"In bronze, marble, wood, and steel, images of people of the heroic era are sculpted with a bold and strong chisel - a single image of man and humanity, marked by the unique stamp of great years."

ANDart critic Arkin

Vera Ignatievna Mukhina was born in Riga on July 1, 1889 into a wealthy family andreceived a good education at home.Her mother was Frenchfather was a gifted amateur artistand Vera inherited her interest in art from him.She didn’t have a good relationship with music:Verochkait seemed that her father did not like the way she played, but he encouraged his daughter to take up drawing.ChildhoodVera Mukhinatook place in Feodosia, where the family was forced to move due to serious illness mother.When Vera was three years old, her mother died of tuberculosis, and her father took his daughter abroad for a year, to Germany. Upon their return, the family settled again in Feodosia. However, a few years later, my father changed his place of residence again: he moved to Kursk.

Vera Mukhina - Kursk high school student

In 1904, Vera's father died. In 1906 Mukhina graduated from high schooland moved to Moscow. UShe no longer had any doubt that she would pursue art.In 1909-1911 Vera was a student at a private studiofamous landscape painterYuona. During these years, he first showed interest in sculpture. In parallel with painting and drawing classes with Yuon and Dudin,Vera Mukhinavisits the studio of the self-taught sculptor Sinitsina, located on Arbat, where for a reasonable fee one could get a place to work, a machine and clay. From Yuon at the end of 1911 Mukhina moved to the studio of the painter Mashkov.
At the beginning of 1912 VeraIngatyevnawas visiting relatives on an estate near Smolensk and, while sledding down the mountain, she crashed and disfigured her nose. Home-grown doctors somehow “sewed” the face onto whichFaithI was afraid to look. The uncles sent Verochka to Paris for treatment. She endured several facial plastic surgeries. But his character... He became harsh. It is no coincidence that many colleagues would subsequently dub her as a person of “tough character.” Vera completed her treatment and at the same time studied with the famous sculptor Bourdelle, at the same time she attended the La Palette Academy, as well as the drawing school, which was led by the famous teacher Colarossi.
In 1914, Vera Mukhina toured Italy and realized that her true calling was sculpture. Returning to Russia at the beginning of the First World War, she created her first significant work - the sculptural group “Pieta”, conceived as a variation on the themes of Renaissance sculptures and a requiem for the dead.

The war radically changed the usual lifestyle. Vera Ignatievna left sculpture, entered nursing courses, and in 1915-17 worked in a hospital. Thereshe also met her betrothed:Alexey Andreevich Zamkov worked as a doctor. Vera Mukhina and Alexey Zamkov met in 1914, and got married only four years later. In 1919, he was threatened with execution for participating in the Petrograd rebellion (1918). But, fortunately, he ended up in the Cheka in the office of Menzhinsky (from 1923 he headed the OGPU), whom he helped to leave Russia in 1907. “Eh, Alexey,” Menzhinsky told him, “you were with us in 1905, then you went to the whites. You won’t survive here.”
Subsequently, when Vera Ignatievna was asked what attracted her to her future husband, she answered in detail: “He has a very strong creativity. Internal monumentality. And at the same time a lot from the man. Internal rudeness with great spiritual subtlety. Besides, he was very handsome."


Alexey Andreevich Zamkov was indeed a very talented doctor, he treated unconventionally, tried traditional methods. Unlike his wife Vera Ignatievna, he was a sociable, cheerful, sociable person, but at the same time very responsible, with a heightened sense of duty. They say about such husbands: “With him, she’s like behind a stone wall.”

After October revolution Vera Ignatievna is interested in monumental sculpture and makes several compositions on revolutionary themes: “Revolution” and “Flame of Revolution”. However, the expressiveness of her modeling, combined with the influence of Cubism, was so innovative that few people appreciated these works. Mukhina abruptly changes her field of activity and turns to applied art.

Mukhinsky vases

Vera Mukhinais getting closerI'm with avant-garde artists Popova and Ekster. With themMukhinamakes sketches for several of Tairov's productions Chamber Theater and is involved in industrial design. Vera Ignatievna designed the labelswith Lamanova, book covers, sketches of fabrics and jewelry.At the Paris Exhibition of 1925clothing collection, created according to sketches by Mukhina,was awarded the Grand Prix.

