Who is Nikolai Feshin?

Nicolai Fechin

Nicolai Ivanovich Fechin (Russian: НиколайИвановичФешин; 1879-1955) also translated as Nicolai Fechin, Nicolai Fechin Xun, whose full name is Nikolai Ivanovich Feshin (he has multiple names due to differences in Russian translation and Chinese), is a Russian-American painter who was born in a family of woodcarvers and craftsmen in Kazan, Russia. , a student of Repin, with unique works. His representative works include "Autumn", "Portrait of Kanuliya", "Portrait of Father", etc. His paintings have bright colors, bright contrasts between light and dark, and strong expressive power. His sketches are influenced by traditional oriental paintings. The head sketches are drawn with charcoal on solid and smooth paper. They are unique and profound.

Chinese name: Nicolai Fechin

Foreign name: Nicolai Ivanovich Fechin

Alias: Feixin

Nationality: United States

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Nationality: Russian

Birthplace: Kazan on the Volga River, Russia

Date of birth: 1879

Date of death: 1955

< p>Occupation: Painter

Graduation school: Repin Academy of Fine Arts, Russia

Representative works: "Portrait of Father", "Autumn", "Portrait of Kanuliya"

Personal profile

Introduction

Fei Xin is an artist with a strong desire to create. He has given full play to his artistic talent in various art fields he is involved in. In Taos, he designed a building with a unique structure and full of indigenous charm, and carved the doors, windows, and furniture by himself. He has established his own unique artistic insights in the fields of oil painting, sketching, watercolor, architectural design, wood carving, ceramics, printing design, stage design and other applied arts.

Work

In 1908, he went to Kazan Art School to engage in teaching work, while at the same time creating his graduation work. In 1909, he completed the oil painting "Cabbage Harvest Season", for which he won the title of painter and the opportunity to study abroad in France and Italy. Around this same period he painted Portrait of an Unknown Lady (Lady in Purple), which won a gold medal at the Munich International Exhibition. After the socialist revolution, Feshin still lived in Kazan and taught at the Kazan Art School.

Biography

Family

Nikolai Ivanovich Feshin was born in 1879 in Kazan on the Volga River in Russia. His father was a wood carver and gilder. As a child, Fei Xun followed his father's wood carving and gilding team to travel to nearby and distant rural areas to decorate icons and murals in churches and complete the carving work there. They are all kind-hearted artists who rely on their conscience and craftsmanship. They visited the towns and farms along the Volga River, and he fell deeply in love with the people, the lakes and the forests. His father was Fei Xin's first teacher. He admired his son's painting and wood carving skills and wanted his son to learn from the icon painter and become a good artist.

Love art

Fei Xin, who graduated from primary school in 1895, was admitted to the Kazan Art School. The 16-year-old boy devoted himself to his studies with full enthusiasm. He forgot 3 After suffering from encephalitis, the doctor ordered me to study selflessly and desperately suck the milk of knowledge. Soon the Kazan Fine Arts School was affiliated with the St. Petersburg Royal Academy of Fine Arts (now the Repin Academy of Fine Arts) with its exemplary teaching performance. In 1901, Fei Xun was recommended by the school to be an auditor at the Academy of Fine Arts with excellent results.

University study

The Academy of Fine Arts regulated him with strict sketch teaching and the latest painting techniques, and Repin gave him careful training and special care. Repin's warmth and thoughtfulness gave him great encouragement, and his gratitude is beyond words. Feixin has been studying the late paintings and portraits of his teacher Repin for a long time, and was attracted by Varande Serov's superb painting skills. During the eight years he studied at the academy, dozens of sketches and small oil paintings participated in exhibitions or were published in magazines. At the 1908 Academy of Fine Arts Spring Exhibition, two of the young student's works, "Wedding Paikou" and "Woman Under the Bodhi Tree," were exhibited. These two works reveal Fei Xun's maturity and genius. "The Wedding" won him the A. Kuinzhi Prize, and "The Woman Under the Linden Tree" was acquired by the Museum of the Academy of Fine Arts. Fei Xun trained a large number of talented artists and educators for Russia. He taught seriously. During class, he always dressed simply and neatly. He often walked silently from one easel to another with a cigar in his mouth, observing each student's work with great concentration. If he found a good sign, he would get closer and say: "Your painting, in my opinion, is very good." Then he would pick up pencils and brushes to modify the painting enthusiastically and seriously. He often puts his easel next to the students' easels and draws models with them. This is an intuitive and effective demonstration teaching method. In the evening, they sat in the studio, and Fexin seemed to be a different person. He talked enthusiastically with his friends and students about the famous Russian painters Kramskoi, Repin, and Serov, and about the Western painters Holbein and Rembrandt. Lang, France and Hals talk about the lessons learned from them. Feixin also often talked about the modernists, saying: “Don’t listen to them, don’t deviate from your own correct path.

