The most mysterious paintings of artists. The most mysterious paintings of great artists

2005) it was about works in which, in addition to the main plot, there is one more - hidden. It manifests itself when you approach the picture, move away from it, or look at a certain angle. Now you will learn about the most truthful paintings, which are nevertheless called "tricks", about ghostly silhouettes, "double-viewers", "triple-viewers", and also about a rare kind of icons.

G. Teplov. Still life is a trick. 1737. State Hermitage, St. Petersburg.

P. Drozhdin. "Portrait of the artist A. P. Antropov with his son in front of a portrait of his wife." 1776. Russian Museum, St. Petersburg.

R. Magritte. "The Destiny of Man". 1933 National Gallery of Art, Washington.

Unknown artist. "Lilies of France" (six silhouettes of the Bourbon family). 1815.

O. Kanyu. "Corporal violets (silhouettes of Bonaparte, his wife and son)". 1815. The title of the picture contains a reminder that Napoleon began his military service with the rank of corporal.

S. Del Prete. "The Secret Between Autumn Leaves" 1991 Gallery in Bern, Switzerland.

V. Bregeda. "Prophecy". 1994

N. Zamyatina. "Dreams of Greece". 2004

Words - "double-eyed": sharks - crooks, murmur - do not hum, peace - Moscow State University, durable - accurate. The authors are Olga and Sergey Fedin.

Post card. "My wife and my mother-in-law." Beginning of the XX century. Russia.

I. Botvinik. "My husband and my father-in-law." First half of the twentieth century. USA.

G. Fisher. "Mom, dad and daughter." 1968 USA.

S. Orlov. "Rose for two". 2004 Moscow.

S. Dali. "Disappearing bust of Voltaire". 1940 Dali Museum, St. Petersburg, USA.

Two paintings by Salvador Dali: on the left - "The head of a woman in the form of a battle." 1936; on the right - "Spain". 1938

V. Koval. "Kovalland (self-portrait of the artist)". 1994

The Trinity Icon "The Deesis Order". XIX century. Russia.

Science and life // Illustrations

Icon with faces of Jesus and Mary Magdalene. First half of the 17th century. Melheim, Germany.

Portrait of Alexander III with his wife and son. End of the 19th century. Church Museum at the Church of St. Mitrofan of Voronezh, Moscow.

Gabriel von Max. "Handkerchief of Saint Veronica". 1870s. Germany.

"Savior Not Made by Hands". 1970s photograph from a painting by an unknown artist, Russia.

TRUE DECEIT

Two artists argued - Zeuxis and Parrhasius: which of them is better. Zeuxis drew a bunch of grapes and placed the picture near the open window. Birds flying by saw the grapes, sat down and tried to peck at the painted berries. It was Parrhasius's turn. "Well, where is your job?" - "There, behind the curtain." Zeuxis went to the curtain and tried to pull it back. And she was painted. The legend was born in ancient Greece, about 500 years before our era.

It is more true than it might seem at first glance. The fact is that many birds do not have stereoscopic vision, since their eyes are located on both sides of the head. What one eye sees, the other does not see. Due to the lack of a common field of view, the brain cannot form a three-dimensional image. And experienced hunters know that a primitive, unpainted model of a duck attracts a flying drake no worse than a live decoy bird.

What is important to us in the Greek legend is that the picture did not deceive the birds, but the eye of the master painter. The 19th-century Russian artist Fyodor Tolstoy has paintings that echo the plot of an ancient Greek legend. On one of them - a still life, "covered" with a sheet of tracing paper. One of its corners is bent. And this part of the still life looks so authentic that you involuntarily feel the desire to move the tracing paper lower in order to see the image in full. Paintings of this type are called "deceptions", although we are talking about perhaps the most truthful of all genres of painting.

The appearance of this kind of paintings became possible only after the invention of perspective, chiaroscuro and ... oil paints. Recipes for their preparation are found in the books of the XIII century. But only at the beginning of the 15th century, the Dutch artist Jan van Eyck (1390-1441) improved the technology of preparing paints so much that he is often called the inventor of the oil painting technique. He was the first to apply it in a new way, applying thin transparent layers of paint one on top of the other, achieving exceptional depth and richness of color, as well as subtlety of light and shade and color transitions. After Jan van Eyck, artists were able to achieve such an image, which was easy to confuse with the original.

The founder of the snag genre in Russia is Grigory Teplov, artist, poet, musician, philosopher, statesman of the 18th century. One of his works is on the previous page. It is a pity that reproductions of decoys in magazines and books are unable to convey the feeling that appears when looking at the original. By the way, this is why tricks are rarely seen in art books. This is largely due to the difference in the size of the painting and its printed reproduction, as well as the fact that the desired effect usually occurs depending on the distance between the image and the viewer.

There is another type of deception. In the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg, for example, there is a painting by Pyotr Drozhdin, an 18th-century artist. On it, the author depicted the family of his teacher, the artist Antropov. Looking closely, you notice that the father and son are not standing next to their wife and mother, but with her portrait. The edge of the easel, which at first seemed like a light opening in the wall, separates those standing from the image.

The Belgian artist of the 20th century, Rene Magritte, also used the "easel" technique. Their edges are almost invisible, and the drawings imperceptibly merge into the main plot of the picture, merging with it. On one landscape - the forest, starting outside the window, continues on the painted easel, on the other - the sea from the easel flows into the "real" sea.

Magritte is a master of paradox paintings. On one canvas, he connected objects and phenomena that are incompatible in life; for example, the daytime sky and a house immersed in night darkness, or a person looking in a mirror in front of him sees only the back of his head in it. He also used the principle of paradox in the titles of his paintings. When, by the artist's own admission, he lacked imagination, he gathered friends and asked for help in finding a name. A landscape with an easel, for example, is called "The Destiny of Man".

