Petrov-Vodkin, K.S.: A Trip to Africa

Title

Poezdka v Afriku, “Na rassvete”, 1910, I

A Trip to Africa

Keywords

Summary

In this piece, divided into fourteen short passages, Petrov-Vodkin offers the reader brief sketches from his trip to North Africa in 1907. A dreamlike quality permeates the entire work, which begins with the author’s disillusionment with Paris and the realisation of his need for a soul-searching journey. Africa is presented as a spiritual place, where Islamic doctrine coexists with paganism, and where the Western man can lose himself, or find himself again.

Bio

One of the most renowned Russian and Soviet painters, Kuz’ma Petrov-Vodkin travelled to North Africa (Algeria and Tunisia) in 1907. This trip had a profound impact, both spiritual and artistic, on the painter, who recollected his experience in many letters to his mother, as well as in this short, poetic travelogue. Inspired by the African setting and colours, he made several studies and paintings with an African subject, among which The Nomad’s Family (1907), The City of Constantine (1907), The Kiss (1907), The Odalisque’s Dance (1907). Paintings from the “African cycle” were exhibited in Paris (1908) and Saint Petersburg (1909).

Sources

K.S. Petrov-Vodkin, Pis’ma. Stat’i. Vystupleniia. Dokumenty, ed. by E. Selizarova, Moskva 1991;

G. Bobilewicz, Vizual’naia reprezentatsiia Afriki v evropeiskom i russkom izobrazitel’nom iskusstve nachala XX veka, “Slavic Almanac”, 2011, 17 (2), p. 127-146;

Afrika v russkom iskusstve. Katalog vystavki (Russkii muzei, 2023), Sankt-Peterburg 2023.

A.F.