Nicholas Roerich - an artist, writer, philosopher, archaeologist, and social activist - was one of the most unique and universal figures in Russian culture in the first half of the 20th century. He gained international renown as a painter who created his famous "Himalayan" and "Tibetan" series of canvases, and as the author of the Treaty on the Protection of Artistic and Scientific Institutions and Historic Monuments (the Roerich Pact, 1935). He was successful in many creative endeavours as well - painting, monumental art, theatre design, artistic ceramics, furniture, and majolica. He also published literary works, impressions, essays, and correspondence. Roerich's paintings are exhibited in museums all over the world.
The Russian Museum is in possession of the largest collection of Roerich's works from various periods. Much of the collection is comprised of paintings from the 1930s and 1940s - his Indian period - which were donated to the museum by the artist's oldest son Yury, a scholar of the Orient.
Interested in archaeology since his youth, many of the canvases from Roerich's early years reproduce scenes from the life of Slavic tribes. 'Overseas Guests' (1902), 'Slavs on the Dnieper' (1905), and 'Idols' (1905) are typical works by Roerich, which brought him fame in Russia in the early 1900s. Less well-known are his tranquil and serene landscapes of Karelia and his architectural studies.
A separate section of the exhibition will be dedicated to the large decorative panels from the suite 'Bogatyr Frieze' (1910), made to decorate the dining room of Filadelf Bazhanov's home in St Petersburg. The frieze's panels are done in tempera, a technique Roerich began using in 1906, preferring it to oil because of its "airy quality and resonance of tones".
Also from the 1910s are deeply meaningful compositions with surprising but harmonious colour combinations and velvet-like surfaces ('Three Joys', 'Procopius the Righteous', 'Battle in the Heavens', 'The Decrees of Heaven', and others).
Roerich's easel paintings and multiple nature-themed works executed in the mid-1920s and 1930s during his Central Asian and Manchurian philosopher, archaeologist, and social activist - was one of the most unique and universal figures in Russian culture in the first half of the 20th century. He gained international renown as a painter who created his famous "Himalayan" and "Tibetan" series of canvases, and as the author of the Treaty on the Protection of Artistic and Scientific Institutions and Historic Monuments (the Roerich Pact, 1935). He was successful in many creative endeavours as well - painting, monumental art, theatre design, artistic ceramics, furniture, and majolica. He also published literary works, impressions, essays, and correspondence. Roerich's paintings are exhibited in museums all over the world.
The Russian Museum is in possession of the largest collection of Roerich's works from various periods. Much of the collection is comprised of paintings from the 1930s and 1940s - his Indian period - which were donated to the museum by the artist's oldest son Yury, a scholar of the Orient.
Interested in archaeology since his youth, many of the canvases from Roerich's early years reproduce scenes from the life of Slavic tribes. 'Overseas Guests' (1902), 'Slavs on the Dnieper' (1905), and 'Idols' (1905) are typical works by Roerich, which brought him fame in Russia in the early 1900s. Less well-known are his tranquil and serene landscapes of Karelia and his architectural studies.
A separate section of the exhibition will be dedicated to the large decorative panels from the suite 'Bogatyr Frieze' (1910), made to decorate the dining room of Filadelf Bazhanov's home in St Petersburg. The frieze's panels are done in tempera, a technique Roerich began using in 1906, preferring it to oil because of its "airy quality and resonance of tones".
Also from the 1910s are deeply meaningful compositions with surprising but harmonious colour combinations and velvet-like surfaces ('Three Joys', 'Procopius the Righteous', 'Battle in the Heavens', 'The Decrees of Heaven', and others).
Roerich's easel paintings and multiple nature-themed works executed in the mid-1920s and 1930s during his Central Asian and Manchurian
expeditions and his travels through India, Mongolia, Tibet, and Japan, full of the energy of the mountains, give viewers the feeling that they are part of the Universe, if only a very small part. The paintings of the 1940s - 'Igor's Campaign', 'Boris and Gleb, Guerillas', and others - are Roerich's heartfelt response to the events of the Second World War.
Roerich was convinced of the close connection between the heavenly and the earthly. The sources of this philosophical relationship to the universe lie in his fascination with the theories of the Russian and Eastern cosmists (Nikolai Fyodorov, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, Vladimir Solovyov) and the teachings of Ramakrishna and Vivekananda.
The interaction between the Slavs and their neighbours to the north, and the migration of Eastern peoples through the territory of ancient Rus and Siberia, were themes that captivated Roerich his entire life. Another was the existence of a universal God, or, more precisely, an essence that determined the past and the future of all peoples. Hindus and Buddhists believe in a connection between the Earth and other worlds, that the order on Earth is maintained by a superior hierarchy in Shambhala. Where is this legendary place? According to Roerich's transcription of the words of a Tibetan Lama, "Only in some places, in the Far North, can you discern the resplendent rays of Shambhala". The exhibition includes Roerich's famous painting 'Midnight', his unique illustration of these words.
Roerich was of the opinion that culture, which had manifested the foundation on which humanity developed, was the world's most precious treasure. Culture and art, more than anything else, reflect the evolutionary progression of the world, while the spiritual progress of humanity and of each individual is the gradual understanding of the knowledge sent by the universal mind.
The exhibition also includes quotations from Roerich's essays and articles, as well as rare publications, archival materials, and photographs from the Russian Museum's academic library and manuscript department.