Vasily Zhuk painted the picture ‘Morning in the Mountains’ in 1985. The artist captured a brief moment when the morning sun is rising above the cold mountains and illuminating the dense coniferous forest and snowdrifts with a soft diffused light.
In the foreground, a large snow-covered fir tree obscures the sun from the viewer. A sunbeam shines through the branches and emphasizes their contour. In his work, Zhuk used the contrast of light and shadow and highlighted certain areas so that the tree looked glowing from within.
The desire to show the surrounding world as natural and alive in its variability, an attempt to capture a fleeting impression makes the landscape ‘Morning in the Mountains’ look like Impressionist paintings, and the artist’s desire to capture the spectacular state of nature, and artistically embellish it makes the painter close to Romantic painters.
Impressionism is a direction in painting that developed from the last third of the 19th to the beginning of the 20th century. Impressionist artists abandoned the traditions of Realism and classical painting; they tried to convey the emotions of what they saw and used a technique that was careless from the point of view of the academic school.
Vasily Zhuk was born in 1941 in the village of Selets, Bryansk region. From an early age, he had to help his family. His father died at the front, and his mother was left alone with five children. The boy worked as a shepherd, and in his spare time he painted landscapes.
Zhuk was going to become a professional artist and entered a vocational school at the department of decorative and applied arts. However, soon the department was converted into an electrical installation. During his life, Vasily Zhuk managed to work as an electrician, a driver, a graphic designer, an engineer in industrial aesthetics and a teacher of art history.
In the foreground, a large snow-covered fir tree obscures the sun from the viewer. A sunbeam shines through the branches and emphasizes their contour. In his work, Zhuk used the contrast of light and shadow and highlighted certain areas so that the tree looked glowing from within.
The desire to show the surrounding world as natural and alive in its variability, an attempt to capture a fleeting impression makes the landscape ‘Morning in the Mountains’ look like Impressionist paintings, and the artist’s desire to capture the spectacular state of nature, and artistically embellish it makes the painter close to Romantic painters.
Impressionism is a direction in painting that developed from the last third of the 19th to the beginning of the 20th century. Impressionist artists abandoned the traditions of Realism and classical painting; they tried to convey the emotions of what they saw and used a technique that was careless from the point of view of the academic school.
Vasily Zhuk was born in 1941 in the village of Selets, Bryansk region. From an early age, he had to help his family. His father died at the front, and his mother was left alone with five children. The boy worked as a shepherd, and in his spare time he painted landscapes.
Zhuk was going to become a professional artist and entered a vocational school at the department of decorative and applied arts. However, soon the department was converted into an electrical installation. During his life, Vasily Zhuk managed to work as an electrician, a driver, a graphic designer, an engineer in industrial aesthetics and a teacher of art history.