Icarus. 1938

“If we now look back and try once again to survey and compress the decade with cinematic speed Mukhina's life, - writes P.K. Suzdalev, - passed after Paris and Italy, then we will face an unusually complex and turbulent period of personality formation and creative search for an extraordinary artist new era, a female artist, formed in the fire of revolution and labor, in an unstoppable striving forward and painfully overcoming the resistance of the old world. A swift and impetuous movement forward into the unknown, despite the forces of resistance, towards the wind and storm - this is the essence of Mukhina’s spiritual life of the past decade, the pathos of her creative nature. "

From drawings and sketches of fantastic fountains („ Female figure with a jug”) and “fiery” costumes for Benelli’s drama “Dinner of Jokes”, from the extreme dynamism of “Archery” she comes to the projects of monuments to “Liberated Labor” and “Flame of the Revolution”, where this plastic idea takes on sculptural existence, form, albeit not yet fully found and resolved, but figuratively filled.This is how “Julia” is born - after the ballerina Podgurskaya, who served as a constant reminder of shapes and proportions female body, because Mukhina greatly rethought and transformed the model. “She wasn’t that heavy,” said Mukhina. The refined grace of the ballerina gave way in “Julia” to the strength of deliberately weighted forms. Under the stack and chisel of the sculptor was not just born beautiful woman, but the standard of a healthy, harmoniously built body full of energy.
Suzdalev: ““Julia,” as Mukhina called her statue, is built in a spiral: all spherical volumes - head, chest, belly, thighs, calves - everything, growing out of each other, unfolds as the figure is walked around and again twists in a spiral, giving rise to the feeling the whole form of the female body filled with living flesh. Individual volumes and the entire statue resolutely fill the space occupied by it, as if displacing it, elastically pushing the air away from itself. “Julia” is not a ballerina, the power of her elastic, deliberately weighted forms is characteristic of a woman of physical labor; this is the physically mature body of a worker or peasant woman, but with all the heaviness of the forms, there is integrity, harmony and feminine grace in the proportions and movement of the developed figure.”
In 1930, Mukhina’s well-established life suddenly breaks down: her husband is arrested on false charges, famous doctor Zamkova. After the trial he is sent to Voronezh and Mukhina along with ten year old son follows her husband. Only after Gorky’s intervention, four years later, did she return to Moscow. Later Mukhina created a sketch tombstone Peshkov.

Portrait of a son. 1934 Alexey Andreevich Zamkov. 1934

Returning to Moscow, Mukhina again began to design Soviet exhibitions abroad. She creates architectural design Soviet pavilion at the World Exhibition in Paris. Famous sculpture“Worker and Collective Farm Woman,” which became Mukhina’s first monumental project. Mukhina's composition shocked Europe and was recognized as a masterpiece of 20th century art.


IN AND. Mukhina among second-year students of Vkhutein
From the late thirties until the end of her life, Mukhina worked primarily as a portrait sculptor. During the war years, she created a gallery of portraits of medal-bearing soldiers, as well as a bust of Academician Alexei Nikolaevich Krylov (1945), which now adorns his tombstone.

Krylov’s shoulders and head grow from a golden block of elm, as if emerging from the natural growths of a thick tree. In places, the sculptor’s chisel glides over chipped wood, emphasizing their shape. There is a free and relaxed transition from the raw part of the ridge to the smooth plastic lines of the shoulders and the powerful volume of the head. The color of elm gives a special, vibrant warmth and solemn decorativeness to the composition. Krylov's head in this sculpture is clearly associated with images ancient Russian art, and at the same time - this is the head of an intellectual, a scientist. Old age and physical decline are contrasted with the strength of spirit, the volitional energy of a person who has given his entire life to the service of thought. His life is almost lived - and he has almost completed what he had to do.

Ballerina Marina Semyonova. 1941.

In the half-figure portrait of Semyonova, the ballerina is depictedin a state of external stillness and internal composurebefore going on stage. In this moment of “getting into character,” Mukhina reveals the confidence of an artist who is in the prime of her wonderful talent - a feeling of youth, talent and fullness of feeling.Mukhina refuses the image dance movement, considering that the portrait task itself disappears in it.

