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Bogdan Wenig

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Bogdan Wenig
Богдан Вениг
Ivan Kramskoi, Bogdan Wenig, 1861, chalks on paper; Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow[1]
Born
Johann Gottlieb Wenig

July 30, 1837
Reval, Governorate of Estonia, Russian Empire
DiedMay 13, 1872
Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire
Resting placeVolkovo Cemetery, St. Petersburg
EducationFyodor Bruni
Alma materImperial Academy of Arts (1864)
Known forpainting
Style
Spouse
Katharina Nummelin
(m. 1866)
Children3
RelativesCarl Wenig (elder brother)

Johann Gottlieb Wenig,[a][2] russified as Bogdan Bogdanovich Wenig[a] (30 July 1837 – 13 May 1872[3]) was a Baltic German painter in the Academical style, active in Saint Petersburg during Tsar Alexander II's reign. The younger brother to fellow painter Carl Wenig, he was a second-rate master most remembered among the fourteen protestants led by Ivan Kramskoi into leaving the Imperial Academy of Arts and establishing the Artel of Artists in 1863.

Biography

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His father, Gottlieb (1804–1874), was a music teacher and organist at St. Nicholas Church in Reval. His mother Agathe (1808–1895), an amateur artist, was the aunt of Peter Carl Fabergé.[4] In 1848, he and his family moved to Saint Petersburg, where his father had found employment with the Directorate of the Imperial Theatres. In 1851, he joined his brother Carl at the Imperial Academy of Arts, studying historical painting with Fyodor Bruni.[5]

He was especially noted for his draftsmanship; receiving three small silver medals (1854, 1856, 1857), two large silver medals (1856, 1857), a small gold medal (1859) and, finally, a large gold medal for his sketch depicting the Kiss of Judas (1862).[5]

In 1863, he was one of the artists involved in the "Revolt of the Fourteen"; refusing to participate in the 100th anniversary competition for a large gold medal. From then until 1871, he was a member of the Artel of Artists, led by Ivan Kramskoi.[6]

He graduated from the academy in 1864 with the title of "Artist 2nd Class". In 1865, together with Kramskoi and Nikolay Koshelev, he worked on painting the main dome at the Cathedral of Christ the Savior.[7] During his last years, he worked as a portrait painter. The cause of his early death was apparently not recorded.

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Notes

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  1. ^ a b Russian: Иога́нн Го́тлиб Ве́ниг, Богда́н Богда́нович Ве́ниг.

References

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  1. ^ Catalogued in Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, ed. (2021). Рисунок XIX века. К. Государственная Третьяковская галерея. Каталог собрания. Рисунок XVIII–XX веков (in Russian). Vol. 2, pt. 4. Moscow: Tretyakov Gallery. p. 219, cat. no. 629; ill. p. 220. ISBN 978-5-89580-342-4. The Russian Museum, St. Petersburg holds a lesser, certainly preparatory drawing signed and dated April 1861, catalogued in Goldstein 1965, p. 375.
  2. ^ EAD, cited in Popova-Yatskevich 2015, p. 360 n. 2, records him as Johann Gottlieb Fried[rich] Wenig. Neumann 1908, p. 168, uses the name Johann Gottfried Wenig, and so do Vollmer 1942, p. 376 and Gudymenko 2022, p. 477.
  3. ^ EAD; Popova-Yatskevich 2015, p. 360 n. 2.
  4. ^ Valentin Skurlov, "Фаберже и Эстония" (Fabergé and Estonia), In : Aрхив Валентина Скурлова, 2009
  5. ^ a b Kondakov 1915, p. 35.
  6. ^ O. L. Leykind and D. R. Severyukhin, "Артель художников", In: Encyclopedia of Saint Petersburg (Online)
  7. ^ Y. V. Alekseyev-Alyurvi, Painting technology in the dome of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow (Online)

Further reading

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Contemporary sources
Scholarly notes
Reference books
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