Isaak
Ilich Levitan was born in 1860, on August 18 (30) in the village of
Kibarty near the station Verbovo, Kovenskaya guberniya. At the end of
the 1860s he moved to Moscow with his parents. In 1873 he followed his
brother in submitting an application to the College of Painting, Sculpture
and Architecture. In 1875 his mother died. In 1876-1879 he was exempt
from paying for his education due to poverty. Levitan was quite ashamed
of his poverty and would go to the station to sketch early in the morning
before trains with passengers would arrive. In 1877 his father died
of typhoid fever. In the same year Levitan took part in an itinerant
artists' exhibit for the first time when he showed the paintings Evening
and Sunny Day. Spring.
In 1879 after a law was enacted to expel Jews from Moscow he was forced
to move to a town outside of the capital. In 1880 Levitan took his ailing
sister Theresa to Ostankino and spent three whole years there. In 1882
he began to study under Vasily Polenov at the College of Painting, Sculpture
and Architecture. In 1884 he was accepted by the Traveling Exhibit Partnership.
In 1897 Levitan was diagnosed with a severe heart ailment. In 1898 he
worked on the painting The Lake. In 1900 he participated in the World
of Art journal exhibition. At the end of April 1900 Levitan caught a
bad cold and fell ill. On June 22,19 00 at 8:30 Levitan died. On his
death bed he asked his brother to burn all of his letters.
Copyright © 2000-2001 Зина Перевертова