GHOST SILHOUETTES

There is a special technique for creating a hidden image: when artists use the contours of the drawn objects. For the first time, paintings with "hidden silhouettes" appeared, apparently, in medieval France. Their main heroes were, of course, the kings. The fact that the lily is a symbol of the Bourbon dynasty is already well known to us, at least from the costumes of the main characters from the films based on the novel by Alexandre Dumas "The Three Musketeers". Two hundred years ago, drawing bouquets of royal lilies, artists turned the curves of the stems, the contours of the leaves and the petals into human faces. When you guess the secret, the bouquet turns into a portrait of the royal family. After the Bourbon dynasty was overthrown, artists began to paint Emperor Napoleon with his wife and son. But Josephine loved violets, so they replaced lilies.

Over the past centuries, artists, of course, have expanded the subject matter of such works. One example is a painting where you first see some dry leaves flying through the air. And on the canvas is a piece of paper with an inscription in French: "A dream carried away by wind and time." Usually, artists do not write its name on the front side of the picture. Here, in the lower left corner of the canvas, it is written in German: "The secret between the autumn leaves." This is not only the name of the painting, but also the key that reveals the intention of the artist - Sandro Del Prete. His name is known all over the world today. And he started as an amateur (I report this especially for the participants in the contest of mysterious paintings). In his youth, Del Prete studied drawing for only six months, until the age of 44 he did not consider himself a professional artist and worked in an insurance company in his native Swiss city of Bern, where he still lives.

In a painting by the Taganrog-based artist Viktor Bregeda, who was also attracted by this technique, figures kneeling in prayer against the backdrop of a desert mountain landscape. This is only part of the plot that you see right away, but the title - "Prophecy" - suggests that the main content is not so obvious and has not yet been revealed. Invisible at the first moment, the picture contains those before whom the pilgrims bowed: God the Father, God the Son and the winged horseman - an angel descended from heaven.

The painting "Dreams of Greece" by Muscovite Natalya Zamyatina looks like an ordinary still life with a porcelain vase and fruit. The title doesn't seem to match the image very well. But take a closer look at the drapery. What do the folds of the fabric and the contours of the vase hide (or reveal)?

DOUBLE EYES

The term that gave the name to the section of the article was invented by the writer and author of many publications in the journal "Science and Life" Sergei Fedin. He called double-eyed texts that can be read in two ways. Let's take the word "sharks" as an example. The first two letters "ak" can be written as one letter "zh". And "s" is easy to portray similar to "e". Let's leave the letters in the middle unchanged and get a word that is easy to read in two ways: "sharks" and "rogues". Several examples of such inscriptions are given here.

The word "double-eyed" corresponds to the English "ambigram" - dual. We talk about verbal double-views here because, using their example, it is easier to understand the perception of dual images in painting.

What are we looking for, moving our gaze along the lines of double vision? Some familiar letter. The same thing happens in pictures. The brain searches for familiar images already in memory, which is quite unlike the storage of photographic images. Memory is a kind of "coder" that captures the properties of the image, such as the presence of straight and curved sections of lines, the boundaries of changing brightness, color, and the like.

Looking at the two-eyes more closely, we find the letters that we did not notice initially, and we add the second word from them. The same thing happens with the hidden image.

So far, no one has come up with the word "three-eyes", that is, the image of three words of different meanings in one entry. If you succeed, be sure to submit your work to the mystery painting competition. But the picturesque triplets have already been created, and we will now talk about them.

TWO-FACED AND THREE-FACED PAINTING

In the previous issue of the magazine, in the article "Invisible-Visible" you met the image of a female head, which looks either young or old, depending on the position of the picture. Now let's get acquainted with a portrait that does not need to be turned over. To the question: "Does it depict a young or old woman?" Different people give different answers. Some say - a girl, others - an old woman. The picture has long become a classic. But for those who see her for the first time, each time they have to explain how to see the second image: "The lady's eye is the girl's ear, and the nose is the oval of a young face." According to physiologists, the viewer, looking at the portrait, pays the most attention to the eyes and nose. Therefore, the first impression usually depends on which part of the picture your eyes fell on in the first moment. After a little training, you can learn to order yourself who you want to see.

In terms of the number of publications in books and magazines, the plot with a young and old woman is far ahead of all other illusory pictures. The author is sometimes called the American cartoonist W. Hill, who published the work in 1915 in the magazine "Pak" (translated into Russian "Puck" - an elf, a fairy-tale spirit). Sometimes the image is attributed to the psychiatrist E. Boring, who used the portrait in the 1930s as an illustration for his work. In the scientific community, "Two Ladies" is still called the "Boring figure". In fact, back in the early years of the 20th century, a postcard was put into circulation in Russia with the same picture and the inscription: "My wife and my mother-in-law." The German postcard of 1880 served as a prototype for it (the author is unknown).

The picture with two ladies is regularly reproduced in books on psychology. But it is still largely unknown how the human mind perceives dualistic images. Artists just continue to develop an already well-known technique. In the first half of the 20th century, a similar portrait of an elderly and young man appeared. Then, in 1968, the artist G. Fischer made a new hairstyle for both ladies and got a third character. In fact, he added just one element, and the picture became known as "Mom, Dad and Daughter." The woman's hair turned into the profile of a man, thanks to which there were three people in the portrait.

In a modern painting by the Moscow artist Sergei Orlov (see p. 132), there are not only two different faces, but also two female figures that belong to both the girl and the old woman. The old lady is looking at the flower she is holding in her hand. The young one is sitting with her back to us, straightening her hair and turning her head to the left.

The works of Sergei Orlov, Victor Bregeda and other artists working in this manner can be seen on the Internet. There is a special project "Dualities" http://hiero.ru/project/Dubl of the site "Hieroglyph", where the authors exhibit their works for discussion.

Not a single book about illusory paintings is complete without a story about the work of the Spaniard Salvador Dali. 300 years after Arcimboldo, he revived the direction of illusory paintings.

