on the decorations and Kustodiev painted a portrait of Chaliapin at home.

The Soviet government has allocated to artist such a small room, that the picture entirely there did not fit, and he painted it in parts. Shalyapin posed talked about himself, and sometimes they sang together, the duo.

«Portrait of Shalyapin» is written in the creative style of Boris Kustodiev - against the background of the festively specifically the Russian city sketches: walks fun-Russian pancake week.

The first title of the picture a New city. The new city is a city where Chaliapin arrived for the first time on tour. Such was the intention of the artist. But that name did not stick. The picture became called the Portrait of Chaliapin.^[3] A picture full of symbolism Chaliapin rises over his people, from which he happens. He is dressed in a nice suit, holding a fashionable at the time cane. Kustodiev painted even a favorite Chaliapin’s dog.^[3] In the lower left corner of the portrait Kustodiev painted daughters Fyodor Chaliapin, Mary and Martha, strolling on the festive square, accompanied by a close friend and secretary of singer I.Dvorictchin (ru: Дворищин) near the theatre poster, a push of F. Shalyapin's concert.^[1][2]

In 1922 Chaliapin took this picture with him from Russia in emigration.^[5]

In the same 1922 Kustodiev made a miniature copy of this portrait. Now this picture is stored in the Russian Museum, St. Petersburg.

References