SCENES FROM THE ANCIENT GRAECO-ROMAN WORLD

Henryk Siemiradzki

Source polona.pl

From en.wikipedia.org

Henryk Siemiradzki (15 November 1843 – 23 August 1902)was born to a Polish noble szlachta family of a military physician, Hipolit Siemiradzki, and Michalina (nee Prószyńska) in the village of Bilhorod (Białogród), or Novobelgorod (now Pechenegi, sources vary) near the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv under the Russian Empire. His parents were close friends with Adam Mickiewicz's family. Henryk Siemiradzki studied at Kharkiv Gymnasium where he first learned painting under the local school teacher, D.I. Besperchy, former student of Karl Briullov. He entered the Physics-Mathematics School of Kharkov University and studied natural sciences there with great interest, but also continued to paint. After graduating from the University with the degree of Kandidat he abandoned his scientific career and moved to Saint Petersburg to study painting at the Imperial Academy of Arts in the years 1864–1870. Upon his graduation he was awarded a gold medal. In 1870–1871 he studied under Karl von Piloty in Munich on a grant from the Academy. In 1872 he moved to Rome and with time, built a studio there on via Gaeta Avenue, while spending summers at his estate in Strzałkowo near Częstochowa in Poland. Siemiradzki was active in the period of foreign Partitions of Poland, and best remembered for his monumental Academic art. He was particularly known for his depictions of scenes from the ancient Graeco-Roman world and the New Testament, owned by national galleries of Poland, Russia and Ukraine.

(en.wikipedia.org)

‘Le Repos, De’

From artmight.com

Rome Village

From allartclassic.com

‘Am Brunnen, bezeichnet H. Siemiradzky, Öl auf Leinwand’

Source Dorotheum

From commons.wikimedia.org

‘Wasserträgerin in antiker Landschaft mit Olivenbäumen’

The Patrician Siesta Images

From onokart.files.wordpress.com

‘Phrine al festival di poseidone agli eleusinia’ (detail)

Source sailko

From commons.wikimedia.org

The future victims of the Colosseum

Author M0tty

From commons.wikimedia.org

Siemiradzki went to Munich, at that time the second, after Paris, artistic center of Europe. He was confident enough to work independently, however he visited the studios of other masters, and especially often that of Carl Piloti, the famous historical painter. In Munich, Siemiradzki painted his first big work Roman Orgy in the Time of the Caesars (1872). The picture was bought by the St. Petersburg Academy, and the money helped the artist move to Italy. In Rome, where everything lives and breathes with art, he remained for the rest of his life, visiting Russia only from time to time. In the 1890s Siemiradzki worked for the theater, he designed stage curtains for the Krakow and Lvov theaters, decorated the house of the Philharmonic Society in Warsaw. Henryk Siemiradzki died in 1902 in his estate Strzalkowo, near Czestochowy in Poland, he was buried first in Warsaw, but in a year was re-buried in Krakow in the necropolis of the famous Poles. Though Siemiradzki received his education in Russia, his art can’t be classified as any ‘national’ school. It is international. The painter himself is one of the best representatives of the late European Neoclassicism.

(Olga’s gallery at abcgallery.com)