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Lot Essay
With candied pyrotechnics scored across the sky, Sir Claude Francis Barry's The Heart of Moscow, May 9th 1945 captures a key historical moment and sets the drama against the famous skyline of Manezhnaya Square, featuring, from left to right, the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University, the State Duma, Hotel Moskva and The Historical Museum.
In the early hours of 9 May 1945 (Moscow time), Field-Marshal Wilhelm Keitel submitted the capitulation of the Wehrmacht to Marshal Georgii Zhukov in the Soviet Army headquarters in Berlin-Karlshorst, signalling the surrender of Nazi Germany to the Soviet Union and the end of the Great Patriotic War. Barry's canvas records this inaugural Victory Day; the noble architecture of Moscow transformed into a theatrical backdrop for euphoria, excitement and relief, symbolically and literally represented by the exploding fireworks that illuminate and enliven a war-darkened Moscow.
A pacifist who had refused to fight in World War I, it is fitting that Barry was inspired by the extraordinary spectacle marking the end of the war. The creative possibilities provided by the subject allowed Barry to explore the drama of pitting pure colour against dark tones, his sprays of pigment so precisely positioned that they appear as if woven through the coarse-weave canvas.
A prolific painter and skilled etcher who worked alongside key figures of the Newlyn School including Stanhope Forbes, Henry Scott Tuke and Norman Garstin, Sir Claude Francis Barry was also heavily influenced by Sir Alfred East and Frank Brangwyn, as illustrated by his dedication to form and colour. Barry's early narrative approach to painting swiftly gave way to the distinctive stylistic traits of Vorticism and Pointillism, the latter clearly identifiable in The Heart of Moscow, May 9th 1945.
Although there is no record of Barry travelling to Moscow, the accuracy of his Moscow canvasses suggests that he worked from photographs, possibly from images taken by Dmitrii Baltermants, Anatoliy Garanin or the Krasnaya Zvezda press photographer, Sergei Loskutov. Barry is one of the few non-Russian artists who recorded this particularly momentous occasion in world history.
In the early hours of 9 May 1945 (Moscow time), Field-Marshal Wilhelm Keitel submitted the capitulation of the Wehrmacht to Marshal Georgii Zhukov in the Soviet Army headquarters in Berlin-Karlshorst, signalling the surrender of Nazi Germany to the Soviet Union and the end of the Great Patriotic War. Barry's canvas records this inaugural Victory Day; the noble architecture of Moscow transformed into a theatrical backdrop for euphoria, excitement and relief, symbolically and literally represented by the exploding fireworks that illuminate and enliven a war-darkened Moscow.
A pacifist who had refused to fight in World War I, it is fitting that Barry was inspired by the extraordinary spectacle marking the end of the war. The creative possibilities provided by the subject allowed Barry to explore the drama of pitting pure colour against dark tones, his sprays of pigment so precisely positioned that they appear as if woven through the coarse-weave canvas.
A prolific painter and skilled etcher who worked alongside key figures of the Newlyn School including Stanhope Forbes, Henry Scott Tuke and Norman Garstin, Sir Claude Francis Barry was also heavily influenced by Sir Alfred East and Frank Brangwyn, as illustrated by his dedication to form and colour. Barry's early narrative approach to painting swiftly gave way to the distinctive stylistic traits of Vorticism and Pointillism, the latter clearly identifiable in The Heart of Moscow, May 9th 1945.
Although there is no record of Barry travelling to Moscow, the accuracy of his Moscow canvasses suggests that he worked from photographs, possibly from images taken by Dmitrii Baltermants, Anatoliy Garanin or the Krasnaya Zvezda press photographer, Sergei Loskutov. Barry is one of the few non-Russian artists who recorded this particularly momentous occasion in world history.