Partisan.1942

"We know historical examples, - Mukhina spoke at an anti-fascist rally. - We know Joan of Arc, we know the mighty Russian partisan Vasilisa Kozhina. We know Nadezhda Durova... But such a massive, gigantic manifestation of true heroism, which we meet among Soviet women in the days of the battle against fascism, is significant. Our soviet woman consciously goes to great deeds. I’m not only talking about such women and heroic girls as Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, Elizaveta Chaikina, Anna Shubenok, Alexandra Martynovna Dreyman - a Mozhai partisan mother who sacrificed her son and her life to her homeland. I'm talking about thousands of unknown heroines. Isn’t any Leningrad housewife, for example, a heroine, who during the days of the siege of her hometown did she give the last crumb of bread to her husband or brother, or just to a male neighbor who made shells?”

After the warVera Ignatievna Mukhinacarries out two large official orders: creates a monument to Gorky in Moscow and a statue of Tchaikovsky. Both of these works are distinguished by the academic nature of their execution and rather indicate that the artist is deliberately moving away from modern reality.

Project of the monument to P.I. Tchaikovsky. 1945. On the left is “The Shepherd Boy” - a high relief for the monument.

Vera Ignatievna fulfilled the dream of her youth. figurinesitting girl, shrunk into a ball, amazes with its plasticity and melodiousness of lines. Slightly raised knees, crossed legs, outstretched arms, arched back, lowered head. A smooth sculpture that somehow subtly echoes the “white ballet” sculpture. In glass it became even more graceful and musical, and acquired completeness.

Seated figurine. Glass. 1947

http://murzim.ru/jenciklopedii/100-velikih-skulpto...479-vera-ignatevna-muhina.html

The only work, besides “The Worker and the Collective Farm Woman,” in which Vera Ignatievna managed to embody and bring to completion her imaginative, collective and symbolic vision of the world, is the tombstone of her close friend and in-law, the great Russian singer Leonid Vitalievich Sobinov. It was originally conceived as a herm depicting the singer in the role of Orpheus. Subsequently, Vera Ignatievna settled on the image white swan- not only a symbol of spiritual purity, but more subtly connected with the swan prince from “Lohengrin” and the “swan song” of the great singer. This work was a success: Sobinov’s tombstone is one of the most beautiful monuments in the Moscow Novodevichy Cemetery.

Monument to Sobinov at the Moscow Novodevichy Cemetery

The bulk of Vera Mukhina’s creative discoveries and ideas remained in the stage of sketches, models and drawings, replenishing the rows on the shelves of her studio and causing (albeit extremely rarely) a flow of bitternesstheir tears of the powerlessness of the creator and woman.

Vera Mukhina. Portrait of the artist Mikhail Nesterov

“He chose everything himself, the statue, my pose, and point of view. I determined the exact size of the canvas myself. All by myself", - said Mukhina. Confessed: “I hate it when they see how I work. I never allowed myself to be photographed in the workshop. But Mikhail Vasilyevich certainly wanted to write me at work. I couldn't do not give in to his urgent desire.”

Boreas. 1938

Nesterov wrote it while sculpting “Borey”: “I worked continuously while he wrote. Of course, I couldn’t start something new, but I was finalizing... as Mikhail Vasilyevich rightly put it, I started darning.”.

Nesterov wrote willingly and with pleasure. “Something is coming out,” he reported to S.N. Durylin. The portrait he painted is amazing in the beauty of its composition (Borey, falling from his pedestal, seems to be flying towards the artist), in its nobility color range: dark blue robe with a white blouse underneath; the subtle warmth of its shade competes with the matte pallor of the plaster, which is further enhanced by the bluish-lilac reflections from the robe playing on it.

In a few yearsBefore this, Nesterov wrote to Shadr: “She and Shadr are the best and, perhaps, the only real sculptors we have,” he said. “He is more talented and warmer, she is smarter and more skilled.”This is how he tried to show her - smart and skilled. With attentive eyes, as if weighing the figure of Borey, eyebrows drawn together in concentration, sensitive, able to calculate every movement with his hands.

