Sculptor Paolo Trubetskoy in the Tretyakov Gallery. Paolo Trubetskoy (studying an old photograph) Trubetskoy Valentin Petrovich minimalist artist

Pavel (Paolo) Trubetskoy(Italian: Paolo Troubetzkoy), (February 15, 1866, Intra, Italy - February 12, 1938, Italy) - sculptor and artist, worked in Italy, the USA, England, Russia and France.

Illegitimate son of a Russian emigrant, prince Peter Petrovich Trubetskoy(1822-1892). The prince, who had two wives at once - one in Russia, the other abroad - was forbidden by Emperor Alexander II to return to his homeland in order, as it was said, “to prevent the spirit of debauchery from entering his native fatherland.”

Paolo Trubetskoy. Photo from the 1910s

Pavel (Paolo) Trubetskoy was born on February 15, 1866 in Italy in the town of Intra near Lake Maggiore. His father, Prince P.I. Trubetskoy, was at the Russian royal court. In 1863, he came to Italy as a diplomat at the Russian embassy in Florence, not yet knowing that he would remain here for the rest of his life. The prince's wife was a US citizen, pianist Ada Winans (1835-1917), who came to Florence to study singing. She was keenly interested in music, painting, sculpture, and literature. Thanks to her, an artistic atmosphere reigned in the Trubetskoys’ house.

Paolo Troubetzkoy (1866-1938). Portrait of his mother (ca. 1912). Portrait of a mother Verbania-Pallanza, Italy.

Siblings: Pierre (Peter) (1864-1936) - graphic artist and painter; and Luigi (1867-1959) - electrical engineer. From the age of eight he became interested in sculpture and, under the influence of his brother Pietro, a decorative artist, he performed his first sculptures for the puppet theater

Villa "Ada" (Trubetsky's house) was often visited by the famous Italian artist Daniele Ranzoni, who had a certain influence on Paolo, although he was not his direct teacher.

Verbania-Intra. Monument to painter Daniele Ranzoni,

In 1874, Paolo completed the first sculpture - the head of a singing old man made of wax. This work was praised by the sculptor J. Grundy. Then Paolo completed another work that attracted Grandi’s attention - he carved the sculpture “Resting Deer” from marble.

In 1877-1878 Paolo studied and graduated primary school in Milan. Returning to Intra, at the insistence of his father, he entered a technical school. And he even took private lessons in physics and mathematics, but he studied reluctantly.

He did not give up his favorite hobby and in 1882 he sculpted the plaster sculpture “Cow with a Calf”. The young man became interested in animal painting. In 1883-1884, after graduating from college in Intra, he visited Russia. Upon his return he settled in Milan. Meanwhile, the father began to think about military career son. Fortunately, my mother insisted on studying at art school, and Paolo enters the Milanese studio of Giuseppe Grandi. Soon he moved to the studio of D. Barcaglia, a marble maker from Piedmont, then to the studio of Ernesto Bazzaro, from whom he took technical and craft lessons. He never received a completed art education.

From 1885 he worked in his own studio on Via Solferino (then on Corso di Porta Nuova). He was a member of the literary and artistic movement Scapigliatura (“gypsy” or “bohemian”; participants in the movement opposed themselves, on the one hand, to the conservatism of official culture, and on the other, to late Italian romanticism, which was considered epigone).

In 1885, Trubetskoy acquired his own studio in Milan. And a year later he participated for the first time in an exhibition in Milan, where he showed the sculpture “Horse”, and the work was noticed. In the same year he visited the USA and held a personal exhibition in San Francisco; several of his works were acquired by the city Art Museum. From that time on, he began to receive orders from wealthy Italian clients, among whom were Counts Visconti di Modrone and Durini.

Soon the Trubetskoy family went bankrupt and sold the villa. Paolo is forced to live on his own. From 1886 until Trubetskoy’s arrival in Russia, there was a so-called “period of poverty.” The artist moves from place to place, working on farms to earn money to live and practice art. This is also the time of his artistic development. Until about 1891, animalism occupied the main place in his work. Later, to earn money, taking advantage of his fame, he began working on commissioned portraits.

Paolo Troubetzkoy (1866-1938). Padre e figlia (1895). Verbania-Pallanza, Italy.

Marble bust of a girl (1895)

In 1890, Trubetskoy participated in a competition for a monument to Garibaldi for Milan. For his project he received the first prize, and the famous Italian writer G. d'Annunzio wrote a long article about its merits. A year later, the sculptor completed the design of the monument to Dante for the city of Trento, receiving a cash prize. The project had many advantages, but due to the complexity the allegorical nature was rejected by the jury. Subsequently, Trubetskoy's work was repeatedly exhibited at international exhibitions, including in Russia. In 1896, Trubetskoy performed a monument to Senator Carlo Cadorna for Pallanza.

Monument to Italian politician Carlo Cadorna, in Verbania-Pallanza, by Paolo Troubetzkoy

Verbania-Pallanza. Monument to mayor Paolo Cavanna, bronze bust modelled by Paolo Troubetzkoy in 1896

From 1895 he participated in almost all the International Biennales in Venice (until 1934). From the first steps he received the support of the critic Vittorio Pica, who became his enthusiastic fan, and later the critic Ugo Oietti wrote a lot about him. Participated in many European exhibitions.

Le Comte Robert de Montesquiou by Paolo Troubetskoy (1897) from the Orsay Museum on display at MUNAL in Mexico City

Statue of Robert de Montesquieu (1907) in the workshop of P. P. Trubetskoy in Paris. Photo archive of the Landscape Museum, Verbania, Pallanza

In 1897 he came to St. Petersburg and accepted the offer of Prince Lvov, director of the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, to teach sculpture. In 1898-1906. was a professor of sculpture at the Moscow School of Painting and Painting. His activities as a teacher have had big influence on the formation of a number of Russian masters. Young sculptors - A. T. Matveev, N. A. Andreev and others - received mastery lessons from him, others, such as V. N. Domogatsky, experienced his influence. During these years he entered the circle of the “World of Art”. In 1899, his portrait was painted by V. A. Serov.

Valentin Aleksandrovich Serov (1865-1911) Portrait of en:Paolo Troubetzkoy

The expression “to sculpt à la Trubetskoy” (that is, quickly, juicy, lively and fun) entered the speech of Moscow sculptors. The type of artist that Paolo personified was also new to them. “Tall”, “prominent”, as they wrote about him in the press, with excellent manners, able to behave and at the same time a liberated artist, alien to secular conventions, an artist of the European type, he allowed himself to ignore any authority, to have a hobby (such as : keep animals and animals in his studio and be a vegetarian) and flaunt the fact that “for the sake of complete independence of thought and attitude to life, he has never read and does not read anything.” His natural self-esteem, independence, and natural demand for respect for his art put him in a very special position at the school. A separate workshop was built for the sculptor, high, with an overhead light and wide doors, into which “paired carriages and Cossacks on horseback” could freely enter, as B.L. Pasternak recalls, who turned out to be an involuntary observer of everything that was happening there (they began to go out into this workshop one of the windows of the apartment of his father L.O. Pasternak). The director of MUZHVZ, Prince A.S. Lvov, was in a hurry to build a bronze foundry for Trubetskoy and ordered an excellent foundry worker, Carlo Robecchi, from Italy. From the point of view of Muscovites, such attention to the needs of the artist was unprecedented.

