Marc Chagall was born in a Jewish family in Vichebsk, Russia. 2 1 year-old, admitted to St. Petersburg Central Higher School of Arts and Crafts, but failed. He studied in Leon Baxter's studio and has a modern artistic tendency.
At the age of 23, he went to Paris, where he participated in the activities of cubist painters and became a member of Paris painting schools such as Modigliani and Sudin. In a short time, he accepted and integrated the artistic essence of Van Gogh, Fauvism and Cubism.
19 14 War broke out, and he returned to Russia to be drafted into the army. 19 15 married Bella, and then he had a new understanding of the tragic reality. When the Russian Revolution broke out, Luna Tsarski, who was in charge of ideology by the new regime, was appointed as an art committee member in his hometown. During this period, he actively planned to establish an art academy and an art museum. After all, he is a painter with modern artistic concept. He did not adapt to the new regime and returned to Paris on 1922. In the turbulent years of war and racial persecution, Xia Jiaer introduced tragic, social and religious materials into his works. He immigrated to the United States during World War II, and when his wife died, his strong memories of the past and more distant times ran through his works. After World War II, Xia Jiaer became an active artist in the field of western painting, and went back and forth to other countries to engage in creation and activities.
Her silence belongs to me and her eyes belong to me. I hit it off immediately with her. She knows my childhood, my present and my future. It's like she keeps staring at me and can see through the deepest part of my soul ... I know she is my other half ... "(quoted from Xia Jiaer's My Life, London, 2065,438+03, p. 77).
Xia Jiaer's contribution to modern art is very important. Brayton, a modern art theorist, pointed out that from 19 1 1, his art overthrew the obstacles of similar composition and regularity. In fact, at the turning point of many new paintings, people have met his art. He looks so special and lasting, but he obeys the most popular research with extremely positive instinct and gives them solutions.
Sometimes, money doesn't make people more popular. 1985, Marc Chagall died at the age of 97. He has been a gifted scholar appreciated by suburban residents all his life. Modernism in his works has no tears, is not as troublesome as cubism, and is not as castles in the air as abstraction. For those middle-class Jews, Marc Chagall described the world in which their ancestors lived, while Marc Chagall had a poetic temperament in that lost and charming world. In 1960s, the birth of "The Violinist on the Roof" marked that Marc Chagall's creation reached a new height. His popularity has also reached its peak among the general public. However, for a long time, Xia Jiaer has not been paid enough attention in the art world, and he is only regarded as a mediocre modernist artist, blindly pursuing trite sensational techniques, affectation and vulgar art
So, can Marc Chagall's reputation last forever? The answer is yes. The exhibition of Marc Chagall's life works held in San Francisco fully touched the senses of the audience, reminding people that Xia Jiaer's best works have great influence, and their artistic brilliance will not be concealed by his later works. Is there too much mediocrity in Xia Jiaer's works? That's right. But he is also a great and creative artist. His works can be as pleasing as any of Bonaire's works, or as creative as the twisted curves in Miro's works.
In his life, his hometown Vitebsk has always been crucial. His parents are Yiddish-speaking Hasidic Jews. Their sects have rich cultural traditions, strong mysticism and religious color, which are fully reflected in their works. At the age of 35, Xia Jiaer wrote that lovely but not completely true autobiography My Life. Xia Jiaer spent a lot of time recalling his father's house and describing his sister's innocence and uncle's eccentricity. Nak transports livestock in a bumpy van and plays the violin. Sisi is a barber with a perm moustache. In grandpa's house, the skins of livestock hang like clothes. The themes displayed in these ancient paintings were moved many times, and finally his art was born. He remembers that the whole family used canvas to protect the wooden floor of the room. "My sister thinks," he said, "it's very convenient to spread the floor with canvas. 」
Xia Jiaer has other ideas. For him, the lover in the work must be able to fly, the cow can hang upside down in the air, and logic and gravity give way to the chaotic beauty brought by fantasy. In his works, he also created a quiet world: human beings and wild animals live in a mysterious harmony, so the mixture of human nature and * * * is as strange and familiar as Ovid's works.
In 1990s, the surrealist school tried to recommend Xia Jiaer as the pioneer of their school. Xia Jiaer refused. Xia Jiaer does not agree with the surrealist school to regard the following consciousness, dreams and instinct as its creative source. His artistic thought is that art comes from a complete self, from memory and from desire. Let the world fly freely under his brush. He has always been the master of his fantasy.
Xia Jiaer is especially good at romantic fantasy. What he talks about most in his works is another major theme besides Jewish life: love, especially his love for Bella. They got married on 19 15. Bella died on 1944. Six years later, Xia Jiaer created Lovers in the Red Sky: a couple flew across the sky together, just like Xia Jiaer and Bella did in many other oil paintings. Those lovers flying in the air are Xia Jiaer's most lovely contribution to the western painting world. They are the secular versions of the great floating image in Christianity, the ascension of Jesus and the ascension of the Virgin Mary.