Not a work blouse, but neat, even smart clothes - how effectively the bow of the blouse is pinned with a round red brooch. His shadar is much softer, simpler, more frank. Does he care about a suit - he's at work! And yet the portrait went far beyond the framework originally outlined by the master. Nesterov knew this and was glad about it. The portrait doesn’t speak about smart skill - it’s about creative imagination, curbed will; about passion, holding backoccupied by the mind. About the very essence of the artist’s soul.

It's interesting to compare this portrait with photographs, made with Mukhina during work. Because, even though Vera Ignatievna did not allow photographers into the studio, there are such photographs - Vsevolod took them.

Photo 1949 - working on the figurine “Root in the role of Mercutio”. Closed eyebrows, a transverse fold on the forehead and the same intense gaze as in the portrait of Nesterov. The lips are also pursed slightly questioningly and at the same time decisively.

The same ardent power of touching a figurine, a passionate desire to pour a living soul into it through the trembling of fingers.

Another message

July 1 marks the 128th anniversary of the birth of Vera Mukhina, the author of “Worker and Collective Farm Woman”, the stone orator of the Stalin era, as her contemporaries called her.

Vera Mukhina's workshop in Prechistensky Lane

Vera Mukhina was born in Riga in 1889 into a wealthy merchant family. She lost her mother early, who died of tuberculosis. The father, fearing for his daughter's health, moved her to favorable climate to Feodosia. There Vera graduated from high school, and later moved to Moscow, where she studied in studios famous landscape painters Konstantin Yuon And Ilya Mashkov.

Mukhina’s decision to become a sculptor was, among other things, influenced by a tragic incident: while riding a sleigh, the girl received a serious facial injury. Plastic surgeons literally had to “sew on” 22-year-old Vera’s nose. This incident became symbolic, revealing to Mukhina the exact application of her artistic talent.

At one time, Vera Ignatievna lived in Paris and Italy, studying the art of the Renaissance. In the USSR, Mukhina became one of the most outstanding architects. Universal fame came to her after her monument "Worker and Collective Farm Woman" was exhibited at the World Exhibition in Paris in 1937.

It was with the sculpture “Worker and Collective Farm Woman”, which became a symbol "Mosfilm", as well as with a seemingly simple invention - a faceted glass - the name of Vera Mukhina is associated in the minds of the majority.

But Moscow is also decorated with other sculptures of the famous master, many of which were installed after her death.

Monument to Tchaikovsky

Bolshaya Nikitskaya 13/6

In the mid-50s on Bolshaya Nikitskaya, in front of the building Moscow State Conservatory, erected a monument Pyotr Tchaikovsky, on which the sculptor worked for 25 years. In 1929, at the request of Nikolai Zhegin, director of the Tchaikovsky House Museum in Klin, Mukhina made a bust of the composer. 16 years later, she received a personal order to create a monument to Tchaikovsky in Moscow.

The original version of the sculpture depicted the composer conducting while standing. But such a monument required a large space, and it was abandoned. The second sketch depicted Pyotr Ilyich sitting in a chair in front of a music stand, on which lay an open music notebook. The composition was complemented by a figurine of a shepherdess, indicating the composer’s interest in folk art. Due to some ambiguity, the shepherd was replaced with the figure of a peasant, and then he was removed.

The design of the monument was not approved for a long time, and the already seriously ill Mukhina wrote Vyacheslav Molotov: “Stage my Tchaikovsky in Moscow. I guarantee you that this work of mine is worthy of Moscow...” But the monument was erected after Mukhina’s death, in 1954.

Monument to Tchaikovsky in front of the Moscow Conservatory

Monument to Maxim Gorky

Muzeon Park ( Krymsky Val, ow. 2)

The monument was designed by a sculptor Ivan Shadr in 1939. Before his death, Shadr made a promise with Mukhina to complete his project. Vera Ignatievna kept her promise, but during her lifetime the sculpture was never installed. Monument Gorky on the square Belorussky railway station appeared in 1951. In 2005, the monument was dismantled to clear space for the construction of a transport interchange on the Belorussky Station Square. Then they put him in literally this word, in the park "Museon", where he remained in this position for two years. In 2007, Gorky was restored and put back on his feet. Currently, Moscow authorities promise to return the sculpture to its original location. The monument to Maxim Gorky by Mukhina can also be seen in the park near the building Institute of World Literature named after A.M. Gorky.