Workshop of P.P. Trubetskoy in the courtyard of the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. 1900s

The bronze sculpture “Moscow Cab Driver” (1898, State Russian Museum) is the first work performed in Russia. The genre composition seems to be traditional in plot. Similar everyday scenes were encountered more than once in the works of Russian sculptors - E. A. Lanseray and L. V. Posen. For Trubetskoy, this was the embodiment of the first Russian impressions, without contemplative ethnography, with captivating sincerity, special plastic expressiveness of soft, “flowing” forms.

Moscow cab driver. Bronze (1898)

Trubetskoy’s talent turns out to be so bright and unusual that the works of a very young sculptor begin to appear at exhibitions and attract attention.

Paolo Troubetzkoy (1866-1938). Prince Meshcherskiy (ca. 1895). Verbania-Pallanza, Italy.

Mrs. Hernheimer. 1897 Bronze. Tretyakov Gallery

Portrait of Grand Duchess Elizaveta Feodorovna, 1899

Portrait of Princess M. N. Gagarina." Gypsum. 1898

Trubetskoy’s works, which appeared at exhibitions, aroused sharp criticism from conservative circles of the St. Petersburg Academy, who saw in his innovative method a violation of “classical” canons, and attracted the attention of leading representatives of the Russian public, the artistic intelligentsia. The sculptor meets and becomes close to I. E. Repin, I. I. Levitan, F. I. Chaliapin. .

Portrait of Isaac Levitan (1899, State Russian Museum)

P.P. Trubetskoy sculpts Princess Tenisheva on her estate Talashkino near Smolensk. 1899

A great friendship connected Trubetskoy with L.N. Tolstoy. Tall, large, extraordinary person physical strength, who tenderly loves animals, aroused the writer’s keenest sympathy. According to the testimony of L. N. Tolstoy’s secretary, V. A. Bulgakov, “the sculptor Paolo Trubetskoy... belonged to Lev Nikolaevich’s favorites... He loved him for his simple open soul, truthfulness, hatred of secular conventions, love of animals, vegetarianism ". Lev Nikolayevich willingly posed for him and talked with him in the sculptor’s workshop and at home in Yasnaya Polyana.

From April 15 to April 23, 1898, he models a bust of the writer: “In the evening, Prince Trubetskoy, a sculptor living, born and raised in Italy, visited us. Amazing man: extraordinarily talented, but completely primitive. He didn’t read anything, he didn’t even know War and World Wars, he didn’t study anywhere, he was naive, rude and completely absorbed in his art. Tomorrow he will come to sculpt Lev Nikolaevich and will have lunch with us.” On December 9/10, Trubetskoy visits the Tolstoys again, together with Repin. On May 5, 1899, Tolstoy, in a letter to Chertkov, refers to Trubetskoy, justifying the delay in completing the novel Resurrection caused by new changes in the manuscript: “The fact is that, as an intelligent portrait painter, the sculptor Trubetskoy<ой>, is busy only with conveying the facial expression - the eyes, so for me the main thing is the spiritual life expressed in the scenes. And I couldn’t help but rework these scenes.” A little more than a decade later, in early March 1909, Trubetskoy created two more sculptures of the writer - Tolstoy on horseback and a small figurine. From August 29 to 31, Trubetskoy models a bust of Tolstoy. The last time he stayed with his wife in Yasnaya Polyana was from May 29 to June 12, 1910; he paints a portrait of Tolstoy in oil, creates two sketches in pencil and is engaged in the sculpture “Tolstoy on Horseback.” On June 20, the writer again expresses the opinion that Trubetskoy is very talented.

Portrait of L.N. Tolstoy. 1899. Bronze
S.A. Tolstaya wrote:
“Best of all is a small bust with folded hands by Trubetskoy.”

Paolo Troubetzkoy (1866-1938). Lev Tolstoy (ca. 1898). Verbania-Pallanza, Italy

Lev Tolstoy a cavallo (1899).

P.P. Trubetskoy sculpts Leo Tolstoy in his office in Khamovniki. 1898, State Museum L.N. Tolstoy, Moscow

Prince Trubetskoy, sculptor, sculpts a portrait of L.N. Tolstoy, Gorbunov reads aloud to him

Trubetskoy P.P. and Tolstoy L.N. (work on a bust of Tolstoy L.N., 1898)

One evening I was informed that my friends, the Trubetskoy ladies, had come to us along with their cousin, the sculptor Paolo Trubetskoy. I've already heard a lot about him. He was a great original. His childhood and youth passed in Milan. Living in Italy, Trubetskoy never visited museums. He was a strict vegetarian. His mother was an American from the southern states. He himself did not speak Russian. They claimed that Trubetskoy is very talented and his name is widely known abroad.
I was looking forward to it. Everything related to art has always interested me very much.
I saw a tall, shy and silent young man, but with eyes that seemed to stare into everything that came into their field of vision.
Trubetskoy's first conversation with my father was funny.
“I haven’t read anything from your books,” said Trubetskoy.
“And they did well,” the father remarked.
- But I read your article about the dangers of tobacco, I wanted to quit smoking.
- So how is it?
- And so: I read the article and continue to smoke.
And both interlocutors laughed.
At first glance, Trubetskoy was captivated by his father’s appearance and watched his every move and gesture. The artist passionately studied his future model, discovering in it what was needed to create a sculpture.
By nature, my father was modest and shy. Feeling the guest's gaze on him, he became increasingly embarrassed.
“I understand now,” he whispered to me, “what you women should experience when someone is in love with you.” How embarrassing!
To escape the gaze of his guest, the father decided to go to... the bathhouse. He loudly announced this to everyone present. And suddenly I saw how Trubetskoy perked up.
“And I, Lev Nikolaevich, will go with you, if you allow me.”
Seeing his model without covers was an unexpected success for the sculptor. He beamed with joy.
The father was horrified.
“No,” he said, “I’ll go to the bathhouse another time.” It's a very cold evening today...
As you know, Trubetskoy made several busts and figurines of Tolstoy. Perhaps these are the most successful creations of the great sculptor.

