Nikolay Karazin’s Graphic Series for the Amu Darya and Samara Expeditions of 1874 and 1879

The article examines the drawings and watercolors by the artist Nikolay Nikolayevich Karazin (1842—1908), based on the materials of the Amu Darya and Samara expeditions of 1874 and 1879. The paper aims at reviewing the graphic series “Amu Darya Scientific Expedition”, published in the magazine “Niva” in 1874—1875, and a series of watercolor portraits made during the Samara expedition, in comparison with the pencil portraits by Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin (1842—1904) in the album of photographs “Russian Turkestan”, published in 1874. This collection of artworks has not previously been the subject of a special art history study. Their examination introduces into the field of specialists’ view a significant stage of Nikolay Karazin’s creative path. The relevance of the article, in view of the investigations of recent years, lies in the representation of the image of an artist-traveler, a draftsman during expeditions in the second half of the 19th century.

The study of the first series is based on the nature and national types of the Amu Darya delta. The analysis of individual examples of journal graphics is accompanied by a description of some of the author’s simultaneous graphic originals, as well as works of other artists interested in Central Asian ethnography. The article uses a comparative methodological principle, with the analysis of fragments of N.N. Karazin’s literary works — travel essays with a pronounced ethnographic component.

The artist’s series of watercolors based on the Samara expedition also presents several images of the ethnotypes of Russian Turkestan, a region of Central Asia in its western part. As a result, there are identified the similarities and differences in the artistic methods and manners, as well as the conditions of creative work, of the two artists — Nikolay Karazin and Vasily Vereshchagin. The analysis is carried out using a comparative method and a socio-historical background.

The Amu Darya and Samara graphic cycles represent N.N. Karazin as a mature creator who intuitively used the means of the approaching new time and modern style. At the same time, he did not leave the boundaries of the literary and artistic genre “voyage pittoresque”, overall successfully combining realistic tendencies with the vision of a romantic.

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