The capital’s authorities promise to return the monument to Gorky to the Belorussky railway station

Sculpture "Bread"

"Park of Friendship" (Flotskaya St., 1A)

One of Mukhina’s famous works in the 30s was the sculpture "Bread", made for the exhibition “Food Industry” in 1939. Initially, at the request of the architect Alexey Shchusev, the sculptor was preparing four sketches of compositions for the Moskvoretsky Bridge, but the work was interrupted. The sculpture “Bread” was the only one for which the author returned to the sketches and brought the idea to life. Mukhina depicted the figures of two girls passing a sheaf of wheat to each other. According to art critics, the composition “sounds” the music of labor, but free and harmonious labor.

Sculpture "Fertility" in the Park "Friendship"

"Worker and Collective Farm Woman"

VDNKh (Mira Ave., 123 B)

The most famous monument to Vera Mukhina was created for the Soviet pavilion at the World Exhibition in Paris in 1937. The ideological concept of the sculpture and the first layout belonged to the architect Boris Iofan, the author of the exhibition pavilion. A competition was announced for the creation of the sculpture, in which Mukhina’s project was recognized as the best. Shortly before this, Vera's husband, a famous doctor Alexey Zamkov, thanks to the intercession of a high party official, returned from Voronezh exile. Vera Mukhina’s family was “on notice.” And who knows, the repressions would have passed if not for the victory in the competition and triumph at the exhibition in Paris.

Work on the statue took two months; it was made at the pilot plant of the Institute of Mechanical Engineering. According to the author's idea, the worker and collective farmer were supposed to be naked, but the country's leadership rejected this option. Then Mukhina dressed Soviet heroes in overalls and sundress.

During the dismantling of the monument in Paris and its transportation to Moscow, people were injured. left hand collective farmers and right hand worker, and when assembling the composition in 1939, the damaged elements were replaced with a deviation from the original project.

After the Paris exhibition, the sculpture was transported back to Moscow and installed in front of the entrance to the Exhibition of National Economic Achievements. Long years the sculpture stood on a low pedestal, which Mukhina bitterly called a “stump.” Only in 2009, after several years of restoration, “Worker and Collective Farm Woman” was installed at a height of 33 meters.

Vera Ignatievna Mukhina (1889-1953) - Russian (Soviet) sculptor. People's Artist USSR (1943). Full member of the USSR Academy of Arts (1947). Winner of five Stalin Prizes(1941, 1943, 1946, 1951, 1952). From 1947 to 1953 - member of the Presidium of the USSR Academy of Arts.

Vera Mukhina was born on July 1 in Riga in the family of a Russian merchant. Her mother died of tuberculosis and the family moved to family estate near Mogilev, and then to Feodosia. The father was afraid that his daughters might get the same disease that killed his wife. However, another grief awaited the family. My father owned an oil mill and the man who invented machines for him went bankrupt and died. Since 1903, Vera and her older sister Maria lived with wealthy uncles in Kursk. Vera studied diligently, played the piano, painted and wrote poetry. The uncles spared no expense in raising smart and sympathetic nieces. They visited Berlin, Tyrol, Dresden. They dressed fashionably and went to balls. Soon the sisters left Kursk and went to Moscow. Vera studied in the sculpture workshop of Sinitsina, in the painting studio of Yuon and Dudin. Vera Mukhina was captivated by the work of Paolo Trubetskoy, who had just moved to Moscow. Now Vera’s dream was to go abroad. Alas, neither she nor her sister had the money for this.

