Paintings of Ciurlionis - music in colors

This man was released the fate of incomplete 36 years of life. They passed, filled with almost non-stopping creative work, and its legacy is voluminous. The paintings of Ciurlionis and his musical works are so original that they hardly made it to recognition even at home, but decades later life-long fame turned into world fame.

National roots

In 1875 in the south of Lithuania, in the town of Orans, there lived a family of a church organist named Ciurlionis. Mikalojus Konstantinas - so named the son of his son born in the autumn of that year. In the life of the future artist and composer, music entered very early. He liked to listen to the game of his father on the organ, he was fascinated by Lithuanian folk tunes performed by his mother. By the age of 10, he often replaced his father as an organist at the festive services and was accepted to study at the orchestra school.

At the age of 18 he entered the Warsaw Conservatoire - first at the piano department, and then in the composition class. This period of life was filled to the brim with a wide variety of creative pursuits: he played and composed music, was carried away by drawing and reading philosophical works.

Notes and Paint

Ciurlionis continued his musical education in Leipzig, but gradually he comes to the fine arts as a more powerful way of expressing the artistic images that filled him . Born Ciurlionis-artist, he again becomes a student - attends the Warsaw School of Fine Arts, where he studies painting and graphics. There a little time was devoted to studying the linear perspective , etc., greater importance was attached to fantasy and freedom of expression.

At that time in Europe there were few painters, professionally engaged in music, and composers who participated in art vernissages. Ciurlionis' paintings are full of music, and his symphonic compositions evoke in the audience bright and clear visual images of nature and the surrounding world. It is no coincidence that his symphonic poems and paintings are called the same: "The Sea", "In the Forest", etc.

Homecoming

All his short life he worked frantically, being afraid not to be in time. Creativity Ciurlionis - the search for answers to eternal questions on the verge of the earthly and heavenly. It was the master's best when he lived and worked at home - in Vilnius and Druskininkai.

Native land of the artist - Dzukia, or Dainava - wooded areas of southern Lithuania. There remains a distinctive national culture, where Christian Catholic introductions have lain on the pagan traditions of the way of life and the idea of the world.

Here he writes landscapes in the open air and large-scale works on philosophical themes. The paintings of Ciurlionis are full of a vague and undecided, this is an obvious deification of nature, the creation of new worlds of universal scale. "The Tale of the Kings", "The Legend of the Black Sun", "The Horseman over the City" - in these works pagan symbols of folk legends and legends reign. "Creation of the World", "Eternity" - whole cycles of worldviews gave rise to the birth of the term "cosmism" in describing the work of Ciurlionis.

Recognition in the capital

Contemporaries describe the light, positive nature of the artist, his easy and benevolent character. But in matters of creativity, Ciurlionis did not know any compromises, he did not know how to adapt to the generally accepted tastes. Therefore, the non-recognition of his paintings at the first Lithuanian art exhibition could not make him write more familiar pictures. On the contrary, he sharply reacts to requests to clarify the meaning of his works, is surprised at the unwillingness of the inhabitants to spend efforts for spiritual development, for a new and interesting movement.

In 1906, at an exhibition of graduates of the Warsaw School of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg, Ciurlionis' paintings produce a furore. Fantastic stories and extraordinary picturesque manner find a strong response both from the artistic elite and from ordinary art lovers.

Legendary masters of Russia at the beginning of the century: Dobuzhinsky, Benoit, Somov, Bakst, Lansere - know the name of Ciurlionis, many get acquainted with him personally, he is invited to participate in exhibitions. Attract obvious national features in his work and his inherent spirituality of a huge scale.

Life is like a flash of lightning

He works without rest, he tackles immense depths in the depths, participates in public life in Lithuania and throughout Russia. There are new musical compositions, graphic and pictorial cycles, artistic and journalistic texts. And the strength is not enough. By the spring of 1910, the mental state of Čiurlionis inspired anxious relatives and friends.

Disappointment and fear become the dominant in creativity and communication with the world. It took the efforts of relatives and patrons to place Ciurlionis in the clinic, where doctors tried to defeat the growing depression. But when recovery began to seem real, in April 1911 Ciurlionis received a severe cold and died of pneumonia.

Top of Ciurlionis

Immediately after the death of the master, a wave of interest to the amazing world of the brilliant Lithuanian rose. And this wave does not subside - his creative work is too extraordinary. The synthesis of music and painting for connoisseurs and art lovers all over the world is called Ciurlionis. Mikalojus Konstantinas - the sacred name for Lithuania - is considered the first Lithuanian professional composer, the history of national art exhibitions begins with it.

Creativity of the master does not lend itself to unambiguous formulations of art critics of many countries, it causes controversy for every new generation, and the Ciurlionis Museum in Kaunas is never empty.