"Portrait of Natasha Rambova" , By Artist Svetoslav Roerich | ArtLiveAndBeauty

"Portrait of Natasha Rambova" , Svyatoslav Roerich

  

 In the work of Svetoslav Roerich (1904-1993), female portraits occupy a special place. According to the artist: “... I am mainly interested in the character of a person. And I try to paint portraits of the people I know. Sometimes it’s quite easy to read a person’s character, but it’s better to get to know him, study him. ”
 
 It should be noted that almost always the artist Svetoslav Roerich chooses a model to his liking, and it is thanks to the feeling of sympathy that works of portraiture are born. The mutual understanding of the artist and the model, of course, was the basis of the creative process. The model is able to capture the mind of the master and turn him to the creation of a work of art.

 The best female portrait in Svetoslav Roerich's work, unsurpassed in mastery of execution, was "Portrait of Natasha Rambova". It was written in the spring of 1931, shortly before Svyatoslav Roerich moved to live in India. The painting depicts the American dancer Winifred Shaunnessy, who had the stage name Natasha Rambova in memory of her Russian teachers.
 
 Before the viewer appears a woman with a regal posture, in a golden brocade robe and turban. This is the appearance of a ruler equal to the Queen of Sheba. The oriental coloring of the portrait turns out to be like a prophecy of the author: he managed to make visible the actress's only nascent love for the East.
 
 It is known that after the end of her dancing career, she took up archeology, studied the Egyptian civilization of Luxor and became a brilliant star not only on stage, but also on the academic horizon.
 
 The solution is in bright colors, the drawing is concise, one can even talk about graphic, but without the slightest tendency to replace painting with dry schematics. Attracting attributions of bygone times and distant lands does not in the least push the model itself into the distant past. You have no doubt that this young, beautiful woman belongs to our twentieth century, and the East for her is still only a dream, and not an organically related life that has raised her.
 
 The portrait is executed in golden-pink tones with luminous tempera paints. The rich brocade of the dancer's clothes, with its golden heaviness, creates a contrast to the male figures moving in the dance in the background, which, as it were, hang in a pink, slightly purple fog, symbolizing the inner world of Natasha Rambova.

"Portrait of Natasha Rambova", Svyatoslav Roerich - 1931 Canvas, tempera. Size: 137.5 x 107 cm Nicholas Roerich Museum, New York