In the first picture, the viewer sees two richly dressed women. The man in the turban leads them into the gallery. The artist transforms this scene into a second plot. The contour of a human head is formed from the arch of the gallery - an image of a sculptural portrait of the French philosopher Voltaire by Houdon.

The plot with Voltaire is found in the works of Dali repeatedly. Twice he also used the plot of the painting "The head of a woman in the form of a battle" (top left), where the figures of galloping horsemen and people rushing across a yellow field add up to a woman's face. But then "The head of a woman in the form of a battle" entered as a detail of another canvas: "Spain". This fact shows how difficult it is to find a new, original solution for a two-faced picture.

If I became the organizer of an exhibition of the best dualistic paintings, then next to the works of Dali I would place paintings by the contemporary Volgograd artist Vladislav Koval. And certainly - the "Stalingrad Madonna", in which the image of a woman with a baby in her arms is woven from birch branches. In the painting "Decommissioning to Shore", the distant coastal cliffs visible on the horizon turn into a lonely, drooping figure of a sailor. In the painting "Icarus" her hero is seen either flying or falling. On the next canvas, a soldier wrapped in a raincoat, freezing, turns into a Madonna with a child. In the work "Pyramid" V. Koval for the first time in the history of art combined several dual images into an integral work of art. And he used almost all the painting techniques that I talked about. Here and the construction of new images from the details of the landscape, and paintings, the content of which depends on the angle of view or distance. Today Koval is one of the most famous Russian artists. His fame has a curious beginning. While studying in Moscow, he sent letters to his relatives in Volgograd and did not stick stamps on envelopes, but drew. All sent letters reached the recipients without additional payment. When the press ministry announced a competition among artists, student Vladislav Koval brought a pack of envelopes to the organizers. And he became the winner, the youngest among the participants.

UNUSUAL ICONS

Examples of mysterious paintings are found even in such a strict and canonical form of art as icons. The icon "Jesus in the dungeon" was once brought to the Museum of Old Russian Art in Moscow. On the front of it, Jesus is depicted with shackles on his feet, and around are the instruments of the Passion, that is, torture. Each has a name next to it. Based on the peculiarities of writing words, art critics determined that the author was an Old Believer. The uniqueness of the icon was that the image was crossed by narrow vertical stripes. It has been suggested that these are traces of a lattice that once covered the image of Christ. However, the clue to the dark stripes turned out to be much more interesting, and it belongs to the head of the Canon icon-painting workshop, art historian and artist Alexander Renzhin.

It turns out that the icon once contained not one, but three images. The stripes are nothing more than traces of vertical plates that were attached to the frame (setting) of the icon. They adhered closely to its surface and therefore left traces. On both sides of each plate were drawn (it is customary to say - written) parts of two more icons. Standing in front of the icon, you could see one image, moving to the left - another, to the right - the third. The plates of the icon were lost, but Renzhin managed to find exactly the same whole icon. It turned out that parts of the images of the Mother of God and John the Baptist were written on both sides of 12 plates. When you look at the icon from the side, the parts of the image are combined into a single whole.

The storerooms of the Museum of the History of Religions in St. Petersburg contain icons of this type, but with a different plot. On one of them in the foreground is a dove, a symbol of the Holy Spirit. But as soon as you move to the right, the image of God the Father will appear, to the left - the face of God the Son. It is difficult for a modern viewer, spoiled by light effects, to imagine the power of the impression of the tripartite icons on the believers of past centuries, and even in the twilight of a church lit only by candles. In addition, in the 20th century, a similar technique was used in advertising, and therefore it lost its unusualness.

There are icons whose surface is not flat, but profiled, with vertical triangular grooves. On one side of each groove, an image is written, visible on the left, and on the other, visible on the right. When you look from the front, you see a "mixture" of the two images. Therefore, in the church, a large candlestick was placed in front of such an icon so that it could be seen only from two sides.

At the church of St. Mitrofan of Voronezh in Moscow on 2nd Khutorskaya Street there is a church museum. There, among other interesting exhibits, you can see a tripartite image. This is not an icon, but a portrait of the royal family. Standing in front of the portrait, you see Emperor Alexander III. Move to the right - the image of Empress Maria Feodorovna appears. The spectators, standing on the left, see the young heir, the future Emperor Nicholas II. A curious feature of the image helped establish the time of its creation. On the right temple of Nikolai, a bloody stain is visible. This is the footprint of a Japanese sword. In 1890-1891, the heir traveled around the world, and an assassination attempt was made in Japan. A Japanese policeman struck Nikolai with a sword, but the young heir swerved and received only a minor wound. The second time the attacker did not have time to strike, he was knocked down, but not by the hosts who received the distinguished guest, but by the Greek prince George accompanying Nicholas.

THE LEGEND OF SAINT VERONICA

In 1879, an exhibition of German artists was held in St. Petersburg. One of them, Gabriel von Max, presented the painting "The Handkerchief of St. Veronica" with the image of a piece of rough canvas nailed to the wall with the face of Christ in the center. The peculiarity of the picture was that the audience could see the eyes of the Savior either closed or open. Newspapers of that time wrote that the organizers had to put chairs in the hall, as some of the ladies fainted, exclaiming: "Look! Look!"

Of course, the mysterious picture attracted the attention of the capital's artists who tried to unravel the secret, and the artist Ivan Kramskoy wrote an article about it for the Novoe Vremya magazine, where he revealed the technique by which the German author achieved the desired effect.

The legend of Saint Veronica spread throughout Europe in the Middle Ages. Later, it became the official Church Tradition, that is, it was recognized as true as those recorded in the Gospel. When Jesus Christ was led to Mount Calvary to be crucified there, a compassionate woman named Veronica wiped the sweat from his face with a handkerchief that had covered her eyes. At the same time, the face of the Savior in the crown of thorns was miraculously imprinted on the scarf. Tradition formed the basis of the Orthodox icon "Savior Not Made by Hands". It is easiest for us, non-specialists, to recognize this icon by the image of a scarf on which the face of Jesus is written, although the scarf itself (more often they say "plats") is drawn differently and rather conventionally. Among Western Christians, a similar image is called the "Scarf of St. Veronica."

