Ivan Shishkin

Ivan Ivanovich Shishkin (; – ) was a Russian Realist painter and draughtsman, best known for his landscape subjects. One of the most notable artisans to emerge during Tsar Alexander II's reign, he was among founding members of the Peredvizhniki company.

Biography

Shishkin was born in Yelabuga, Vyatka Governorate (today Republic of Tatarstan). He came from a family of Yelabuga merchants and was the son of grain merchant Ivan Vasilyevich Shishkin (1792–1872). The artist’s grandfather, Vasily Afanasyevich Shishkin-Serebryakov (1764–1827), was a palace peasant who registered as a third-guild merchant in Yelabuga in 1792.

Artistic training At the age of 12 Shishkin was enrolled in the First Kazan Boys' Gymnasium but after five years of study he returned home to Yelabuga, where he lived for four years. In 1852 he entered the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, where he studied for four years until 1856.

At the Academy Shishkin formed a close friendship with his classmates and like-minded artists Aleksander Gine and Jogin Pavel. In 1857 they worked together in Dubki, a small settlement on the shore of the Gulf of Finland near Sestroretsk. In the following years they traveled together to Valaam Island on Lake Ladoga, home to its famous monastery. Those trips helped Shishkin refine his skills in depicting nature, allowing him to render landscapes accurately with both brush and pencil.

Along with this final award Shishkin earned the right to travel abroad on a scholarship from the St Petersburg Imperial Academy of Arts. In 1861 he went to Munich, Germany, where he visited the studios of the famous artists Benno Adam and Franz Adam, who were highly regarded as animal painters. While there he painted View in the Vicinity of Düsseldorf on commission for the collector N. Bykov. This painting earned him the title of academician from the Imperial Academy of Arts.

During his time abroad, in addition to painting, Shishkin worked extensively on pen drawings, which greatly impressed foreign audiences.

He also took part in exhibitions at the Academy of Arts, the All-Russian Exhibition in Moscow (1882), the Nizhniy Novgorod (1896) and the World Fairs (Paris, 1867 and 1878 and Vienna, 1873).

Shishkin's painting method was based on analytical studies of nature. He became famous for his detailed and poetic forest landscapes, which captured the beauty of Russia’s wilderness. His works often depicted the changing seasons, wild nature, animals and birds. He was also an outstanding draftsman and printmaker.

Ivan Shishkin owned a dacha in the village of (now part of the Gatchina District, Leningrad Oblast), south of St Petersburg. There he painted some of his finest landscapes. His works are notable for poetic depiction of seasons in the woods, wild nature, animals and birds.

Final years In 1873 the Academy of Arts officially awarded Shishkin the title of professor after purchasing his painting Forest Wilderness. In 1892 he was invited to become professor-director of the landscape painting workshop class in the Academy of Arts, but for various reasons he held the position only briefly. He was buried at the Smolensk Orthodox Cemetery. In 1950, his remains and tombstone were transferred to the Tikhvin Cemetery at the Necropolis of the Masters of Art.

A minor planet 3558 Shishkin, discovered by Soviet astronomer Lyudmila Zhuravlyova in 1978, was named in his honor.

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