Fat Tatyana. Memories

Tolstoy L.N., Tolstaya S.A., to the right of L.N. Trubetskoy P.P., guests (1898)

Tolstoy L.N. and Trubetskoy (on a horseback ride)

Trubetskoy (prince, sculptor) sculpts L.N. Tolstoy (not in the photo), with his wife

Looking at his portrait works, one can be convinced that Trubetskoy’s “picturesque”, whimsical and sketchy treatment of sculptural form relates, as a rule, primarily to the depiction of clothes. Even in small figurines, Trubetskoy’s human faces are worked out carefully and quite clearly. These are his works “S. Yu. Witte with a setter" (1901), "Gagarin with her daughter", "Model Dunya" (1912) and others.

Portrait of Princess M.N. Gagarina with her daughter Marina, 1898

Model (Dunya) (1900)

Portrait of Sergei Witte with a setter, 1901

M.S. Botkin. 1901 Bronze. Tretyakov Gallery

Most of Trubetskoy's works are characterized by great lyricism and warmth. The latter applies not only to portrait figurines, but also to a number of excellent images of children and animals, as well as typical genre compositions.

LAPON, SON RENNE ET SES CHIENS Moscow (1899, Art Institute of Chicago).

Friends, 1901

Children (N.S. and V.S. Troubetzkoys) (1900, State Russian Museum)

Abbraccio materno 1898

Trubetskoy shows his works at exhibitions of the World of Art, the Union of Russian Artists, and at foreign shows, including International exhibition in Paris in 1900, where his works were awarded a medal of honor.

In 1900, Trubetskoy won the competition to create a monument to Alexander III among such famous sculptors, like R. R. Bakh, V. A. Beklemishev, A. M. Opekushin, M. A. Chizhov, A. L. Ober, A. O. Tomishko.

The competition program stipulated that the king was depicted sitting on a throne.

Trubetskoy did not like this, and, together with the sketch corresponding to the announcement of the competition, he submitted another sketch showing the Tsar sitting on a horse. This second model delighted the Tsar's widow, and thus Trubetskoy received an order for 150,000 rubles.

Trubetskoy’s sketch with Shekhtel’s pedestal, quadrangular in plan, was approved. Bas-reliefs were placed on both sides of the pedestal, explaining the meaning and purpose of the monument.

The master did a tremendous amount of preliminary work. He made eight small models, two life-size and two on the scale of the monument itself. The sculptor treated its creation as a historical mission that fell to his lot. “How could I dare,” he said, “to take on such a monument if I were not sure that I would make a masterpiece. Have no doubt, it will be the most beautiful statue in the world.”

“They reproach me,” he said another time, “that I seem to have not finished my work, that there is a lot of unfinished work in it. I think this reproach is unfounded. Everyone understands the completeness of a given work in their own way. There is nothing classical in the monument - it is a completely ideological monument. Negative attitude I am inclined to explain the attitude towards me from the public to a large extent by a certain originality, novelty... It is all the more understandable that the people of St. Petersburg are not at all accustomed to a new word in this field of art...” “They reproach me,” the sculptor complained, “for a fat horse. But I had to choose a heavy horse for the monument, taking into account the heroic figure of the king. Regarding the question of what I was striving for - portraiture or expression famous idea, - then in in this case I, of course, pursued both goals, because without portraiture there can be no monument, and without a symbol there can be no work of art. I wanted to represent the great Russian power in the image of Alexander III, and it seems to me that the entire figure of the emperor on my monument embodies my main idea.”

Many members of the imperial family were against the installation of the monument, considering it a caricature. The sculptor himself joked: “My goal is to depict one animal on another.”

Russian criticism very often ascribed to Trubetskoy’s works features that were not originally characteristic of them. First of all, this affected the monument to Alexander III. From the words allegedly said by the author that in this work he set himself the task of depicting one animal on another, far-reaching conclusions were drawn. According to the ingrained habit of interpreting works of plastic arts from literary platforms that are more understandable to society, in this monument for a long time tried to guess some hidden deep and critically bold content. Trubetskoy said quite sincerely that he was fundamentally alien to politics, as well as any social problems. It was pointless to look for criticism in the monument to the emperor, because the author really wanted to please royal family and win the competition. In addition, it is known that the sculptor treated animals almost better than people. Therefore, even if he actually uttered the above words, he put a very simple meaning into them. In the monument to Alexander III, Trubetskoy decided to boldly artistic task the relationship between two large sculptural masses at the moment of stopping movement. To portray this relationship truthfully is a more than sufficient task for work of art and, of course, more meaningful and capacious than simply declaring with a monument that the tsar was a tyrant (which, by the way, he was not).

Only thanks to the unexpected favor of the Dowager Empress, who was touched by the portrait resemblance, was the work allowed to be completed

The casting of the monument in bronze lasted more than a year and a half. The opening of the monument took place on May 23, 1909.

Opening of the monument to Alexander III on May 23, 1909 on Znamenskaya (Vosstaniya) Square in St. Petersburg. In 1937, the monument was removed under the pretext of reconstruction of the square and placed for storage in the courtyard of the Russian Museum. On November 9, 1994 it was installed in the courtyard of the Marble Palace. Sculptor: Trubetskoy

P.P. Trubetskoy at the monument to Emperor Alexander III in St. Petersburg. 1909 Photo archive of the Landscape Museum, Verbania, Pallanza

The appearance of the monument to Alexander III in St. Petersburg in 1909 caused a storm of controversy, discussions, and different interpretations. “Disgraced Monument”, “Greatness and Vulgarity” - the titles of newspaper articles eloquently determined the public’s assessment. But there were also a lot of positive reviews.

Ilya Efimovich Repin, with his characteristic temperament, exclaims to the author of the monument: “Bravo, bravo, Trubetskoy! Charming! Congratulations to Russia... what courage, breadth..."

However, the ruling circles were not happy with the finished creation: the opening date of the monument (May 1909) was announced to the artist so late that he could not get to the celebration on time.

N. B. Nordman left a description of these events in her book Intimate pages. One of the chapters, dated June 17, 1909, is called: “Letter to a friend. A day about Trubetskoy." Nordman describes how he and Repin arrive in St. Petersburg and go to the hotel where Trubetskoy is staying, and how at first they cannot find him.

Together with Trubetskoy, they all “fly by tram” to inspect the monument: “A spontaneous, powerful creation, enveloped in the freshness of a brilliant work!!” After visiting the monument, have breakfast at the hotel. Trubetskoy remains himself here too. He immediately, in his incorrect Russian language, in his usual manner, uses vegetarianism:

“ — Maitre d'hotel, eh! Maitre d'hotel!?

Butler bows respectfully to Trubetskoy.

- Did you cook the dead man here? In this soup? ABOUT! The nose hears... a corpse!

We all look at each other. Oh, those preachers! They, like statues in Egypt at feasts, speak and remind us of what we don’t want to think about in the ordinary forms of our life. And why is this about corpses eating? Everyone is confused. They don't know what to choose from the map.

And so they order together. And Trubetskoy laughs with a childish smile. He's in good spirits.