Vera spent the winter of 1912 at the Kochany estate. She was riding a sleigh and suddenly crashed into a tree. The girl had her face bleeding. She had several plastic surgery in the hospital. She experienced more than just physical pain. The wounds gradually healed, and relatives offered money for a trip to Paris. Now Vera did not think about her face, she thought about who would be her teacher. Her choice fell on Bourdelle. Every morning she went to sculpt him. Every evening she painted at Colarossi's. Vera still managed to go to exhibitions, concerts, and lectures by the Cubists. She lived in Paris at Madame Jean's boarding house. In 1914, Vera managed to visit Italy. She fell in love with Michelangelo's work for the rest of her life. The first one started World War and Vera went to work as a nurse upon returning to Russia. Before last days In her life, she wounded the most precious thing she had - letters from Alexander Vertepov. He also studied with Bourdelle and was incredibly talented. He went to the front and died in one of the battles. In the grip of grief, Vera began working on the sculpture “Pieta”. Before this, Vera sculpted portraits of her sister and Vertepov. Alas, “Pieta” has not survived to this day. It was a composition where a fallen warrior is mourned by his bride. Vera asked the neighbors to water the sculpture from time to time so that it would not dry out, but the neighbors overdid it, and the composition suffered hopelessly.

Vera Mukhina fell in love again. She met the young doctor Alexei Zamkov in 1914, just before he left for the front. Two years later he returned home with typhoid fever. Alexei managed to overcome the illness, and soon he and Vera got married. After the revolution, almost all friends and relatives emigrated. Vera's sister married a Frenchman and also left. Their grandfather’s capital would have allowed Vera to live comfortably abroad. However, Vera and Alexey remained in Russia. In 1920, their son Vsevolod was born. The family had to go through a lot. At first, Vera did not have a suitable workshop; Vera participated in all sorts of competitions to be recognized. Then Vera’s best friend died, and a little later Vsevolod hurt himself when he jumped from an embankment. His mother nursed him for four whole years. First he was put in plaster, then he was in wheelchair and then on crutches. Things improved a bit in the 1930s. Vera created and taught at the Higher Art and Technical Institute. However, the persecution of her husband began. Alexey suggested using a device that increases vitality. They did not understand him and accused him of everything possible. The family had to move to Voronezh. There Vera created beautiful sculptural portraits of her husband, his brother and son.

In 1934 at International exhibition Her sculpture “Peasant Woman”, created in 1927, was exhibited in Venice. After the Second World War, the bronze cast of “The Peasant Woman” became the property of the Vatican Museum in Rome, and for Tretyakov Gallery Mukhina made the second cast of this sculpture. World fame came to Vera in 1937. In Paris she created her famous “Worker and Collective Farm Woman”. Vera was helped in creating the project by engineers, workers, and sculptors. Few people know that “Worker and Collective Farm Woman” from the All-Russian Exhibition Center is the second copy of the sculpture, since the first was damaged on the way from Paris. During the Second World War, Vera Mukhina worked everything. She completed portraits of Russian ballerinas - and Maria Semyonova. In 1948, she designed vases and made portraits in glass. Vera created several monuments. Vera Mukhina passed away on October 6, 1953. She, who in her youth loved balls so much and beautiful dresses, at the end of her life she said: “Suits are becoming obsolete allotted years, but images never.”

June 19 (July 1) 1889 - October 6, 1953
- Russian (Soviet) sculptor. People's Artist of the USSR (1943). Full member of the USSR Academy of Arts (1947). Winner of five Stalin Prizes (1941, 1943, 1946, 1951, 1952). From 1947 to 1953 -
Member of the Presidium of the USSR Academy of Arts.

Many of Vera Ignatievna’s creations have become symbols Soviet era. And when a work becomes a symbol, it is impossible to judge its artistic value - the symbolic value will distort it in one way or another. The sculptures of Vera Mukhina were popular while heavy Soviet monumentalism, so dear to the hearts of Soviet leaders, was in fashion, and were forgotten or ridiculed later.

Many of Mukhina’s works had a difficult fate. And Vera Ignatievna herself lived difficult life, where worldwide recognition coexisted with the possibility of losing her husband at any moment or going to jail herself. Did her genius save her? No, it was the recognition of this genius that helped strongmen of the world this. What helped was the style, which surprisingly coincided with the tastes of those who built the Soviet state.