From a connoisseur of Russian art, priest Valentin Dronov, I heard a story that I quote here verbatim: “Two or three times in my life I had to see the icon of the Savior Not Made by Hands, which showed a miraculous property. The eyes of Jesus on it seemed either open or closed. It depended on the spiritual state of the praying person. If he was calm, the Savior seemed to be sleeping. If he was in agitation, his eyes opened." At home, Father Valentin kept a photograph of this image, which is given here.

I have not yet been able to find anything similar in our museums. In a guide to Bethlehem, the city where, according to legend, Christ was born, it is said that one of the frescoes on the column in the Church of the Nativity has the same property: "the face on the icon opens and closes its eyes."

The icon that is described is very rare, so any evidence of people who have seen or at least heard of such images is important. We ask readers to inform the editors of the journal about this.

These canvases are known even to those who are far from the world of art, because they are real masterpieces. And each of them conceals some secret that cannot be seen with the naked eye.

And it seems that every stroke has already been studied up and down, however, scientists are constantly discovering something new in these old paintings. Their authors left to their descendants unusual riddles that they managed to solve!

The editors of InPlanet have prepared a list of 12 legendary paintings that have kept secrets for many years and even centuries!

Portrait of the Arnolfini / Jan van Eyck (1434)

This portrait was the first in the history of Europe, which depicts a couple. It is an excellent example of the early Renaissance. Historians are still arguing who is depicted on the canvas, and what is happening there. Many are sure that this is a wedding, as indicated by some signs in the picture.

But the most curious fragment is practically hidden from view - in the reflection of the mirror on the wall, you can see the outlines of four people. It is vaguely clear that there is a man and a woman, and the signature - "Jan van Eyck was here." Art critics believe that the artist depicted himself and his wife.

The Last Supper / Leonardo da Vinci (1495-1498)

This fresco is one of the most famous works of Leonardo da Vinci and is also fraught with many secrets. The most interesting mystery is hidden on the surface - in the images of Jesus and Judas.

The artist painted the rest of the images with ease, but these two faces were the most difficult for him. For the face of Jesus, he was looking for the embodiment of goodness, and he was lucky - he met a young singer in the church choir. But the last unwritten spot was Judas, and da Vinci spent hours in eateries to pick up the perfect embodiment of evil. And, finally, he was lucky - in a ditch he found a drunkard who could hardly stand on his feet. From it, he painted the image of Judas, but in the end he was surprised.

This man approached him and said that they had already met. A few years ago he was a choir singer and had already posed for Leonardo for this picture. So, one man began to personify good and evil.

Portrait of Mrs. Lisa del Giocondo / Leonardo da Vinci (1503-1505)

Perhaps the most mysterious painting ever painted is the Mona Lisa. For several centuries now, it has haunted art historians and historians, giving rise to ever wilder and more intriguing ideas of its creation.

Who is this woman with a mysterious smile and no eyebrows? Traditionally, it is considered that this is the wife of the merchant Francesco Giocondo. But there are several more theories that have a right to exist. For example, that the Mona Lisa is a self-portrait of Leonardo himself. There is also a possibility that this painting was painted by da Vinci for himself, and the real canvas was discovered in Aizerlut 100 years ago. This Gioconda is more suitable for the description of the painting by contemporaries of Leonardo.

More recently, scientists have suggested that the mysterious smile of the girl on the canvas is due to the fact that she had no teeth. By the way, the x-ray showed that she had eyebrows, just that the restorations had significantly damaged them.

Creation of Adam / Michelangelo (1511)

Another Renaissance genius, Michelangelo, created his fresco for the Sistine Chapel, where it remains to this day. The plot for this part of the mural was a scene from Genesis called the creation of Adam. And on the fresco there are many encrypted symbols.

For example, it is worth taking a closer look at the Creator who creates Adam, and you can see ... the human brain. Experts believe that in this way the artist drew an analogy of the Creator with the source of the mind, but simply the brain. This theory is confirmed by the fact that Michelangelo was fond of anatomy and constantly conducted experiments on corpses.

Sistine Madonna / Raphael (1513-1514)

This huge canvas, painted by Raphael, is an example of the highest art of the Renaissance. The painting was commissioned by Pope Julius II and was in the monastery of Piacenza. Some art historians believe that this masterpiece was painted for the funeral of the pope.

Raphael encrypted many signs on canvas that historians managed to uncover. One of the obvious secrets of the Sistine Madonna - in the background, the artist depicted the faces of the cloud in the form of the faces of angels. Some historians believe that these are unborn souls.

Shore scene / Hendrick van Antonissen (1641)

The canvas of the famous Dutch marine painter Hendrik van Antonissen has long attracted the attention of art historians. This 17th-century painting depicts a seemingly ordinary seascape. But the specialists were embarrassed by the large number of people who had gathered on the shore for no apparent reason.

The truth was established with the help of an x-ray study, which established that in reality the picture depicted a whale. But the artist decided that it would be boring for people to see the dead carcass of a whale, so he redid the picture. And with a whale, the canvas looks much more impressive!

The Last Day of Pompeii / Karl Bryullov (1830-1833)

Russian artist Karl Bryullov was impressed by the history of Pompeii while visiting Vesuvius in 1828. He was a very restrained person by nature, but then Karl was simply overwhelmed with emotions, he stayed in the ruined city for four days and after a couple of years began to paint his famous painting.

There is a special secret on the canvas - if you look closely, in the left corner you can see a self-portrait of the artist himself. He also captured his beloved, Countess Yulia Samoilova, with whom he had a long relationship at least three times, possibly more. She can be seen in the form of a mother clutching her daughters to her chest, in the form of a girl with a jug on her head and in the form of lying on the ground.