ABOUT! I'm never invited to dinner in Paris anymore. I'm boring everyone with my preaching!! ....

I.E. Repin, sculptor Paolo Trubetskoy with his wife at the croquet court

Later, Repin arranges a banquet for his friend Trubetskoy at the Contan restaurant. About two hundred invitations were sent, but “in all of St. Petersburg there were only 20 people who wanted to honor the world famous artist." They kept silent about him for a long time, “until finally Diaghilev brought his things and introduced the Russians to him!” Repin in empty hall delivers a lively speech, and he also hints at Trubetskoy’s lack of education, deliberate and consciously cultivated. The best monument to Dante in Italy was created by Trubetskoy. “They asked him - you probably know every line of Heaven and Hell by heart?...I’ve never read Dante in my life!” How does he teach his students, Repin asks rhetorically, “after all, he speaks Russian poorly. - Yes, he teaches only one thing - when you sculpt, he says, you must understand where it is soft and where it is hard. - That's it! Where is soft and where is hard! What depth in this remark!!! those. soft - muscle, hard - bone. Anyone who understands this has a sense of form, but for a sculptor that’s everything.” At the 1900 exhibition in Paris, the jury unanimously awarded Trubetskoy the grand prix for his work. He is an era in sculpture...

I.E.REPIN Portrait of P.P. Trubetskoy. (1908, Fragment National Gallery contemporary art, Rome)

The construction of the monument summed up Trubetskoy’s work in Russia. About fifty easel works were created by Trubetskoy in Russia. This was an unusually fruitful period of his work.

In St. Petersburg he met the Swede Elin Sandström (Sundström), who became his wife (their son Pierre died in 1908 at the age of two). In 1905 he moved with his wife to Finland.

Paolo Troubetzkoy (1866-1938). "My wife" Portrait of a wife (ca. 1911). Verbania-Pallanza, Italy.

Bronze bust of boy (sculptor's son Pierre) Portrait of a son (1915)

In 1906-1914 he lived in Paris. At the Paris Salon of 1906, Trubetskoy exhibited expressive portrait Auguste Rodin, an image of the exquisite Madame Decorie, a portrait of Armand Deyo, of whom Rodin said: “magnificent.”

Paolo Troubetzkoy (Pavel Trubetskoy) Portrait sculpture of Auguste Rodin. Cantor Arts Center of Stanford University in Palo Alto, California

Critics stated that Trubetskoy brought his specific genre of “portrait-statuette” to Paris. However, this was the last surge of widespread interest in Trubetskoy’s work. In the West, not only favorable reviews have already been heard. Other statements addressed to him also appeared: “light, immature”, “sculptor of the aristocratic nobility.”

Paolo Troubetzkoy (1866-1938). A Lady wearing a hat (1905-1909). Verbania-Pallanza, Italy.

Seated lady. 1909

Model posing for P.P. Trubetskoy in his workshop. Photo archive of the Landscape Museum, Verbania, Pallanza

Every year he traveled to Italy, visited Sweden and England, and visited Russia. He painted portraits of many European aristocrats and celebrities, including A. France, B. Shaw, A. Zorn. Commissioned by the Uffizi Gallery, he created a self-portrait (1912). He worked on competitive projects for monuments to Alexander II for St. Petersburg (1910) and in honor of the 300th anniversary of the House of Romanov for Kostroma (1912), created a bronze monument-bust to the Chairman of the 1st State Duma S. A. Muromtsov at the Donskoy Monastery cemetery in Moscow (1912).

"Prince Paul Troubetskoy II," by the Swedish artist Anders Leonard Zorn, etching. 9 11/16 in. x 7 in. Yale University Art Gallery, G. Allen Smith Collection. Courtesy of Yale University, New Haven, Conn..

"TROUBETZKOY" red chalk drawing on paper
Joaquin Sorolla Y Bastida. Probably it is a self portrait by Troubetzkoy and the Sorolla signature was added later

In 1910, Trubetskoy was elected an honorary member of the TPHV; In addition, he was a member of the Milan Academy of Arts and a regular participant in the Paris Autumn Salon.

In 1911-1912 he visited the USA for the second time. He held solo exhibitions in New York (1911, Hispanic Society of America and Albright Art Gallery) and in Chicago (1912, Art Institute). Christian Brinton wrote a long introductory article for the New York exhibition catalogue. During the trip, he painted a portrait of naval officer F.-D. Roosevelt - the future president. Upon returning to Italy, he bought a rural house in Suna di Novara near Pallanza.

When Trubetskoy exhibited his works at the Roman Secession in 1913, they no longer aroused much interest. Critics wrote that Trubetskoy works in the spirit of “outdated impressionism.”

Paolo Troubetzkoy (1866-1938). Bust of a Lady (ca. 1910). Verbania-Pallanza, Italy

Paolo Troubetzkoy (1866-1938), Elin Troubetzkoy (1910-11). Verbania-Pallanza, Italy.

In 1914, the sculptor travels to the USA. Trubetskoy intended to spend several months in America, but because of the war he stayed until 1921. Lived in Los Angeles and Hollywood; Portraited movie stars, sculpted figures of Indians and cowboys.

Indian chief

Trubetskoy is building a large studio in Hollywood and buying a small house. He is visited by E. Caruso, M. Pickford, D. Fairbanks, C. Chaplin. In 1919, according to Trubetskoy’s design, a monument to Dante was erected in San Francisco, and in 1920, a monument to General Harrison Gray Otis was erected in Los Angeles. He has held solo exhibitions in New York, Detroit, Toledo, Philadelphia and San Francisco. “In these crazy years, he remains a sculptor of pretty women,” writes J. S. Grioni

Ballerina

Margaret Draper with her dog, 1921

In 1921 he returned to Paris. In 1927, his Swedish wife, Elin Sundström, dies. Trubetskoy experiences her death painfully; he almost committed suicide. He spent his summer every year at a villa in Ca Bianca in Suna di Novara, where he finally settled in 1932 (five years after the death of his wife). He spent his last years traveling between Pallanza and Milan (both cities now have streets named after him).

In 1921 he held a personal exhibition at the Georges Petit gallery in Paris, where 60 of his latest works were presented. In 1922 he created an obelisk to the soldiers who fell in I World War, for Pallanza (the monument is an idealized portrait of the sculptor’s wife with her deceased son).

Verbania-Pallanza. World War I mwemorial, modelled by Paolo Troubetzkoy in 1922

In the same year his big personal exhibition(37 plaster, bronze and marble sculptures) in one of the halls of the Exhibition Palace of the XIII Venice Biennale. At the XV Venice Biennale (1926), among the six sculptures he showed was a bronze bust of Benito Mussolini. In 1924, his exhibition took place at the Charpentier Gallery in Paris.