Vera Ignatievna Mukhina was born on July 1 (June 19, old style) 1889 into a wealthy merchant family in Riga. Soon Vera and her sister lost their mother, and then their father. The father's brothers took care of the girls, and the sisters were not offended by their guardians in any way. The children studied at the gymnasium, and then Vera moved to Moscow, where she took painting and sculpture lessons

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The guardians were still afraid to let the young girl go to Paris, the Mecca of artists, and Vera was brought there not by talent, but by an accident. While sledding, the girl fell and severely injured her nose. And in order to preserve the beauty of their niece, the uncles had to send her to a better place. plastic surgeon in Paris. Where Vera, taking advantage of the opportunity, stayed for two years, studying sculpture with the famous sculptor Bourdelle and attending anatomy courses.

In 1914, Vera returned to Moscow. During the First World War, she worked as a nurse in a hospital, where she met her future husband, surgeon Alexei Andreevich Zamkov. They married in 1918, and two years later Vera gave birth to a son. This couple miraculously survived the storms of revolution and repression. She is a merchant family, he is a nobleman, both have difficult character and “non-working” professions. However, the sculptures of Vera Mukhina win in many respects creative competitions, and in the 20s she became a famous and recognized master.

Her sculptures are somewhat heavy, but full of power and indescribable healthy animal strength. They perfectly correspond to the calls of the leaders: “Let’s build!”, “Let’s catch up and overtake!” and “Let’s exceed the plan!” Her women, judging by appearance, they can not only stop a galloping horse, but also lift a tractor onto their shoulder.

Revolutionaries and peasant women, communists and partisans - socialist Venuses and Mercurys - ideals of beauty that all Soviet citizens should be equal to. Their heroic proportions, of course, were almost unattainable for most people (like modern fashion model standards 90-60-90), but it was very important to strive for them.

Vera Mukhina loved to work from life. Sculptural portraits of her husband and some friends are known much less than her symbolic works. In 1930, the couple decided to flee the Union, tired of bullying and denunciations and expecting the worst, but in Kharkov they were taken off the train and taken to Moscow. Thanks to the intercession of Gorky and Ordzhonikidze, the fugitives received a very mild punishment -
exile for three years in Voronezh.

"The Worker and the Collective Farm Woman" save Vera from the iron broom of the thirty-eighth. Among many projects, architect B. Iofan chose this one. The sculpture adorned the USSR pavilion at the World Exhibition in Paris, and the name of Vera Mukhina became known throughout the world. Vera Mukhina is congratulated, given orders and awarded prizes, and most importantly, now she is saved from bullying. She is entrusted with teaching at the art university. Later she goes to work in the experimental workshop of the Leningrad porcelain factory.

After the war, Vera Mukhina worked on the monument to M. Gorky (designed by I.D. Shadr) and P.I. Tchaikovsky, which was installed in front of the Conservatory building after her death.

Vera Mukhina: Socialist art

Vera Mukhina and Alexey Zamkov, television program "More than Love"

Vera Mukhina, television program
"How the idols left"

Vera Mukhina Museum in Feodosia

Museum

Virtual trip
around the museum V. I. Mukhina

Vera Mukhina is a famous sculptor of the Soviet era, whose work is still remembered today. She greatly influenced Russian culture. Her most famous work is the monument “Worker and Collective Farm Woman,” and she also became famous for creating a cut glass.

Personal life

Vera Ignatievna Mukhina was born in 1889 in Riga. Her family belonged to a famous merchant family. Father, Ignatius Mukhin, was a major merchant and patron of the sciences and arts. Parents' house The outstanding artist can still be seen today.

In 1891, at the age of two, the girl lost her mother - the woman died of tuberculosis. The father begins to worry about his daughter and her health, so he transports her to Feodosia, where they live together until 1904 - that year her father dies. After this, Vera sister moves to Kursk to live with his relatives.

Already in childhood, Vera Mukhina begins to enthusiastically draw and understands that art inspires her. She enters the gymnasium and graduates with honors. Afterwards Vera moves to Moscow. The girl devotes all her time to her hobby: she becomes a student of such famous sculptors as Konstantin Fedorovich Yuon, Ivan Osipovich Dudin and Ilya Ivanovich Mashkov.