A trip to Paris
As a Jew living in Christian Europe, Xia Jiaer is doomed to be an outsider. Obviously, he has never felt comfortable in the "ism" in Europe. 19 10, Marc Chagall came to Paris with a small scholarship and lived in the "beehive" apartment on the left bank of the Seine. At this time, Paris, although it can't provide enough food and spacious studios for all young people who admire art like him, has been bathed in several rounds of modern art baptism, and the world disturbed by "lawless" Manet, Monet, Renoir, pissarro, Seurat, Cezanne, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Apollinaire, Matisse and Picasso, although a little crazy, is generous and therefore more colorful.
Xia Jiaer, who first arrived in Paris, not only brought the meager scholarship, but also brought a head full of dreams, love and affection. It was in his hometown, when the hardships of life drove him to climb to the roof and sit down, overlooking the town where he was born and raised, thinking about all kinds of gifts that life gave him. Although lonely, he found love and fairy-tale poetic existence. Looking at the dark land and the snow scattered on it, he found himself in love with them; Looking at the low wooden houses and churches with crosses, he found himself in love with them; Looking at the busy people living in those small houses and the roosters, hens, goats and cows strolling in the yard, he found himself in love with them; And uncle Nash and his violin. Although he was often drunk, the sound of the piano was shaking, and he found himself in love with them. It was on that roof that Xia Jiaer gradually forgot the injustice of life, and his heart was filled with more and more love, poetry and hope, until it was summed up in one sentence, that is, at the age of 13, he told his parents: "I want to be a painter. Therefore, when Xia Jiaer, whose heart was full of love, came to Paris, he did not fall into the crazy whirlpool of the times. He is shy and introverted, living in seclusion in the free and open air of Paris. At the same time, he was surprised and encouraged by the unbridled courage and color of the surging modern art.
Here, he is a stranger and one of the 30,000 painters who came to Paris. Xia Jiaer was afraid of being drowned in the crowd. Countless painters suffering from genius mania are desperate, howling, taking drugs, narcissism, struggling and suffering ... Xia Jiaer painted his eyes like a player, and today he appeared in Bahners magazine with a stutter. He may have confidence in himself for a while, but it is inevitable that he will fall into self-doubt in anxiety. It was such a crazy time. Bannas was full of future masters, but Xia Jiaer from Russia seemed so lonely. He kept his distance from schools, not because of his independence, but because of his timidity and fear of being laughed at. He would rather be quietly locked in a ramshackle room and paint naked. For a long time, he didn't dare to show his work to Apollinaire. I passed the door of Valade, an art dealer, several times, but I couldn't make up my mind to enter.
Xia Jiaer's masterpieces in Paris include Motherland, Donkey and others. This strange and beautiful painting is full of the breath of Russian land. That flowering tree is lonely and pure. The milkmaid's head flew, which is said to be for the balance of the picture. She doesn't feel abrupt at all, but has a childish innocence. This painting looks original and automatically generates more compositions. Every time I revisit this painting, there will always be new feelings and new discoveries. He wants to express his gratitude to Paris. Three years after he came to Paris, he painted Paris from the Window, which surprised him at first sight.
Russia: A Journey with Jonathan Dimbleby
19 14 years, Xia Jiaer returned to Russia. I thought I would only stay for a short time, but because of the war and revolution, I was trapped in Russia for 8 years. The former Soviet Union appointed him as the artistic representative of Vitebsk and went to the People's Art School where a large number of pioneers from the former Soviet Union gathered. Xia Jiaer thinks that art schools should accommodate all kinds of art schools, while Malivich has a soft spot for abstract creative techniques. Later, Malivich and his followers launched supremacism and radical modernism, occupying the artistic position of the former Soviet Union. Xia Jiaer left the former Soviet Union on 1922 because he lost confidence in the situation there. Before he left, he created a work "Introduction to Jewish Theatre", which is still preserved in Moscow. This canvas oil painting was used to decorate the 90-seat National Jewish Box Theatre in Moscow. It embodies Xia Jiaer's artistic style: deliberately showing a mixed aesthetic view, with a large number of broad colors originated from supremacism as the background, but only as the background, setting off those non-abstract acrobats and livestock. In the lower right corner of this painting, just above Xia Jiaer's signature, a man directly peed in a pig's eye. Is this a counterattack against Malivich? Some scholars think so.
He came to Paris with Russia and returned to Russia with Paris. After the October Revolution, Xia Jiaer was appointed as the principal of the art school. His art was not understood, and people asked him suspiciously, "Why are cows green?" "Why are horses flying in the sky?" Xia Jiaer gave up painting and devoted himself to school work, only to find that all the people were united against him. * * * also put pressure on his practice. Xia Jiaer felt an unprecedented sense of disillusionment. 1922, Xia Jiaer returned to France. He took refuge in the United States during World War II. Xia Jiaer, who experienced two world wars, repeatedly showed the image of Jesus on canvas with compassionate religious feelings: he was abandoned in a corner of the picture, and no one cared about him. Angels are falling, fish are flying in the sky with scary wings, the pendulum is leaning uneasily to one side, and the rabbi has a desperate expression ... There is deep anger in it, but more helplessness.