In 1932, Trubetskoy returned to Italy. He took part in exhibitions of Russian artists in Paris - in the galleries d’Alignan (1931) and La Renaissance (1932). Among the works last period- statues of G. Puccini in front of his House Museum in Torre del Lago and in the La Scala theater in Milan.

Giacomo Puccini

Bronze sculpture -Giacomo Puccini.1925

Paolo Troubetzkoy (1866-1938). George Bernard Shaw. Verbania-Pallanza, Italy.

P.P. Trubetskoy sculpts a portrait of Bernard Shaw. 1926 Photo archive of the Landscape Museum, Verbania, Pallanza

Lady Standing, 1927

The sculptor traveled to Egypt (1934) and Spain (1935) with exhibitions of his works. In the last months of his life, due to the physical impossibility of sculpting, he turned to painting and painted several portraits. The master's last work was the figure of Christ mourning humanity, which does evil.

Doroshevich Vlas Mikhailovich.Paolo Trubetskoy(Excerpts)

Let me introduce you:
- Prince Paolo Troubetzkoy.
Giving a huge hand, this one huge man, with a huge forehead and a childish expression on his face, of course, will not tell you:
- Sculptor!
It would be unnecessary.
But he is tempted to recommend:
- Vegetarian.
This is his way of life and occupation.
- What do you do?
- Vegetarianism.
But the maid has already reported:
- Madame est servie!
(The action takes place in Paris, where Trubetskoy lives.)
You are welcome to the dining room.
Separate preparations were made for Trubetskoy.
Vegetarian.
He asked in advance.
With childish touching:
- Just please don’t put meat broth in anything.
- I swear!
He has not yet reached that “highest level” on which our invaluable L.N. stands. Tolstoy.
They say that when Tolstoy was ill, at the insistence of the doctor, chicken broth was slowly poured into his soup.
Lev Nikolaevich became seasick. His body itself can no longer tolerate anything:
- Corpse.
This is the highest level.
Trubetskoy has not arrived yet and is afraid to meet him.
But he is so strict!
We conducted preliminary negotiations.
- Can I have fish?
- Fish?!
He hesitated.
- It’s better, if possible, without fish.
-Can you cook with butter? He hesitated here too.
- Better in Provençal. They serve it to him:
- Strictly vegetarian.
We, the rest, eat our “sinful” food.
The soup goes well.
But when they serve veal, Trubetskoy asks indignantly:
- Don’t you hate eating a corpse?
And he begins to tell in detail, picturesquely, how the calf is killed, how it suffers.
Knives and forks are slower.
- Gentlemen, more! - the hostess calls out in despair. Nobody wants.
White "duck in Rouen" - the pride of a French cook! - carried away untouched.
The duck, so that the “precious” blood remained in it, was not slaughtered, but strangled.
- Shame on you? - Trubetskoy thunders and describes the duck’s torment. His wife stops him in vain.
He jumped on his horse and preached, preached, preached. Dinners “with Trubetskoy” often end in the ladies’ tears and even hysterics!
But that doesn't mean anything!
Trubetskoy “converted” several people at the table.
I'll give it more often.
Several ladies thought:
- Really?
And they decided to become vegetarians. Trubetskoy is triumphant. The day is not lost. I didn't have lunch for nothing!
The mistress of the house herself, at first frowning, was eventually moved, convinced and announced:
- I am also a vegetarian from today! Let's say she has a cold duck for dinner. But this “means nothing.”
This:
- Last time!
We get up from the table, thanks to Trubetskoy, quite hungry.
Let's go to the living room.
And Trubetskoy continues... preaching vegetarianism.
He is expected to talk about art.
He talks about vegetarianism.
He is the apostle of vegetarianism.
Vegetarians are his homemade ones. Vegetarians are his servants.
And he even made his dogs vegetarians!
But then a blow to his heart awaited him.
He has extremely original dogs, from Siberia.
In my opinion, these are just tamed wolves.
And Paolo Trubetskoy taught them:
- Eat exclusively plant foods. His triumph knew no bounds.
- Meat is only a bad habit for dogs. He showed everyone his “wolves”.
- Look! How healthy! And full! And vegetarians!
But one morning he saw how the cooks of the house next to his workshop were feeding his vegetarian dogs “out of pity” with bones and leftover meat.
And the “vegetarians” devoured the “slaughter” by both cheeks.
At the sight of such treachery, Trubetskoy only exclaimed:
- Che bestie!
But to whom this applied - to hypocritical dogs or to people “seducing” them - is unknown.
In any case, Trubetskoy hated the neighboring cook, like Saint Eve.
At the end of the conversation, he says that he is going to write:
- A book about vegetarianism.
After this, no one will eat meat.
- It is so simple. Everyone will understand. The book has been written for ten years.
But maybe someday Trubetskoy, who doesn’t read any books, will write his own.

This is a "child of nature." He probably never read Rousseau.
But Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “a great admirer of nature,” would probably be delighted with him:
- That's ideal!
King Lear would say about him:
- This is man as he came from the hands of nature. There is neither knowledge from books nor infection from art!
Trubetskoy sculpted Tolstoy. Tolstoy was interested:
-Have you read any of my works? Trubetskoy answered simply and frankly:
- No.
Lev Nikolaevich has just received a French translation of his work:
"About Art".
- Here. Would you like to read it? This might interest you. The next day Tolstoy asked:
- Well? Have you read it?
- I read two pages.
- Did not like?
- Asleep.
Tolstoy burst out laughing.
And, it seems, he finally fell in love with Trubetskoy.
Trubetskoy finds that too many books have been written.
- It just clogs your brain.
Books prevent people from seeing things as they are:
- With my own eyes.
Regarding some equestrian statue of Trubetskoy, they reproached that the horse looked like Garibaldi’s horse:
- On the famous monument in Rome. Trubetskoy answered innocently:
- I haven’t seen it.
And this is more than possible.
This is certain.
Trubetskoy passes by sculptural works, the most famous, without even being interested in looking at them.
You can meet him everywhere except art exhibition, gallery, museum.
Not a single layman has seen less sculpture than Trubetskoy.
Looking at a sculpture is harmful for a sculptor.
This makes it difficult to “see objects as they are”:
- With my own eyes!
- What do I care about how Michelangelo conveyed nature? I must convey it the way I see it.
He recognizes neither teachers nor students. There is only one teacher - life. The only one for him:
- Sculpture gallery - street.
- Every person is a moving sculpture. The artists' mistake is that:
- They try to sculpt like others: “like the ancients,” “like Michelangelo,” “like Rodin.”
Coming out:
- Copies.
Like, for example, ... Canova. Such works:
- Not needed.
Everyone must bring:
- Yours. Sculpt:
- As he sees it.
Trubetskoy was made a teacher at the school of painting and sculpture. He was the most original teacher in the world.
- I taught everything I knew. How to mix clay, how to strengthen the frame so that the statue does not fall. And then: “Sculpt as you know!” That's all what I know. The rest, I see. What can I teach him here? I don't know how he sees. He can't see like me.
- But this is a preaching of ignorance?
- Independence! - he says.
But it’s good that nature wanted to endow her “child” with a genius instinct.
Trubetskoy hates opera.
The combination of words and music is disgusting to him, like a painted statue
- Music that needs to be explained in words is not music.
- These are two different arts.
- Music is an independent art, it must express everything through its own means.
And this fact is cited as proof.
He heard that Beethoven's "Eroic Symphony" exists.
But I have never heard the symphony itself.
One day in Milan he went to an afternoon Toscanini symphony concert.
Without looking at the poster.
Without taking the program.
After several works that “didn’t say anything” to him, he heard something like this...
- Music!
Something that made his hair stand on end.
- Was it the “Eroic Symphony”? - he turned to his neighbor. He looked at him in surprise:
- Yes.
- You see! - Trubetskoy adds triumphantly. Therefore, no words, no programs, no posters are needed. Extra.
- Everyone will recognize the “Heroic Symphony” anyway.
- But in music there are not only “heroic symphonies”!
- And no one needs this.
This is one of those people who do not leave offspring in art.
Nugget.
It all started with them, and it will all end with them.
But he is sure that if people:
- If we didn’t clog our brains with other people’s thoughts - art, literature - everything would become brilliant.
People would become interesting. They would write and sculpt:
- In my own way.
It would always be original, often interesting, sometimes brilliant.