At Christmas 1912, Vera goes to Smolensk to visit her uncle, and there she has an accident. A 23-year-old girl is sledding down a mountain and crashes into a tree; the branch severely injures her nose. Doctors promptly sew it on in a Smolensk hospital, and later Vera undergoes several plastic surgeries in France. After all the manipulations, the face of the famous sculptor acquires rough male forms, this confuses the girl, and she decides to forget about dancing in famous houses, which she adored in her youth.

Since 1912, Vera has been actively studying painting, studying in France and Italy. She is most interested in the direction of the Renaissance. The girl goes through schools such as the Colarossi studio and the Grand Chaumiere Academy.

Vera returns home two years later, and Moscow does not welcome her at all: the First World War begins. The girl is not afraid of hard times, quickly masters the profession of a nurse and works in a military hospital. It was at this tragic time in Vera’s life that happy event– she meets her future husband Alexei Zamkov, a military doctor. By the way, it was he who became for Bulgakov the prototype of Professor Preobrazhensky in the story “ dog's heart" Afterwards, the family will have a son, Vsevolod, who will become a famous physicist.

In the future, until her death, Vera Ignatievna was engaged in sculpture and the discovery of young talents. On October 6, 1953, Vera Mukhina died of angina pectoris, which is most often a consequence of heavy physical work and large emotional stress. There were many firsts and seconds in the sculptor’s life. This is short biography famous Soviet woman.

Creativity and work

In 1918, Vera Mukhina for the first time received a state order to create a monument to Nikolai Ivanovich Novikov, a famous publicist and educator. A model of the monument was made and even approved, but it was made of clay and stood for some time in a cold workshop, as a result of which it cracked, so the project was never implemented.

At the same time, Vera Ignatievna Mukhina creates sketches of the following monuments:

• Vladimir Mikhailovich Zagorsky (revolutionary).
• Yakov Mikhailovich Sverdlov (political and statesman).
• Monument to Liberated Labor.
• Monument "Revolution".

In 1923, Vera Mukhina and Alexandra Aleksandrovna Ekster were invited to decorate the hall for the Izvestia newspaper at the Agricultural Exhibition. Women make a splash with their work: they amaze the public with their creativity and rich imagination.

However, Vera is known not only as a sculptor; she also owns other works. In 1925, she created a collection of clothing for women in France together with fashion designer Nadezhda Lamanova. The peculiarity of this clothing was that it was created from unusual materials: cloth, peas, canvas, calico, matting, wood.

Since 1926, sculptor Vera Mukhina began to contribute not only to the development of art, but also to education, working as a teacher. The woman taught at the Art College and the Higher Art and Technical Institute. Vera Mukhina gave impetus creative destiny many Russian sculptors.

In 1927 it was created worldwide famous sculpture"Peasant woman" After receiving first place at the exhibition dedicated to October, the monument’s journey around the world begins: first the sculpture goes to the Trieste Museum, and after World War II it “moves” to the Vatican.

We can probably say that this was the time when the sculptor’s creativity flourished. Many people have a direct association: “Vera Mukhina – “Worker and Collective Farm Woman” - and this is not accidental. This is the most famous monument not only to Mukhina, but also in principle in Russia. The French wrote that he is greatest work world sculpture of the 20th century.

The statue reaches a height of 24 meters, and certain factors were taken into account in its design. lighting effects. According to the sculptor’s plan, the sun should illuminate the figures from the front and create a glow, which is visually perceived as if the worker and collective farmer were floating in the air. In 1937, the sculpture was presented at the World Exhibition in France, and two years later it returned to its homeland, and Moscow took the monument back. Currently, it can be seen at VDNKh, and also as a sign of the Mosfilm film studio.

In 1945, Vera Mukhina saved the Freedom Monument in Riga from demolition - her opinion was one of the decisive experts in the commission. IN post-war years Vera enjoys creating portraits from clay and stone. She creates a whole gallery, which includes sculptures of military men, scientists, doctors, writers, ballerinas and composers. From 1947 until the end of her life, Vera Mukhina was a member of the presidium and academician of the USSR Academy of Arts. Author: Ekaterina Lipatova