Alexander Yevgenyevich Yakovlev

Self-Portrait, 1917

Alexandre Jacovleff , Russian Александр Евгеньевич Яковлев , (born June 3 ^jul. / 15. June  1887 ^greg. In Saint Petersburg , Empire Russia ; † 12. May 1938 in Paris , France ) was a Russian-French painter , draftsman and designer .

Life

Yakovlev was the son of an engineer in the Russian Navy and a mathematician. From 1905 to 1913 he studied at the Russian Art Academy in his hometown, among others with Dmitri Nikolajewitsch Kardowski . Even during his student days, his works were published in Russian magazines. After completing his studies, he became a member of the Mir Iskusstwa artist and exhibition association .

In 1913 Yakovlev received a travel grant to study abroad. With his college friend Vasily Ivanovich Schuchajew he traveled to Italy and Spain until the outbreak of the First World War . In 1915 he exhibited at the Mir Iskusstva exhibition in Saint Petersburg and received both praise and criticism for his work. In the next few years he dealt, among other things, with red chalk drawings and frescoes for interiors and gave readings at the architecture courses for women . With Shukhaiev, Kardowski and Nikolai Ernestowitsch Radlow he founded his own, St. Petersburg Guild of St. Luke .

In the summer of 1917, Yakovlev received a scholarship for a study trip to the Far East , which took him to Mongolia , the Republic of China and the Japanese Empire within two years . After the October Revolution in Russia in 1917, he went to France, where he took French citizenship. His wife, who was divorced from him, committed suicide in Berlin in 1929 .

Citroën expeditions

In 1924/25 Yakovlev toured the Sahara and Equatorial Africa for the Citroën automobile company as artistic advisor to the Croisière Noire . He drew portraits of the two expedition leaders Georges-Marie Haardt and Louis Audouin-Dubreuil during this automobile expedition , which led to Antananarivo in Madagascar . The paintings he created in the period that followed led to his being appointed a member of the French Legion of Honor . In 1928 he had a major exhibition in Moscow .

Another expedition by the Citroën company, the Croisière Jaune , led Jakowlew in 1931 and 1932 from Beirut through Syria , via Iran and Afghanistan to Mongolia and China. His watercolors, drawings and paintings after this expedition were very often in the style of Orientalism . The watercolors from this trip include a portrait of Mīr von Nagar in the Himalayas .

Last years

From 1934 to 1937 Jakowlew was the head of the painting department at the Art School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston in Massachusetts, USA . He returned to France and lived on the island of Capri and in Paris. He died there in 1938 as a result of an operation.

literature

• Georges-Marie Haardt / Louis Audouin-Dubreuil: La croisière noire . Éditions Plon, Paris 1927.
• by the same authors: Expédition center Asie. La croisière jaune , Éditions Plon, Paris 1933.
• Theodor Däubler : Alexander Jakovleff . In: Reclams Universum 43.1 (1927), pp. 333–334 (with 5 illustrations).
• Nina Getasvili: Jakovlev, Aleksandr Evgenʹevic . In: General Artist Lexicon . The visual artists of all times and peoples (AKL). Volume 77, de Gruyter, Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-11-023182-3 , p. 226 f.

Web links

Commons : Alexander Yakovlev  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Tate Gallery, London (en.)