His little weaknesses as an artist and inevitable thorns... Trubetskoy does not like to sculpt naked bodies.
Perhaps because in his art gallery, where he studies - on the street - there is no naked people. They said about him:
- He doesn’t like it, because he doesn’t know how.
- Sewing jackets and dresses from clay is one thing. And the naked body is the most difficult thing.
“In refutation” Trubetskoy sculpted... a naked Chaliapin. The original remains original here too. A real "Roman gladiator" has emerged. Exemplary body sculpting.
In Trubetskoy’s workshop I found him at work: he was sculpting a figurine from a naked model.
Probably the second "refutation".
There you are!
Male body, female.
And, having fashioned two “refutations,” Trubetskoy set about “his own”:
- Sculpt what he sees and how he sees it. "Point" of this sculptor:
- Painting!
- I would like to take your portrait! - says Trubetskoy to the lady. The lady is beaming.
Sculpt Trubetskoy!
-Would you be so kind as to pose for me?
- Oh, chermaitre!
- I'll write you in three quarters.
-Will you write?!
- Yes, I’m painting now. The lady is oxidizing.
Three quarters are not.
And in vain.
Trubetskoy is an excellent painter.
Even in the sculpture of him, someone is saying something, - and he will add:
- For some reason! - learned.
He is self-taught in painting.
And excellent.
This brings this stubborn man to indescribable delight:
- See? You don't need to study art.

Trubetskoy Pavel (Paolo) Petrovich (Prince) Gagarin Nikolai Viktorovich (son of Prince V.N. Gagarin)

Trubetskoy Pavel (Paolo) Petrovich. Elizaveta Feodorovna (Grand Duchess, nun, saint) (Early 1890s, State Tretyakov Gallery).

Pavel Petrovich Trubetskoy (1866-1938) Title “Wedding Day” (1922)

“One day, walking past a slaughterhouse in Intra [a town on Lago Maggiore], I saw a calf being killed. My soul was filled with such horror and indignation that from then on I abandoned solidarity with the murderers: from then on I became a vegetarian.

I assure you that I can completely do without steaks and roasts, my conscience is now much clearer, since killing animals is truly barbaric. Who gave this person the right to do this? Humanity would stand much higher if it learned to respect animals. But they must be respected seriously, not like members of animal welfare societies, who sometimes protect them on the streets and enjoy the taste of their meat in their canteens.

But you are promoting, prince!

I would do it willingly. I have long wanted to give a lecture on this topic. There were so many good things to say. And it would be so nice to win! At present I am not engaged in any work, but for some time now I have been filled with the thought of a monument to humanity, renewed by the great ideal of respect for nature.

Symbolic monument?

Yes. This would be the 2nd of all my many works, since I do not like symbols, but, sometimes, they are inevitable. And the second mi fu inspirato dal vegetarianismo (I am inspired by vegetarianism): I called it “Les mangeurs de cadavres” (Corpse Eaters). On one side there is a rough, vulgar man devouring the carrion that has passed through the kitchen, and a little lower a hyena digging up a corpse to satisfy his hunger. One does this for bestial satisfaction - and is called a man; the second does this to maintain its life, does not kill, but uses carrion and is called a hyena.”

I also made an inscription, but this, you know, is for those who are looking for “similarities.”

This conversation took place in Nervi near Genoa and was published in 1909 in Corriere de la sera (Milan). It contains a story about a “turning point”, about an internal “rebirth” in Trubetskoy’s life. That in 1899 similar case took place, we also know from the memoirs of Trubetskoy’s brother, Luigi, who report the same event in a more detailed form, so that the shock experienced by Trubetskoy will become even clearer: after all, he happened to witness the total exploitation of an animal - as working and slaughter cattle.

Prince Peter (Paolo) Petrovich Trubetskoy, descended from a famous Russian noble family, spent almost his entire life in the West and therefore had only a weak knowledge of the Russian language - he spoke Russian with a strong accent. He was born in Intra in 1866 and died in 1938 in the town of Suna, also located above Lago Maggiore. According to the Italian art critic Rossana Bossaglia, he was a fascinating personality - coming from the Russian nobility, seamlessly integrating into the Italian culture of the Lago Maggiore region and consistently applying his moral ideas and a vegetarian lifestyle. On the threshold of the twentieth century, he was invited as a professor at the Moscow Art Academy - “a completely new figure in Russian art. Everything about him was new: starting with his appearance and belonging to the famous family of princes Trubetskoy. “Tall”, “beautiful appearance”, with good manners and “savoir faire”, and at the same time an emancipated and modest artist, free from secular decency, with European education, who allowed himself to have original hobbies (such as: keeping in your studio of animals and animals and be a vegetarian<…>" Despite his Moscow professorship, Trubetskoy worked mainly in Paris: he was influenced by Rodin, and he himself painted pictures of impressionist liveliness, primarily in bronze - portraits, figurines, genre compositions and images of animals.