That outfit is a trendy thing. Wear a narrow skirt today and a baggy one in a few days. Don't learn from this. This is leading yourself to the path of hypocrisy. ”

Creative style

In the years before and after graduating from the academy, Fei Xin created a series of outstanding portraits, the first portrait that made him famous, "Girl in Purple Clothes" In 1908, he won a small gold medal at the Munich International Fair. In 1914, Fexin created "Portrait of Varya Adorasteskaya". The clean pearl-like colors and perfect realism form are all reflected in this work. The painting is soft, concise and harmonious. In terms of artistic quality, it can be compared with Repin's "Dragonfly" and Serov's "Girl and Peach". Fei Xun does not like to use a single artistic expression technique in painting. , the radiant paintings with passionate short brushstrokes and multi-layered rough surfaces are the crystallization of his long-term artistic accumulation. Whenever necessary, he uses transparent colors to adjust the tone, using a thin layer of color mask. On another level, the technique is no less impressive than that of 17th-century Westerners, who sometimes paint with broad strokes, exploiting the light and character of the white canvas, and he likes to use "palettes." "Add a painting knife" technique.

Going to a foreign country

The unsociable Fei Xin felt like he was trapped in a cocoon in a foreign country. He left his motherland under unclear circumstances Mrs. Feixin is the daughter of a famous Kazan tycoon. She had been in contact with the American coal king Stimmar in Kazan. It was only when she arrived in New York that Feixin realized that he had been deeply trapped in cruel debts. He struggled for four years in the small house in Central Park to free himself from his wife's debt. He was often dazed in the deafening noise of New York. He was hired to teach painting at the New York Academy of Art because he could not adapt to the environment. , he gave up after only one month. In 1926, Feixin's lung disease broke out again. On the advice of his doctor, he moved to Daos, a small town in the western United States.

Family changes

< p>In 1936, my wife was seduced by a poet. She dreamed of becoming a writer and living with a man in his 20s. She abandoned Feixin and her daughter to rebuild a new family. This heavy blow almost caused her to fall apart. Feixin was 10 years older. He and his daughter moved to California again. Before World War II, he and his daughter took a trip to Asia - they went to Japan, India, and Indonesia, and lived in Bali, Indonesia for more than a month, observing the island countries. Traveling 20,000 miles, Feixin created many wonderful oil paintings, portraits and landscapes, whether in California or with the Indians in the mountains. >Missing the Motherland

Success has always been with him, and his works have aroused strong repercussions in society. Americans wrote in newspapers and periodicals: "If you want to see a miracle, then go to Fei Go to Xin's exhibition. "

Feixin has lived in the United States for many years and has always missed his motherland. He has always regarded himself as a Russian artist and has never been assimilated to the lifestyle on the other side of the ocean. After the end of World War II in 1946, the Soviet people defeated fascism He was deeply inspired. He always wanted to know how his motherland rebuilt a new life and how the art industry in his motherland was developing? He wrote in the letter: "You have all accomplished the greatest achievements in my motherland. , for which praise and honor are due to you. "He fantasized about seeing the Volga River again, and he came to this conclusion about the path he had taken: "People who engage in art cannot leave their homeland, no matter what the circumstances. A person's entire spiritual foundation begins to be laid in childhood and grows with the surrounding environment until old age and death. In a foreign country you are only a physical presence, because people who are often lonely cannot understand the meaning of life. ”

Late life

In 1922, he contracted typhus, and the famine at that time made his sudden tuberculosis worse. All of this forced him to become depressed Later, under the persuasion of his friends, he accepted the invitation to teach at the New York Academy of Fine Arts and immigrated to the United States. In his later years, his wife left him and he lived alone in a simple house in the suburbs of Los Angeles. He became increasingly sad. The more he realizes that people who engage in art can only live and create in the motherland. His works include "Portrait of Vera Adoratskaya", "Portrait of the Painter Shcherbakov", etc.

< p>In 1926, when the great Russian painter Ilya Yefimovich Repin answered the question of who is the most talented painter of our time, he said cheerfully: "Fehin! ”

More than 30 years have passed. On October 5, 1955, the Ross-Ancelos News Agency sent a brief message: Russian painter Nikolai Fehin died at the age of 76.

Artistic Achievements

Nikolai Fischen has very few surviving works; there is also very little commentary about him in Russia. Many of his works were destroyed by war and immigration, or Lost in international art exhibitions, most of his later works are in private hands; he is a very talented painter with a strong personality, who never blindly worships or imitates others, nor participates in any art schools or organizations; he is inheriting Russia Based on the tradition of oil painting, he has created his own unique artistic style and expression techniques.

Fei Xin entered Repin's studio at the Academy of Fine Arts to study. He had a high degree of affirmation and evaluation of his teacher, but he had his own opinions on artistic pursuits. In terms of material selection and conception, he liked to draw materials directly from ordinary life and pursue Natural and real, pure and vivid; exploring an expression technique that is different from the popular impressionism at that time, focusing on the artistic language and expression techniques with decorative meaning and unique structure that give full play to the unique performance of oil painting.

Feishen is good at creating portraits and custom themes. His brushwork is unrestrained and smooth; sometimes the painting is a strong accumulation of colors, sometimes it is lightly swept to leave the background color; sometimes he uses a scraper and hand instead of a brush to produce different texture effects in the painting, and the colors in the entire painting are loud and saturated; The contrast is sharp and particularly attractive, like a symphony of colors, which is thought-provoking; Fischen completed his artistic journey in the United States. It was undoubtedly a tragedy for him to break away from national traditions and stay away from his homeland, but his artistic achievements have an indelible position in the history of Russian art.

Selected works of Feshin

Oil paintings of Nikolai Feshin

Sketches of Nikolai Feshin