Exhibition of Etchings and Drawings by Pen Varlen (1916-1990) at the Academy Museum in St. Petersburg

The show presents 45 etchings and 23 drawings by Pen Varlen (1916-1990), a graphic artist, master of etching, painter, teacher of the graphic department of I. Repin St. Petersburg, State Academy Institute of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture.

In 1947 he graduated from I. Repin St. Petersburg Institute of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture where he majored in painting under A.A. Osmerkin and at the same time studied the art of engraving and lithography at the printing workshops of the graphic department. In 1950 after finishing his post-graduate course Pen Varlen started his teaching activity that lasted for over 30 years. In 1977 he became a Professor of I. Repin Institute.

In his drawings one can sense the influence of the traditions of the Russian academic school, which in his case is based on the compromise between the impact of I. Repin pictorial strategy and his own adherence to the self-sufficiency of a graphic contour and spot. On the one hand, the artist absorbed the experience obtained in his trips to Europe - from Rembrandt to the European modern art of the middle of the 20th century, on the other hand, he was much affected by the art of Japanese and Chinese calligraphers.

In 1953-1954 the Ministry of Culture of the USSR directed him to the People’s Republic of China to assist in the revival of the national system of art education. Since the 1960s Pen Varlen often visited his native Primorye in the Far East of Russia that was depicted in his numerous landscapes devoted to this land.

Pen Varlen’s works are in the collections of the State Russian Museum, Museum of History of St, Petersburg, Russian State Museum of Arctic and Antarctic, Central Navy Museum, Pushkin House of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Russian National Library, State Museum of Arts of Uzbekistan, Yaroslavl Art Museum, Regional Art Museum in Orel, the History and Architecture Museum-Preserve in Kostroma, P.M. Dogadin State Picture Gallery in Astrakhan and others.




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