His sculpture Divoratori di cadaveri, created in 1900, which he subsequently donated to the Lombard Society for the Protection of Animals, was the only one to which he ever gave a name. She shows a table on which there is a bowl with a pig; A man sits at the table, devouring cutlets. At the bottom it says: “Contra natura” (contro natura); nearby there is a model of a hyena that rushed at dead human body. Below is the inscription: According to the laws of nature (secondo natura) (ill. ыы). According to V. F. Bulgakov, Tolstoy’s last secretary, in a book with memoirs and stories about Tolstoy, the Moscow Tolstoy Museum in 1921 or 1922, through the mediation of P. I. Biryukov, received as a gift two small tinted plaster figurines expressing the idea of ​​vegetarianism: one of the figurines depicted a hyena devouring a dead chamois, and another of an incredibly obese man greedily destroying a roast pig lying on a platter - apparently these were preliminary studies for two large sculptures. The latter were exhibited at the Milan Autumn Salon of 1904, as can be read in an article from the Corriere della Sera of October 29. This double sculpture, also known as “Divoratori di cadaveri”, “has the goal of directly promoting his vegetarian beliefs, which the author has mentioned more than once: hence the obvious penchant for the grotesque, which permeates the figuration and is unique in Trubetskoy’s work.”

Trubetskoy “was raised in his mother’s religion, in Protestantism,” his friend Luigi Lupano wrote in 1954. “Religion, however, was never a problem for him, although we talked about it during our meetings at Cabianca; but he was a man of deep kindness and a passionate believer in life; his respect for life led him to a vegetarian lifestyle, which was not flat pietism for him, but a confirmation of his enthusiasm for every living creature. Many of the sculptures were intended to directly moralize and convince the public of a vegetarian diet. He reminded me that his friends Leo Tolstoy and Bernard Shaw were vegetarians, and he was flattered that he managed to persuade the great Henry Ford to become a vegetarian.” Trubetskoy portrayed Shaw in 1927, and Tolstoy several times between 1898 and 1910.

It is likely that Trubetskoy's first visits to Tolstoy's Moscow home in the spring and fall of 1898, during which he saw vegetarianism in praxi, prepared the way for the decisive moment in Trubetskoy's life, which he experienced in the city of Intra in 1899. From April 15 to April 23, 1898, he models a bust of the writer: “In the evening, Prince Trubetskoy, a sculptor living, born and raised in Italy, visited us. An amazing person: extraordinarily talented, but completely primitive. He didn’t read anything, he didn’t even know War and World Wars, he didn’t study anywhere, he was naive, rude and completely absorbed in his art. Tomorrow he will come to sculpt Lev Nikolaevich and will have lunch with us.” On December 9/10, Trubetskoy visits the Tolstoys again, together with Repin. On May 5, 1899, Tolstoy, in a letter to Chertkov, refers to Trubetskoy, justifying the delay in completing the novel Resurrection caused by new changes in the manuscript: “The fact is that, as an intelligent portrait painter, the sculptor Trubetskoy<ой>, is busy only with conveying the facial expression - the eyes, so for me the main thing is the spiritual life expressed in the scenes. And I couldn’t help but rework these scenes.” A little more than a decade later, in early March 1909, Trubetskoy created two more sculptures of the writer - Tolstoy on horseback and a small figurine. From August 29 to 31, Trubetskoy models a bust of Tolstoy. The last time he stayed with his wife in Yasnaya Polyana was from May 29 to June 12, 1910; he paints a portrait of Tolstoy in oil, creates two sketches in pencil and is engaged in the sculpture “Tolstoy on Horseback.” On June 20, the writer again expresses the opinion that Trubetskoy is very talented.

According to V.F. Bulgakov, who spoke with Trubetskoy at that time, the latter was then a “vegan” and denied dairy products: “Why do we need milk? Are we too young to drink milk? It’s only the little ones who drink milk.”

When the first Vegetarian Bulletin began to be published in 1904, Trubetskoy became a co-publisher of the magazine from the February issue, which he remained until last issue(No. 5, May 1905).

People in the West knew about Trubetskoy’s special love for animals. Friedrich Jankowski in his philosophy of vegetarianism (Philosophie des Vegetarismus, Berlin, 1912) in the chapter “the essence of the artist and nutrition” (“Das Wesen des Kunstlers und der Ernahrung”) reports that Trubetskoy in his art is naturalistic and in general a secular person, but lives strictly vegetarian and, not paying attention to the Parisians, makes noise on the streets and in restaurants with his tamed wolves.” “Trubetskoy’s successes and the glory he achieved,” wrote P. in 1988. Castagnoli, “form a unity with the fame that the artist received for his adamant decision in favor of vegetarianism and with the love with which he took animals under his protection. Dogs, deer, horses, wolves, elephants appear among the artist’s favorite subjects.”

Trubetskoy had no literary ambitions. But his desire to advocate a vegetarian lifestyle was so great that he also expressed it in a three-act play on Italian“The Doctor from Another Planet” (“Il dottore di un altro planeta”). One copy of this text, which Trubetskoy gave to his brother Luigi in 1937, appeared in print for the first time in 1988. In the first act, a girl who has not yet lost respect for her brotherly creatures, whose sensitivity has not yet been spoiled by conventions, condemns hunting. In the second act, an elderly ex-convict tells his story (“Ecco la mia storia”). Fifty years ago he lived with his wife and three children: “We had many animals that we looked upon as members of the family. We ate the products of the earth, because we considered it a low and cruel crime to promote the mass murder of brothers so vilely killed, to bury their corpses in our stomachs and to satisfy the perverted and vile gluttony of the majority of humanity. The fruits of the earth were enough for us and we were happy.” And then one day the narrator witnesses how some driver on a steep, muddy road brutally beats his horse; he besieges him, the driver hits even more fiercely, slips and fatally hits a stone. The narrator wants to help him, but the police unfairly accuse him of murder. As you can see, what happened in the town of Intra is still palpable in this scene.

Trubetskoy was just over thirty years old when he took part in the competition for a monument to Alexander III.

The competition program stipulated that the king was depicted sitting on a throne. Trubetskoy did not like this, and, together with the sketch corresponding to the announcement of the competition, he submitted another sketch showing the Tsar sitting on a horse. This second model delighted the Tsar's widow, and thus Trubetskoy received an order for 150,000 rubles. However, the ruling circles were not happy with the finished creation: the opening date of the monument (May 1909) was announced to the artist so late that he could not get to the celebration on time.

A description of these events was left to us by N.B. Nordman in her book Intimate Pages. One of the chapters, dated June 17, 1909, is called: “Letter to a friend. A day about Trubetskoy." These, writes K.I. Chukovsky, are “charming pages.” Nordman describes how he and Repin arrive in St. Petersburg and go to the hotel where Trubetskoy is staying, and how at first they cannot find him. At the same time, Nordman met actress Lydia Borisovna Yavorskaya-Baryatinsky (1871-1921), founder of the New Drama Theater; Lydia Borisovna feels sorry for Trubetskoy. He's haggard! And so alone. “Everything, everything is decidedly against him.” Together with Trubetskoy, they all “fly by tram” to inspect the monument: “A spontaneous, powerful creation, enveloped in the freshness of a brilliant work!!” After visiting the monument, have breakfast at the hotel. Trubetskoy remains himself here too. He immediately, in his incorrect Russian language, in his usual manner, uses vegetarianism:

" - Maitre d'hotel, eh! Maitre d'hotel!?

