Omgeving van Konstantin Gorbatov (XX) - In Venedig

Painting by an artist from the vicinity of the Russian/German artist Konstantin Gorbatov. The painting shows St. Mark's Square from the water. It is an oil painting on a painter's panel by the firm Talens. On the back the work is described, signed, and dated "in Venice", "C. Gorbatoff", "1925 or 1926"). This description is rather hard to read. The label on the painter's panel is from the Talens firm. The round, dark-blue logo with the stylized letters "Talens" was especially used in the first half of the 20th century. After 1949, when the company received the title 'Royal', the logo and the name changed to Royal Talens. The label is on a so-called 'Academy Board' (hardboard). This type of support became very popular from the 1920s and 1930s as a cheaper alternative to canvas for both students and professional artists.

Provenance
Elisaweta Orechova-Belskaja Collection, Moscow (early 1930s)
Erena Voutke Collection (daughter of Elisaweta Orechova-Belskaja), Berlin (since 1990)

Biography

Konstantin Ivanovich Gorbatov (Russian: Константин Иванович Горбатов) (Stavropol, 17 May 1876 – Berlin, 24 May 1945) was a Russian painter. He is regarded as part of the post-impressionist movement.

Gorbatov spent his youth in the Caucasus and studied engineering from 1896 to 1903 in Riga. In 1904 he moved to Saint Petersburg, initially studied architecture at the Imperial Academy of Arts, but eventually switched to painting. In 1911 he won a gold medal and a study trip at an international exhibition in Munich and then completed his studies in Rome and on Capri. After returning to Saint Petersburg, he worked as a lecturer at the university and exhibited his work several times at exhibitions of the Peredvizjniki (the Wanderers).

Disappointed by the Russian Revolution (1917), Gorbatov left Russia and settled on Capri. In 1926 he moved to Berlin, where he remained until his death. In Berlin, Gorbatov was part of the Russian émigré community there and met leading artists, including Leonid Pasternak. He quickly also became a well-known painter there, exhibited all over Europe, traveled frequently to Italy and in the mid-1930s also to Syria and Palestine. After the Nazi seizure of power, his art gradually fell out of favor in the new Germany and he and his family fell into poverty. During World War II he, as a Russian citizen, was not permitted to leave Germany. Shortly after the German capitulation, on 12 May 1945, he died. Soon after, on 17 June 1945, his wife committed suicide.

Gorbatov bequeathed his work to the Leningrad Art Academy. Today much of his work is housed in the New Jerusalem Monastery and the Regional Museum of History and Art in Moscow.