Aristarkh Vasilevich Lentulov

Acquired directly from the daughter of the artist, Maria Lentulova in 1982
Private Collection, Lithuania from 1987
Semenov Collection, Moscow

Esslingen, Villa-Merkel, Russian Art of the Twentieth Century from the Semenov Collection, 1984
Moscow, Galereya nashi khudozhniki, 'Vystavka kartin iz chastnykh sobranii pamyati Solomona Shustera 1934-1995, 22 September - 30 October 2005, no.20

M.Lentulova, Khudozhnik Aristarkh Lentulov, Moskva: Sovetskii khudozhnik, 1969, p.131 listed under the works for 1909

Weiss, Evelyn et al, Russische Kunst des Zwanzigsten Jahrhunderts: Sammlung Semjonow, Stuttgart, 1984, p.59
Exhibition catalogue Vystavka kartin iz chastnykh sobranii pamyati Solomona Shustera 1934-1995, Moscow: Trilistnik, 2005, p. 46-47, no.20 (illustrated)

 

Structural Condition The canvas would appear to be just strip-lined and is providing a stable and secure structural support. Paint surface The paint surface has a reasonably even if rather discoloured varnish layer and cleaning could certainly be considered. Inspection under ultra-violet light shows a number of retouchings, all of which have clearly been crudely applied and should they be removed would be found to be excessive. I would be confident that the amount of retouching on the paint surface could be considerably reduced if the painting was cleaned and more carefully retouched. The most significant retouchings are: 1) in the 4 decorative spandrels in the corners of the composition, 2) in the green foliage in the centre of the composition, and 3) 3 lines on and next to the standing woman in the centre of the composition. There are other scattered retouchings. Summary The painting would therefore appear to be in reasonably good and certainly stable condition with the potential to reduce the amount of retouching on the paint surface.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

 

One of the luminaries of the famous Jack of Diamonds exhibiting group, Aristarkh Lentulov distinguished himself from the co-founders of the organisation, Petr Konchalovsky and Mikhail Larionov, by his passion for stylistic experimentation. This striking and monumental composition is exemplary of Lentulov's vision at its most innovative.

 

Lentulov's determination to go against the staid teaching methods of the provinces motivated him to move after finishing his studies in Penza, first to Kiev in 1903 and then to St. Petersburg in 1906. Every exhibition in which he participated sent his work in a new artistic direction, as he would align himself with the newly discovered styles of his contemporaries.

 

"Even then I was already full of new trends under the influence of Vrubel, Malyavin and others, striving to find my own response to these new trends through experiments on nature with light and colour" (A.Lentulov, Unpublished Memoirs cited in M.Lentulova, Khudozhnik Aristarkh Lentulov, Moskva: Sovetskii khudozhnik, 1969, p.15)

 

Lentulov's move to Moscow following his marriage to Maria Petrovna Rukina in 1908 is reflected by a much bolder style and vibrant palette. Dating from a pivotal period in Aristarkh Lentulov's oeuvre, The Bathers belongs to a series of canvases executed during the summer of 1909 which the artist spent painting en plein air in the Crimea and stands as a eulogy to the artist's love of colour and light. As Lentulov recalled in his memoirs,

           

I had a passion for sunshine and bright light since birth. I sensed the contrast between light and shadow, the blackness of the shadow against the pure colour of light.

 

Lentulov's choice of subject underscores the influence of the Fauves, in particular Gauguin and Matisse, whose painting Le Bonheur de vivre, 1905-6 can be compared directly to the offered lot (fig.1). Lentulov's composition is similarly characterised by a spontaneity and roughness of execution, and the artist seems to revel in the complex colour harmonies achieved by transferring raw colours from the palette directly onto the canvas. He mirrors this untamed technique with the feral nature of the landscape, which is populated by wild and voluptuous women. Unlike his previous compositions, where bathers are pictured beneath colourful umbrellas, or wearing brightly-hued summer attire, here there is no marker of civilisation.

 

Lentulov further distorts his composition by depicting the central image as if it were executed on a plate hanging against a pattered wall, incorporating both the Blue Rose approach to the canvas as a decorative panel as well as the folkloric elements he would have seen in the canvases of his fellow Jack of Diamonds artists Larionov and Goncharova.

 

As the scholar Elena Murina has argued, Lentulov seems to present Matisse's vision but through the eyes of an Expressionist. Given that the movement had only just appeared in Germany, it serves to highlight Lentulov's unique role as the leading visionary of the Russian avant garde. With its sexually overt subject, The Bathers reveals a modernism one would expect to find in the work of Die Brücke, whose depictions of anti-bourgeois nudist cults shocked the contemporary public (fig.2).