Aleksandr Drevin
Aleksandr Drevin | |
|---|---|
| Aleksandrs Drēviņš Александр Древин | |
Drevin following his arrest, 1938 | |
| Born | Aleksandrs Rūdolfs Drēviņš Александр Давыдович Древин 15 July 1889 Cēsis, Governorate of Livonia, Russian Empire (now Latvia) |
| Died | 26 February 1938 (aged 48) Moscow, Russian SFSR, USSR |
| Resting place | Butovo firing range 55°32′00″N 37°35′39″E / 55.53333°N 37.59417°E |
| Movement | Green Flower |
| Spouse | |
| Children | Andrey Drevin |
Aleksandr Davydovich Drevin (Latvian: Aleksandrs Rūdolfs Drēviņš; Russian: Александр Давыдович Древин; 15 July 1889 – 26 February 1938) was a Latvian and Soviet painter.[1][2] Drevin was executed during the Great Purge as part of the Latvian Operation.
Biography
Drevin was born 15 July 1889 was born in Cēsis, Governorate of Livonia (present-day Latvia).[1]
Drevin attended art school in Riga under Vilhelms Purvītis, thus initially adapting the style of impressionist painting,[3] and first came to Moscow in 1914.[4] He studied under Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin. Since 1917 he worked in the Fine Arts Department of the People's Commissariat of Education.[5] Drevin was part of the "Green Flower" association of avant-garde artists, notably with Konrāds Ubāns, Valdemārs Tone and Kārlis Johansons. Between 1920 and 1921 he was a member of the Inkhuk but later left, together with Wassily Kandinsky, Kliunkov, and Nadezhda Udaltsova, because of the Constructivist-Productivist stylistic manifesto urging the rejection of easel painting. Drevin became a professor of painting at Vkhutemas. In 1922, he was sent to work the First Russian Art Exhibition at the Van Diemen Gallery in Berlin. He travelled across Russia, to Kazakhstan Ural, Altai and Armenia creating a series of artworks of the Soviet landscape. These trips where organised and supervised by Soviet art officials.[5]
Drevin often painted a "brutal primitivism", lacking any political message or any purpose at all. His paintings have been compared to those of Maurice de Vlaminck. Drevin's paintings intentionally were empty of illusionism and decorativeness. After a period of constructivist abstract painting, his style became progressively more realistic during the 1920s.[6]
Arrest and execution
On 17 January 1938, during the Great Purge, as a part of the so-called "Latvian Operation", Drevin was arrested by the NKVD and executed on 26 February at the Butovo firing range near Moscow. He was posthumously rehabilitated in 1957.[2]
Personal life
In 1919, Drevin married Nadezhda Udaltsova.[7] Drevin and Udaltsova had one son, the sculptor Andrey Drevin.
Gallery
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Refugee, 1916
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Suprematism (formerly) Abstraction, 1921
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Painting of Nadezhda Udaltsova, 1923
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Landscape. Street in Armenia, 1933
References
- ^ a b "Notice de personne: Drēviņš, Aleksandrs (1889-1938) forme internationale". BnF Catalogue général. Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France. 11 February 2008. Retrieved 28 February 2026.
- ^ a b "Drevin, Aleksandr (Rudolf) Davidovich". tretyakovgallery.ru. Archived from the original on 6 August 2016. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
- ^ Dombrovskis, Jānis (1925). Latvju Māksla: Glezniecības, grafikas, tēlniecības un lietišķās mākslas attīstības vēsturisks apskats ( Latvian Art: Historical Review of Painting, Graphics, Sculpture and Applied Arts) (1 ed.). Rīga, Latvija: Valters un Rapa. p. 154.
- ^ Sarabianov, Dmitri (1977). Russian and Soviet Painting: An Exhibition from the Museums of the USSR ... Metropolitan Museum of Art. p. 166. ISBN 978-0-8709-9162-2.
- ^ a b Kathleen Tahk (28 August 2014). "A Revolution Beyond Borders:The Soviet Art of the Latvian Riflemen" (PDF). americancouncils.org. Archived from the original (PDF) on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
- ^ Kirill Sokolov (3 June 2002). "Aleksandr Drevin, Nadezhda Udal'tsova: An Exhibition That Never Was". jhu.edu. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
- ^ Rakitin, Vasilii (2000). "Nadezhda Udaltsova". In Bowlt, John E.; Drutt, Matthew (eds.). Amazons of the Avant-Garde. pp. 271–297. ISBN 0-89207-225-3. Retrieved 28 February 2026.
Works cited
- A History of Painting, Alan Bird