Self-portrait with a pipe / Vincent van Gogh (1889)

Everyone knows the story of the cut off ear of the extravagant artist Vincent van Gogh. He even painted his self-portrait with a bandaged ear, which caused heated debate among art historians. It is still not known for certain whether he cut off the ear completely or injured it.

For a long time, experts were embarrassed by the fact that in the picture Van Gogh is depicted with a bandage on his right ear, and he injured his left. But the secret was revealed - the Dutch artist painted self-portraits, looking in the mirror, so there was confusion in the picture due to the mirror image.

Blue Room / Pablo Picasso (1901)

Now the names of these artists are known to everyone, and at the beginning of their career they had to paint several paintings on one canvas - they could not afford to buy fabric. That is why many masterpieces have a so-called double bottom, for example, Pablo Picasso's painting "The Blue Room".

With the help of X-rays, it was possible to find out that a portrait of a man was painted under the image. Art historians determine who this man was. According to one version, Picasso painted a self-portrait.

The Old Fisherman / Tivadar Kostka Chontvari (1902)

The Hungarian artist Tivadar Kostka Chontvari created many paintings during his life, but was little known. He suffered from bouts of schizophrenia, but still dreamed of the glory of Raphael. Tivadar became famous after his death, when the painting "The Old Fisherman" was deciphered, which has now become very popular. It was created in 1902 and is considered one of the most mysterious works of the artist.

At first glance, the canvas depicts an old man, as it was believed for many years. Until one day it occurred to someone to look at the mirror image of the two halves of the old man's face. Then the main secret of this canvas was revealed - on it the master depicted God and the Devil, which are in every person.

Portrait of Adele Bloch-Gower / Gustav Klimt (1907)

This painting is one of the most famous works of Gustav Klimt. In 2006, Golden Adele was bought for a fabulous sum of $135 million. The beautiful woman depicted on it was actually written for the sake of ... revenge.

In 1904, the whole of Vienna, including her husband Ferdinand, spoke about the novel by Adele Bloch-Gower and Gustav Klimt. He came up with an unusual revenge and ordered the artist a portrait of his beloved wife. Ferdinand was very picky and Klimt made over 100 sketches. During this time, the mistress, whose image was given so difficult, got bored with the artist, and their romance ended.

Black Square / Kazimir Malevich (1915)

One of the most famous and controversial Russian paintings is the Black Square by Kazemir Malevich. Few understand the hidden meaning of this provocative canvas. But it’s worth starting, perhaps, with the fact that the square is not at all square and not even black!

X-ray helped to determine that under the "Black Square" there is another work by Malevich, on top of which he wrote his masterpiece. For him, he prepared a special composition of matte and glossy paints, among which, by the way, there was no black tint. And, despite the fact that the sides of the so-called square are 79.5 cm long, the figure does not have a single right angle.

One way or another, Mona Lisa remains one of the most mysterious paintings of our time. Perhaps we will never know what this or that artist wanted to tell us, or maybe at all, all the signs are just a coincidence ...

Italian scientists say they have found remains that may belong to Lisa del Giocondo. Perhaps the mystery of the Mona Lisa will be revealed. In honor of this, we recall the most mysterious paintings in history.

1. Mona Lisa
The first thing that comes to mind when it comes to mysterious paintings, or mystery paintings, is the Mona Lisa, painted by Leonardo da Vinci in 1503-1505. Gruyet wrote that this picture can drive anyone who, having seen enough of it, will start talking about it, crazy.
There are many "mysteries" in this work by da Vinci. Art historians write dissertations on the slope of the Mona Lisa's hand, medical specialists make diagnoses (from such that Mona Lisa has no front teeth to such that Mona Lisa is a man). There is even a version that Gioconda is a self-portrait of the artist.
By the way, the painting gained particular popularity only in 1911, when it was stolen by the Italian Vincenzo Perugio. Found him by fingerprint. So the Mona Lisa also became the first success of fingerprinting, and a huge success of art market marketing.

2. Black square


Everyone knows that the "Black Square" is not actually black, and not a square. It's really not a square. In the catalog for the exhibition, it was declared by Malevich as a "quadrangle". And really not black. The artist did not use black paint.
Less well known is that Malevich considered The Black Square to be his finest work. When the artist was buried, "Black Square" (1923) stood at the head of the coffin, Malevich's body was covered with a white canvas with a sewn square, a black square was also drawn on the lid of the coffin. Even the train and the back of the truck had black squares.

3. Scream

What is mysterious about the painting “The Scream” is not that it allegedly has a hard effect on people, forcing them to almost commit suicide, but that this painting is, in fact, realism for Edvard Munch, who at the time of writing this masterpiece suffered from manic depressive psychosis. He even recalled exactly how he saw what he wrote.
“I was walking along the path with two friends - the sun was setting - suddenly the sky turned blood red, I paused, feeling exhausted, and leaned against the fence - I looked at the blood and flames over the bluish-black fjord and the city - my friends went on, and I stood trembling with excitement, feeling the endless cry piercing nature.

4. Guernica


Picasso painted "Guernica" in 1937. The picture is dedicated to the bombardment of the city of Guernica. They say that when Picasso was summoned to the Gestapo in 1940 and asked about Guernica: “Did you do that?”, the artist replied: “No, you did it.”
Picasso painted a huge fresco for no longer than a month, working 10-12 hours a day. "Guernica" is considered a reflection of all the horror of fascism, inhuman cruelty. Those who have seen the picture with their own eyes claim that it generates anxiety and sometimes panic.