What really excites Xia Jiaer is the use of color collocation by post-impressionist painters. Just as Gauguin or Van Gogh are expressive when using colors, they don't care whether the green face in real life is green or not. This changed Xia Jiaer's creative concept. In his works, the whole work appears bright red, dark green or purple. He found something in his mind: "What I described was brought from Russia. They smell of Paris. 」
It was Xia Jiaer who introduced Jewish life to mainstream western art. He preached the glory of his nation through his memory, thus becoming a poet in the Jewish world and Whitman in a small Jewish village. But in his life, the image of Christianity also appears in today's works, such as Those Lovers Fly. He kept going back to the scene where Jesus was crucified, but the crucified Jesus in the painting was just a Jew with a blue square towel around his waist for Jews to pray.
However, despite the dominance of painful scenes, Xia Jiaer continued to create love scenes. Sometimes, he thinks that man is a beast in every way. 1939, he wrote A Midsummer Night's Dream, in which a woman used her blue fan to fend off a guy who burned himself and looked like a goat. Xia Jiaer believes that we are born with * * *, but sometimes we turn animal instinct into good quality.
Xia Jiaer is far away from impressionism, cubism and abstract expressionism, and pursues his motherland and homesickness in loving memories. He wanted to be a poet or a musician, but in the end he became a painter. He found an unusual way with seven fingers. He just expressed his inner feelings in his own way. In his autobiography, he wrote that every time he heard the singer sing the phrase "bride, bride, what will wait for you", he would cry, and then he felt his head floating and went to the kitchen to cry, where there were fish hidden. The kitchen is Xia Jiaer's favorite place. He likes painting in the kitchen. The familiar smell there made him feel warm.
Xia Jiaer's family is an ordinary family at the bottom. His father is a herring porter and brings home the smell of herring with candy every day. In Xia Jiaer's eyes, father is a candle that lights and goes out at the same time. Sensitive and introverted, Xia Jiaer lives his inner life in a roaming way. He likes to sit on the roof overlooking the town. Sitting on the roof, nearby, far away, silver stars burst into the sky. Sitting on a high place, he watched in surprise as the fire spread throughout the city until sparks splashed down the roof of his house. Although he lives at the bottom, he has a sense of rising beyond life and a vague sense of superiority over his sensitivity, loneliness and fantasy. This lonely child, when he was in the crowd in Vitebsk, walking between countless menstruation and his uncle, after all, he didn't know what his future was, but he clearly realized that he was going to live a different life from them.
Xia Jiaer's paintings entered the primitive chaos, where everything was free, unique and unified in the undifferentiated aesthetic feeling. Horses or people flying in the sky, heads down or flying away, green cows, lovers lying in lilacs, too slender human figures, self-portraits with seven fingers holding a palette, and two faces at the same time, Xia Jiaer's works only have fallen love, without specific modeling. When he prayed to God, he changed everything. The masters of art who founded a certain genre are great, and so is Xia Jiaer. He touched another reality of the world with seven fingers. He uses a world language that needs no explanation and is self-evident.
For some people, it is better to have a dream than to realize it. When he has a dream, the dream is always faithful to him. Realizing dreams means all kinds of possibilities, and maybe it means leaving dreams. Xia Jiaer lived in his own dream and let everything float in his dream. Although no one cares about his works, he is unknown in Paris. People think highly of him and think that he is an "excellent color painter", but they don't want to understand his poor and melancholy life and complicated love for this black land of Russia.
Xia Jiaer was also gifted in music and literature, and finally chose painting, which was inevitable in history and accidental in life, but perhaps what attracted him most was the unreality of this fate: Vitebsk didn't even know what a painter was. The unreality of floating led Xia Jiaer to an unknown road. /kloc-When he was 0/3 years old, he bravely told his family that he wanted to be a painter. Perhaps in the eyes of future generations, Xia Jiaer chose painting as a matter of course, but for Xia Jiaer at that time, life was almost infinite; This is the fate I understand when everyone makes the final choice in countless possibilities or without thinking or thinking repeatedly. Fate means the transformation from contingency to inevitability, which means inevitability.
In his later life, he returned to his hometown Vitebsk from Paris with these two precious "bags". Reality made him go back on the road before he unpacked his bags. In the next 20 years, he crossed between war and peace in thought and reality, traveled through Moscow, Berlin, Paris and southern France, and traveled to Palestine and Syria. He painted landscapes, illustrated pictures, wrote autobiographies and experienced love. However, the disaster never dispersed, and he took refuge in the United States. Here, he lost his lover when he was far away from home (1944), but he didn't let love go with him, let it continue under his own brush, just like when he left home, and collected homesickness at the same time. No matter life or death, they are his most precious "luggage" that he can't give up.
After the bonfire party, Xia Jiaer returned to his hometown of art-France, because he loved France. Maybe he also wants to go back to the synagogue with round square doors and uncle Nash's violin, the hometown with cows and furry goats, farmers and round milkmaids! It's just that reality doesn't even allow him to touch them. He can only look forward, miss and recall with homesickness. In contrast, Paris, a foreign land that surprises him as soon as he opens the window, is easier to get close to. He will always remember, "In those days, the sunshine of art only shone in the sky of Paris." ...