Back In The Days When Men Were Men And Sacred Carpets Meant Something (For Harvard Professor Harvey Mansfield)

KONSTANTIN MAKOVSKY (1839 - 1915)

The return of the Saint Carpet from Macca to Cairo (1875)

Oil on canvas (138x222)

Collection of the National Museum of Armenia, Future European Union.

[Click on image for enlargement.]

"In 1863 Makovsky, together with the other 13 students eligible to participate in the competition for the [Czarist] Large Gold Medal of Academia, refused to paint on the set topic in Scandinavian mythology and instead left Academia without a formal diploma.

Makovsky became a member of a co-operative (artel) of artists led by Ivan Kramskoi, typically producing Wanderers [Peredvizhniki] paintings on everyday life (Widow 1865, Herring-seller 1867, etc.). From 1870 he was a founding member of the Society for Traveling Art Exhibitions and continued to work on paintings devoted to everyday life. He exhibited his works on both the Academia exhibitions and the Traveling Art Exhibitions of the Wanderers.

A significant change in his style occurred after traveling to Egypt and Serbia in the mid-1870s. His interests changed from social and psychological problems to the artistic problems of colors and shape.

In the 1880s he became a fashioned author of portraits and historical paintings. At the World's Fair of 1889 in Paris he received the Large Gold Medal for his paintings Death of Ivan the Terrible, The Judgement of Paris, and Demon and Tamara. He was one of the most highly appreciated and highly paid Russian artists of the time." (Wikipedia)

Photo credit: (c) National Museum of Armenia (All rights reserved) via John Malyon/Artcyclopedia. With thanks.

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Harvey Mansfield's 2007 National Endowment for the Humanities Lecture.