Nikolai Konstantinovich Roerich

Collection of L.O.Levinsohn-Levin, 1918
Acquired in Paris by the present owner in the 1970s 

Stockholm, Gummesons Konsthall., Rörich Separatutställning (Roerich Personal Exhibition), 1918, no.78, Före regnskuren
Copenhagen, Kunsthadel Henry Schou, Rörich Maleriudstilling (Roerich Exhibition of Paintings), 1919 no.78, Før Skybrud
London, The Goupil Gallery, Spells of Russia, 1920, no.112 Before a Shower

 

Nicholas Roerich, List of Paintings 1917-1924 (manuscript), Nicholas Roerich Museum Archive, no.24 Pered livnem under works for 1918
Zhar Ptitsa, Berlin, 1921, no.4/5, p.24 illustrated b/w
F.Grant et al., Roerich, Himalaya, A Monograph, New York: Brentano, 1926, p.126 listed as Before the Shower (oil), L.O.Levinsohn-Levin
A.Yaremenko, Nikolai Konstantinovich Roerich. His Life and Creations during the past forty years: 1889-1929, New York: Central Book Trading Co., 1931, p.35 listed as Before the Shower (oil), L.O. Levinsohn-Levin; illustrated pl.51 as Karelia (1918), Berlin

The work is executed on plywood and the board has warped slightly. There are cracks to the board at the centre of the right and left edges and there is a small loss to the upper left corner. There are frame abrasions with associated paint loss along the edges, and a surface scratch to the tree in the lower left corner. There is a surface scratch running vertically across the left side of the lake. There is a small horizontal crack to the paint surface below the trees in the lower left. There is a layer of surface dirt and flecks of dirt in places. Inspection under UV light does not reveal any obvious signs of restoration. Held in a black wooden frame. Unexamined out of frame.
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In the copy of the 1918 Stockholm catalogue held in the Roerich Museum archive in New York, there is a pencil entry by Roerich 2000 - Levin, referring to the price and buyer. It has never before been reproduced in colour and until recently had all but disappeared from view since the 1920 exhibition in London.

Between 1916 and 1918 Roerich and his family were based in Sortavala in Karelia, where for the most part the artist focused on panoramic landscapes, often using plywood as a support for his paintings, the rough surface of which adds texture to the colourful planes of lake and sky. ‘It is at that time’, writes Matochkin, ‘that the artist’s thirst for a profound understanding of the mysteries of a rocky realm became apparent, which later resulted in a pictorial hymn to mountain ranges and peaks. The airy texture of his early pastel canvases gave way to a dense and saturated oil medium with its palette of cold, contrasting tones. A new expressive principle – the painter’s religious conviction – was manifest in the uneven layers of dabs, in the rigid rhythm of cut forms, and in a blaze of colours’ (Y.Matochkin, Nicholas Roerich, 2008, p.207).

We are grateful to Gvido Trepša, Senior Researcher at the Nicholas Roerich Museum, New York, for providing additional cataloguing information.