Since his very first years of at the art school, Andrey Kurnakov revealed a penchant for landscape painting. The artist described this preference of his as follows, “We, students, devoted every free minute to sketches en plein air. Having read the works of our famous countrymen — Turgenev, Leskov, Tyutchev, and Bunin — we painted not any nature, but the nature of Turgenev, Leskov, Tyutchev, and Bunin.” Later, landscape painting became one of the artist’s favorite genres. He painted every tree, every bush, and every path with great love and knowledge of the subject. Not a single fleeting state of nature escaped his attention.
“The Pond in Spasskoye” is a typical landscape of the Oryol region. Forests, with oak and bird cherry, aspen and spruce, birch and wild apple trees, alternate with picturesque fields.
In his painting, the artist proposes to make a journey to a fairy-tale land where everyone experienced only the best and most joyful emotions. A picturesque path, that one can take enjoying the smells and silence, leads into the dense forest with a motionless pond. Various trees surround it: old poplars cast shadows, young aspens with silver foliage tremble in the wind, and a birch has spread its branches. The surface of the deep pond reflects trees and sunbeams, which have miraculously entered this magical place. The water looks tranquil and cool.
The soft pastel shades of green are adjoined by the bright blue of the pond and the ultramarine shadows from the trees, and emphasized by the unusually pinkish shore. The openwork pattern of young trees and plants, which the artist depicted along the bank, create the decorative effect. The colors are vibrant and light. The shadows are bizarre and expressive. The artist perceives the human world and the world of nature as being extremely close. He admires the images that are both fabulous and realistic.
The picture resembles a theatrical scenery; it seems that the thicket is full of characters and events, including fantastic ones. After all, it was not for nothing that Kurnakov’s famous fellow countryman, Ivan Turgenev, who often came to Spasskoye, called his home village “my Lukomorye” meaning a fairy-tale land.
“The Pond in Spasskoye” is a typical landscape of the Oryol region. Forests, with oak and bird cherry, aspen and spruce, birch and wild apple trees, alternate with picturesque fields.
In his painting, the artist proposes to make a journey to a fairy-tale land where everyone experienced only the best and most joyful emotions. A picturesque path, that one can take enjoying the smells and silence, leads into the dense forest with a motionless pond. Various trees surround it: old poplars cast shadows, young aspens with silver foliage tremble in the wind, and a birch has spread its branches. The surface of the deep pond reflects trees and sunbeams, which have miraculously entered this magical place. The water looks tranquil and cool.
The soft pastel shades of green are adjoined by the bright blue of the pond and the ultramarine shadows from the trees, and emphasized by the unusually pinkish shore. The openwork pattern of young trees and plants, which the artist depicted along the bank, create the decorative effect. The colors are vibrant and light. The shadows are bizarre and expressive. The artist perceives the human world and the world of nature as being extremely close. He admires the images that are both fabulous and realistic.
The picture resembles a theatrical scenery; it seems that the thicket is full of characters and events, including fantastic ones. After all, it was not for nothing that Kurnakov’s famous fellow countryman, Ivan Turgenev, who often came to Spasskoye, called his home village “my Lukomorye” meaning a fairy-tale land.