Butler bows respectfully to Trubetskoy.

Did the dead man cook here? In this soup? ABOUT! The nose hears... a corpse!

We all look at each other. Oh, those preachers! They, like statues in Egypt at feasts, speak and remind us of what we don’t want to think about in the ordinary forms of our life. And why is this about corpses eating? Everyone is confused. They don't know what to choose from the map.

And Lydia Borisovna, with the tact of a woman’s soul, immediately takes Trubetskoy’s side.

You have infected me with your theories, and I will become a vegetarian with you!

And so they order together. And Trubetskoy laughs with a childish smile. He's in good spirits.

ABOUT! I'm never invited to dinner in Paris anymore. I'm boring everyone with my preaching!! Now I decided to talk to everyone about vegetarianism. The cab driver is taking me, and now I say to him: Est - ce que vous mangez des cadavres? Well, that's it, that's it.<…>Recently I went to buy furniture - and suddenly I started preaching and forgot why I came, and the owner forgot. We talked about vegetarianism, went to his garden and ate fruit. Now we are great friends, he is my follower... And I also sculpted a bust of a rich cattle dealer from America. The first session was silent. And on the second I ask - tell me, are you happy?

Is your conscience calm?

I have? Yes, and what, Well, it has begun!..."

Later, Repin arranges a banquet for his friend Trubetskoy at the Contan restaurant. About two hundred invitations were sent, but “in all of St. Petersburg there were only 20 people who wanted to honor the world-famous artist.” They kept silent about him for a long time, “until finally Diaghilev brought his things and introduced the Russians to him!” Repin gives a brisk speech in an empty hall, and he also hints at Trubetskoy’s lack of education, deliberate and consciously cultivated. The best monument to Dante in Italy was created by Trubetskoy. “He was asked - you probably know every line of Heaven and Hell by heart?...I have never read Dante in my life!” How does he teach his students, Repin asks rhetorically, “after all, he speaks Russian poorly. - Yes, he teaches only one thing - when you sculpt, he says, you must understand where it is soft and where it is hard. - That's it! Where is soft and where is hard! What depth in this remark!!! those. soft - muscle, hard - bone. Anyone who understands this has a sense of form, but for a sculptor that’s everything.” At the 1900 exhibition in Paris, the jury unanimously awarded Trubetskoy the grand prix for his work. He is an era in sculpture...

Trubetskoy, in French, thanks Repin for his speech - and at the same time immediately brings up questions of vegetarianism: “Je ne sais pas parler. Mais tout de meme je dirai que j'aime, j'adore la vie! Par amour pour cette vie je voudrais qu’on la respecte. Par respect pour la vie il ne faudrait pas tuer les betes comme on le fait maintenant. On ne fait que tuer, sapristi! Mais je dis partout et a chaque personne que je rencontre… Ne tuez pas. Respectez la vie! Et si vous ne faites que manger des cadavres - vous etes punis par les maladies qui vous donnent ces cadavres. Voila la seule punition que les pauvres animaux peuvent vous donner.” Everyone listens with frowns. Who loves sermons? Meat dishes become disgusting. “Oh! m oi j'aime la nature, je l'aime plus, que toute autre chose< …>Et voila mon monument acheve! Je suis content de mon travail. Il dit juste ce que je voulais – la vigueur et la vie! »

Repin’s exclamation “Bravo, bravo to Trubetskoy!” was quoted by newspapers. The genius of Trubetskoy’s monument made a deep impression on V.V. Rozanov; this monument made him “an enthusiast of Trubetskoy.” S. P. Diaghilev in 1901 or 1902, in the editorial office of the magazine World of Art, showed Rozanov the design of the monument. Subsequently, Rozanov dedicated an enthusiastic article “Paolo Trubezkoi and his monument to Alexander III”: “here, in this monument, we are all, all of our Rus' from 1881 to 1894.” Rozanov found this artist to be “a terribly gifted person,” brilliant, original and ignorant. Rozanov’s article, of course, does not talk about Trubetskoy’s love for nature and his vegetarian lifestyle.

The monument itself suffered a sad fate. Not only did the ruling circles around Nicholas II not favor him, but the Soviet authorities hid him in 1937, during Stalinism, in some backyard. Trubetskoy, famous for his animal sculptures, denied that the piece was intended as a political statement: “I just wanted to depict one animal on top of another.”

Tolstoy willingly allowed Trubetskoy to portray himself. He said about him: “What an eccentric, what a gift.” Trubetskoy not only admitted to him that he had not read War and Peace, he even forgot to take with him the editions of Tolstoy’s works, which he was given as a gift in Yasnaya Polyana. His group “symbolic” plasticity was known to Tolstoy. On June 20, 1910, Makovitsky writes: “L. N. started talking about Trubetskoy: “This Trubetskoy, a sculptor, a terrible supporter of vegetarianism, made a figurine of a hyena and a man and signed: “The hyena eats corpses, and the man himself kills...”.”

N.B. Nordman bequeathed to future generations Trubetskoy’s warning about the transfer of animal diseases to humans. The words: “vous etes punis par les maladies qui vous donnent ces cadavres” are not the only warning from pre-war Russia supposedly foreshadowing mad cow disease.

Based on materials from Peter Brang "Unknown Russia"

Portrait of the prince T. A. Trubetskoy - A. P. Antropov. 1761. Oil on canvas. 54x42

The heyday of Antropov's portrait art occurred in the 1750-1760s. During this period, many foreign portrait painters worked at the royal court - Toke, P. Rotary, and somewhat earlier Groot. The art of these masters, distinguished by its subtlety and grace of manner, was very popular.

Antropov’s pictorial style is close to the traditions of old Russian writing; it also contains features of parsun painting with the latter’s inherent flatness and some dryness of drawing. The artist’s art is marked by features of national identity. It attracts with its truthfulness and simplicity.

Antropov's portraits are simply constructed and painted with frank bright colors, they do not have the tenderness and beauty characteristic of the works of foreign masters. But they attract with accuracy and strength of characterization, with a healthy popular perception of the world.

“Without further ado,” Antropov depicts middle-aged and overweight, brightly colored court ladies, and with all frankness describes the completely unattractive appearance of Emperor Peter III. He accurately conveys the appearance, clothing, jewelry, insignia, but behind all this you can always feel a true and living image of a person.

It is these features that are remarkable and portrait of the prince Tatiana Alekseevna Trubetskoy. Brightly painted cheeks, filled eyebrows, a white wig decorated with a rose not only do not hide, but even enhance and emphasize the living charm of the round, rustic face of a Russian woman with a perky upturned nose and cheerful, lively eyes.

Antropov's work was an important stage in the formation of the realistic school of Russian portraiture.