5. Ivan the Terrible and his son Ivan


We all know the painting "Ivan the Terrible and his son Ivan", usually calling it "Ivan the Terrible kills his son."
Meanwhile, the murder of his heir by Ivan Vasilyevich is a very controversial fact. So, in 1963, the tombs of Ivan the Terrible and his son were opened in the Archangel Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin. Studies have made it possible to assert that Tsarevich John was poisoned.
The content of poison in his remains is many times higher than the permissible norm. Interestingly, the same poison was found in the bones of Ivan Vasilyevich. Scientists have concluded that the royal family had been the victim of poisoners for several decades.
Ivan the Terrible did not kill his son. This version was adhered to, for example, by the Chief Prosecutor of the Holy Synod, Konstantin Pobedonostsev. Seeing the famous painting by Repin at the exhibition, he was outraged and wrote to Emperor Alexander III: “You can’t call the painting historical, since this moment is ... purely fantastic.” The version of the murder was based on the stories of the papal legate Antonio Possevino, who can hardly be called a disinterested person.
There was once a real attempt on the painting.
On January 16, 1913, the twenty-nine-year-old Old Believer icon painter Abram Balashov stabbed her three times with a knife, after which the faces of the Ivanovs depicted in the painting by Ilya Repin had to be painted virtually anew. After the incident, the then curator of the Tretyakov Gallery Khruslov, having learned about the vandalism, threw himself under the train.

6. Hands resist him


The picture of Bill Stoneham, written by him in 1972, became famous, frankly, not the best fame. According to information on E-bay, the painting was found in a landfill some time after the purchase. On the very first night, as the painting ended up in the house of the family that found it, the daughter ran to her parents in tears, complaining that "the children in the picture are fighting."
Since that time, the picture has a very bad reputation. Kim Smith, who bought it in 2000, constantly receives angry letters demanding that the painting be burned. Also, the newspapers wrote that ghosts sometimes appear in the hills of California, like two peas in a pod, like the children from the Stoneham painting.

7. Portrait of Lopukhina


Finally, the "bad picture" - a portrait of Lopukhina, painted by Vladimir Borovikovsky in 1797, after some time began to have a bad reputation. The portrait depicted Maria Lopukhina, who died shortly after the portrait was painted. People began to say that the picture "takes away youth" and even "reduces to the grave."
It is not known for certain who started such a rumor, but after Pavel Tretyakov “fearlessly” acquired the portrait for his gallery, talk about the “mystery of the painting” subsided.

The paintings of great artists can not only delight and give aesthetic pleasure, but also cause mystical awe and even fear. Many paintings by masters are fraught with mysteries. Our story is about them.

Talented paintings always evoke inner awe and admiration among art lovers. The canvases of the great masters fascinate and captivate, because beautiful paintings awaken the most intimate in the souls, something that often a person seeks to hide even from himself. Carl Jung called it the unconscious.

Therefore, paintings by famous artists are perceived as mysterious messages in which the secrets of the world are revealed. To solve them, you need to be as attentive as possible to the details and symbols of the paintings.

More than one generation of art critics will try to unravel the ciphers of Hieronymus Bosch, think about the code of paintings by Leonardo da Vinci, and Michelangelo, and Botticelli, freeze in delight in front of the paintings of the Dutch. What can we say about the paintings of the era of modernism and postmodernism, where beauty, spirituality and precision of lines have given way to cultural symbols, interweaving of lines and cubic forms.

Paintings with the meaning of Pablo Picasso and Frida Kahlo, Jackson Pollock and Salvador Dali reveal the tragic and mystical aspects of being a modern person. To read them, you need to have extensive knowledge and creative intuition.

We invite you to visit the virtual gallery and find out which famous paintings by artists are fraught with riddles or which dramatic stories are associated with:

The Last Supper (Leonardo da Vinci)

Many will notice that this masterpiece is not exactly a painting, but a fresco. However, a fresco is the same canvas, only made on wet plaster. They began to talk about the mystery of this picture back in the 19th century, when the minds of the aristocracy were captivated by various mystical teachings, Masonic lodges and various secret societies flourished in Europe. In the 21st century, interest in the fresco was revived thanks to Dan Brown's book The Da Vinci Code and the series Da Vinci's Demons.

Indeed, this creation of the greatest Renaissance artist contains many secret signs that form the subtext of the fresco. First of all, it should be noted that the artist worked on its creation for three years, until 1498 (Leonardo obviously did not write on damp ground - this is a reason to consider The Last Supper a painting, not a fresco). The composition was ordered by the Doge of Venice, Ludovico Sforza, a famous rake, mystic, merchant and intriguer.

The concepts of fidelity in family life were alien to Sforza, he was indefatigable in his passions, from which his pious wife, Duchess Beatrice d'Este, suffered. Despite the fact that she was one of the most beautiful women of the Renaissance, Ludovico cheated on her with amazing constancy with the best getters of Venice.

Only the death of Beatrice forced Sforza to rethink his priorities and stop looking for love pleasures. To perpetuate her memory, the Duke of Venice commissioned da Vinci's The Last Supper.

The first riddle of the canvas is connected with this background: the apostle John, sitting on the right hand of Christ, outwardly looks more like a woman than a man. Thus, the conjecture was born that this was Mary Magdalene, the wife of Jesus. It was also confirmed by the sign that the inclinations of these two characters create. It turns out a figure that resembles a combination of two triangles, which in mystical teachings meant the connection of the feminine and masculine principles as the basis of the universe.

The second riddle is the image of Judas. At the beginning of work on the painting, Leonardo very quickly found a sitter for the image of Jesus. They became a young singer from the church choir. His beauty and good looks struck the artist.

But for Judas, nature had to be searched for almost three years. Once, in a ditch, Leonardo saw a drunkard descending. He brought him to the refectory and in a matter of days wrote the antipode of Christ. After talking with the sitter, the artist learned that his life went downhill from the moment he posed for the image of Jesus da Vinci. Thus, Christ and the one who betrayed him are written off from one person with a difference of three years.

The third riddle is that there is a self-portrait of Leonardo in the painting. This is the Apostle Thaddeus, seated second from the right.

The fourth code is the repeated number three. Take a closer look at the canvas, all the characters are grouped in threes. This shows the symbolic cipher of the Holy Trinity - the Son, the Spirit and God.

The Creation of Adam (Michelangelo)

A 16th-century fresco by one of the famed Renaissance masters depicts God stretching out his hand to Adam. This is the fourth of the nine scenes of Genesis, which the author depicted in the Sistine Chapel. The painting depicts how God breathes soul into a newly created man.

