Levitan

Isaac Levitan (1860-1900) was a Russian landscape painter, considered one of the best of the 19th Century. His family was of Jewish origin, during a period of organized political animosity under Alexander II. Levitan was able to overcome this based on the strength of his art, achieving support and patronage.


Levitan is recognized for his ability to convey a strong emotional feeling or tone in his works. They are often called "mood" paintings to define this characteristic. This quality of his work is what I connect with most strongly. he has over time become one of my favorite landscape painters.


His paintings are subtle in their language and message. Many works do contain political content, however Levitan never overtly reveals his message, it require knowledge of context.


I have never had the opportunity to see Levitan's work in person. The majority of his paintings reside in various museums and private collections inside of Russia. This has also made it quite hard to find good reproductions and western-published books on him.