Yakut painter Afanasy Osipov was born on February 28, 1928. In his youth, he went to Moscow to study at the Moscow Secondary Art school at the V.I. Surikov Institute, and then entered the institute. Osipov participated in all-union and foreign art exhibitions, became a People’s Artist of the USSR, an academician of the Russian Academy of Arts, and was awarded the Ilya Repin State Prize of the RSFSR. Afanasy Osipov is known not only in Yakutia and Russia. His works are known in other countries as well. Personal exhibitions of the artist took place in Egypt, France, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Romania, Germany, Finland, Mongolia, Japan, and China. Today, his works are kept in the National Art Museum of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), the State Tretyakov Gallery, the State Russian Museum, and private collections in Russia and abroad. Years later, he wrote: “I am happy that my love for the art profession began in my childhood with a love for the land and nature of my native land.”
After returning to his homeland, Osipov taught at the Yakut art school, traveled a lot around the republic, for many years headed the Union of Artists of Yakutia, and organized exhibitions. He painted portraits of his countrymen, pictures of large construction sites in the republic, and beautiful landscapes. But most of all, Afanasy Osipov is known for paintings that depict mountains, such as the Moma and Oymyakonya Ridges, Lena Pillars, mountains on the Blue River, ridges in Kyrgyzstan, Buryatia, Mongolia, Nepal, and the European Alps. People’s poet of Yakutia Natalia Kharlampieva spoke about the artist: ‘He took life philosophically both without judging anyone and without offending anyone. In the valley of his life, love and talent bloomed. Life boomed in all its splendor, and the peaks of the mountains sparkled, thus reminding of honor and dignity.’
After returning to his homeland, Osipov taught at the Yakut art school, traveled a lot around the republic, for many years headed the Union of Artists of Yakutia, and organized exhibitions. He painted portraits of his countrymen, pictures of large construction sites in the republic, and beautiful landscapes. But most of all, Afanasy Osipov is known for paintings that depict mountains, such as the Moma and Oymyakonya Ridges, Lena Pillars, mountains on the Blue River, ridges in Kyrgyzstan, Buryatia, Mongolia, Nepal, and the European Alps. People’s poet of Yakutia Natalia Kharlampieva spoke about the artist: ‘He took life philosophically both without judging anyone and without offending anyone. In the valley of his life, love and talent bloomed. Life boomed in all its splendor, and the peaks of the mountains sparkled, thus reminding of honor and dignity.’
After a trip to the Altai, Afanasy Osipov created a series of paintings dedicated to this region. ‘Mountain Source’ is one of them. The artist showed how mountain rivers are born on this painting. A thin stream flows down from a massive glacier in the foreground. With soft tonal transitions, Afanasy Osipov painted snow-white mountain peaks, autumn grasses of a light ochre hue, and with short semi-transparent strokes, he conveyed a light vibration of the air in the sky.