Anatomists have established that the Creator's purple cloak, under which the angels are gathered, resembles the human brain in outline. Michelangelo, like all artists of that time, studied anatomy in detail, so he knew perfectly well what this organ looks like. But why did he depict him in a painting with a religious plot?

Art critics suggested that in this way the progressive artist and thinker pointed out that the force that moves and develops a person is the mind. In addition, there are a number of other nuances that you should pay attention to:

1. The posture of Adam is symmetrical to the posture of God. However, the first man is relaxed, and only the divine mind is able to fill him with energy.
2. Heroes, wrapped in the cloak of the Creator, create the outline of the human brain. Moreover, Michelangelo outlined the pituitary gland, the pons varolii (transmits impulses from the brain to the spinal cord), and the vertebral arteries with lines.

The painting is an eloquent message from a progressive humanist artist who believed in the power of the human mind.

"Flemish Proverbs" (Peter Brueghel the Elder)

The painting was created by a Dutch painter in the middle of the 16th century. At first glance, its plot is simple - an ordinary day on the market square. However, there are 112 separate compositional components on the canvas that embody popular phraseological turns.

Look closely at the image and see illustrations for idioms: bang your head against the wall; tie the devil to the pillow; hang a bell on a cat (an unreasonable act); speak with two mouths; fry herring for eggs, etc.

This picture is of great interest not only to art historians and culturologists, but also to philologists.

Danae (Rembrandt Harmens van Rijn)

The Dutch artist painted this picture for 11 years (1636–1647). At first glance, the canvas depicts the heroine of the ancient Greek myth Danae, who was hidden in the dungeon by her own father. The reason for this is the prophecy, according to which the king of Argos will fall at the hands of his grandson.

Rembrandt's Danae is a symbol of male impermanence. Studying the picture, art historians have established that Danae has a wedding ring on her ring finger, although, according to legend, she was an unmarried young lady when she was imprisoned. In addition, there was no golden rain in the picture, which Zeus shed to give birth to life in Danae.

The second point that confused the researchers is that the heroine's face did not look like Saskia van Uylenbürch, Rembrandt's young wife, who served as a model for all his paintings of the 1630s. This is all the more strange, since "Danae" was painted by the artist to decorate his own home. So who, instead of his wife, did he capture on the canvas?

The answer came in the 1950s, when art historians began to use x-rays to study paintings. It turned out that initially Danae was nevertheless written off from Saskia, and later the artist rewrote her image, giving the features of the nurse of his son Gertje Dirks. After Saskia's death, she became his mistress, cohabitant and new muse.

"Bedroom at Arly" (Vincent van Gogh)

Unable to withstand the persecution of the Parisian beau monde, Vincent van Gogh escapes from the capital of France. In the spring of 1888, he retires to a small outbuilding in Arly, bought with money from the inheritance. The artist has finally found his home and his own workshop. In Arly, he lived for some time in anticipation of another Parisian fugitive, Paul Gauguin. Together with him, Van Gogh wanted to create a brotherhood of artists.

The painting "Bedroom at Arly", or "Yellow Bedroom", is a documentary evidence of the painter's mental illness. According to it, psychiatrists can study changes in a person suffering from schizophrenia. Here are the signs to look out for:

1. Saturated, and even intrusive yellow color. It looks unnatural in the interior of the bedroom. It's all about foxglove, with which Vincent van Gogh fought epileptic seizures. Regular use of this medicine leads to a change in color perception. People see the world in yellow-green color.
2. The pairing of objects in the room: two chairs, two pillows, two portraits, a pair of engravings by Van Gogh. Thus, the author tried to find peace of mind, to cope with loneliness.
3. Closed shutters are a symbol of the artist's inner isolation and a sense of security.
4. The mirror on the wall was purchased by Van Gogh for self-portraits. People refused to pose for him because they did not perceive his paintings as art.
5. The red blanket on the bed played a dramatic role in the life of the painter. During one of the attacks, he cut off his earlobe and, wrapping himself in this blanket, tried to overcome the fear that had seized him.

The picture is a reflection of the inner world of the artist. In Van Gogh's case, "Bedroom at Arly" is the story of his loneliness and madness.

"Scream" (Edvard Munch)

The Scream is one of the most mystical paintings of the 20th century. She embodied the premonition of a universal tragedy that gripped the artist during one of his walks. Munch saw a bloody sunset blazing in the sky, and inwardly heard the cry of nature's suffering. This is what he wanted to display on his canvas.

The hairless man, resembling a skeleton in outline, opens his mouth wide and closes his ears in horror - this is how the piercing howl of nature strikes him. The feeling experienced by the artist and displayed on the canvas became prophetic. "The Scream" has become a symbol of the twentieth century - a century of violence, wars, cruelty, hatred of man, and the torture of the environment.

A number of mystical stories are associated with the picture. So, all the owners of the "Scream" suffered misfortune - ruin, death, accidents. When the picture got to the museum, several workers showed negligence in working with it - they dropped the canvas. After a while, one committed suicide, and the other was burned in a car accident. These misfortunes were associated with the fatal action of the masterpiece.

Scientists are sure that, as in the case of Van Gogh, the canvas is the embodiment of the mental disorder of its creator, Edvard Munch.

"Old Fisherman" (Tivadar Kostka Chontvari)

A pharmacist from Hungary, having seen a prophetic dream, sold the pharmacy, bought everything necessary for drawing, and went to learn the skill from Lebanese painters.

Upon returning to his homeland at the beginning of the 20th century, he presented an original work - the painting "The Old Fisherman". It seemed that there was nothing special about it: the public did not know what was so mysterious in this canvas. It's all about the subtext, which is not so easy to read. It was possible to solve it only after 50 years.

Chontwari painted strange and slightly frightening paintings, so they were not popular. As a result, he died in poverty, and his canvases ended up in the trash heap. Only a few paintings by the master have survived and ended up in the museum of the city of Pec. Among them was the "Old Fisherman".

One of the museum employees thought of using a mirror to reveal the subtext of the masterpiece. It turned out that if you divide the picture in half with a mirror, then two antagonist plots are formed: the first depicts God sailing in a boat on a calm sea, and the second depicts the devil in a raging sea. This is such a metaphor for the complexity of being created by a Hungarian artist.

This is only a small part of those famous paintings that cause mystical awe and worship. The creations of Mikhail Vrubel, Paul Gauguin, Pablo Picasso, Gustav Klimt and Kazemir Malevich evoke delight, horror and worship. They are solved, they are admired, it takes years to understand their content. Knowledge of the mysteries of the great canvases is a step towards the knowledge of man and the world.

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17:56

There is a superstition that painting a portrait can bring misfortune to the model. In the history of Russian painting, there were several well-known paintings that have developed a mystical reputation.

Ivan the Terrible and his son Ivan November 16, 1581. Ilya Repin

Ilya Repin had a reputation as a "fatal painter": many of those whose portraits he painted died suddenly. Among them are Mussorgsky, Pisemsky, Pirogov, the Italian actor Mercy d'Argento and Fyodor Tyutchev.

The darkest picture of Repin is recognized as "Ivan the Terrible kills his son." An interesting fact: it is still unknown whether Ivan IV killed his son or whether this legend was really composed by the Vatican envoy Antonio Possevino.

The picture made a depressing impression on the visitors of the exhibition. Cases of hysteria were recorded, and in 1913 the icon painter Abram Balashov tore open the painting with a knife. He was later declared insane.

A strange coincidence: the artist Myasoedov, from whom Repin painted the image of the king, soon almost killed his son Ivan in a fit of anger, and the writer Vsevolod Garshin, who became sitter for Tsarevich Ivan, went mad and committed suicide.

"Portrait of M. I. Lopukhina". Vladimir Borovikovsky

Maria Lopukhina, descended from the Count Tolstoy family, became the artist's model at the age of 18, shortly after her own marriage. The amazingly beautiful girl was healthy and full of strength, but she died 5 years later. Years later, the poet Polonsky wrote "Borovikovsky saved her beauty ...".

There were rumors about the connection of the picture with the death of Lopukhina. An urban legend was born that one cannot look at a portrait for a long time - the sad fate of the "model" will suffer.

Some claimed that the girl's father, the master of the Masonic lodge, concluded the spirit of his daughter in the portrait.

After 80 years, the painting was acquired by Tretyakov, who was not afraid of the reputation of the portrait. Today the painting is in the collection of the Tretyakov Gallery.

"Unknown". Ivan Kramskoy

The painting "Unknown" (1883) aroused great interest among the Petersburg public. But Tretyakov flatly refused to buy a painting for his collection. So, "The Stranger" began its journey through private collections. Soon strange things began to happen: the first owner was abandoned by his wife, the house of the second burned down, the third went bankrupt. All misfortunes were attributed to the fatal picture.

The artist himself did not escape trouble, shortly after painting the picture, two sons of Kramskoy died.

The paintings were sold abroad, where she continued to bring only misfortunes to the owners, until the canvas returned to Russia in 1925. When the portrait ended up in the collection of the Tretyakov Gallery, the misfortunes stopped.

"Troika". Vasily Perov

Perov could not find a sitter for the central boy for a long time, until he met a woman who was traveling through Moscow on a pilgrimage with her 12-year-old son Vasya. The artist managed to persuade the woman to let Vasily pose for the picture.

A few years later, Perov met this woman again. It turned out that a year after the painting, Vasenka died, and his mother came to the artist on purpose to buy the painting with the last money.

But the canvas has already been purchased and exhibited at the Tretyakov Gallery. When the woman saw the Troika, she fell to her knees and began to pray. Touched, the artist painted a portrait of her son for the woman.

"Demon Defeated" Mikhail Vrubel

Vrubel's son, Savva, died suddenly shortly after the artist completed the portrait of the boy. The death of his son was a blow to Vrubel, so he concentrated on his last painting, Demon Defeated.

The desire to finish the canvas grew into an obsession. Vrubel continued to finish the picture even when it was sent to the exhibition.

Ignoring the visitors, the artist came to the gallery, took out brushes and continued to work. Worried relatives contacted the doctor, but it was too late - the tasca of the spinal cord brought Vrubel to the grave, despite the treatment.

"Mermaids". Ivan Kramskoy

Ivan Kramskoy decided to paint a picture based on the story by N.V. Gogol "May Night, or the Drowned Woman". At the first exhibition in the Association of the Wanderers, the painting was hung next to the pastoral "The Rooks Have Arrived" by Alexei Savrasov. On the very first night, the picture "Rooks" fell from the wall.

Soon Tretyakov bought both paintings, "Rooks Have Arrived" took a place in the office, and "Mermaids" were exhibited in the hall. From that moment on, the servants and household members of Tretyakov began to complain about the mournful singing that came from the hall at night.

Moreover, people began to notice that next to the picture they experience a breakdown.

The mysticism continued until the old nanny advised to remove the mermaids from the world to the far end of the hall. Tretyakov followed the advice, and the oddities stopped.

"On the Death of Alexander III". Ivan Aivazovsky

When the artist learned about the death of Emperor Alexander III, he was shocked and painted a picture without any order. As conceived by Aivazovsky, the painting was supposed to symbolize the triumph of life over death. But, having finished the picture, Aivazovsky hid it and did not show it to anyone. For the first time, the painting was put on public display only after 100 years.

The painting is divided into fragments, the canvas depicts a cross, the Peter and Paul Fortress and the figure of a woman in black.

The strange effect is that at a certain angle the female figure turns into a laughing man. Some see Nicholas II in this silhouette, while others see Pakhom Andreyushkin, one of those terrorists who failed to assassinate the emperor in 1887.