ROMAN KOCH / CRIMEAN MOUNTAINS PAINTED BY ISAAC LEVITAN

ISAAC LEVITAN (1860-1900)
The Roman-Koch (1,545 m - 5, 069 ft)
Ukraine (de jure) / Russia (de facto) 

From  In the Crimean Mountains, oil on canvas,  1886,  Tretyakov Gallery Moscow

The mountain
The Roman-Koch (1545m- ) or Mountain of the Romans is the highest peak of the Crimean mountain. Its name recalls the ancient Roman prefecture of the East of Cherson. This natural space is protected by the Crimean Nature Reserve. The Crimean Mountains form the Crimean extension of the Greater Caucasus. At its feet, along the Black Sea, lie the towns of Sevastopol, the largest port in Crimea, and Yalta, a seaside resort famous for agreements signed in 1945. Archaeologists have found the oldest anatomically modern human in Europe at the Buran-Kaya site in the Crimean Mountains. The fossils are 32,000 years old with artefacts related to Gravettian culture.

The painter
Isaac Ilyich Levitan (Исаа́к Ильи́ч Левита́н) was a classical Russian landscape painter who advanced the genre of the "mood landscape". Levitan's work was a profound response to the lyrical charm of the Russian landscape. Levitan did not paint urban landscapes; with the exception of the View of Simonov Monastery (whereabouts unknown), mentioned by Nesterov, the city of Moscow appears only in the painting Illumination of the Kremlin. During the late 1870s he often worked in the vicinity of Moscow, and created the special variant of the "landscape of mood"(see above), in which the shape and condition of nature are spiritualized, and become carriers of conditions of the human soul. During work in Ostankino, he painted fragments of the mansion’s house and park, but he was most fond of poetic places in the forest or modest countryside. Characteristic of his work is a hushed and nearly melancholic reverie amidst pastoral landscapes largely devoid of human presence. Fine examples of these qualities include The Vladimirka Road, 1892, Evening Bells, 1892, and Eternal Rest, 1894, all in the Tretyakov Gallery. Though his late work displayed familiarity with Impressionism, his palette was generally muted, and his tendencies were more naturalistic and poetic than optical or scientific. 

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2021 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MOUNT CHKHARA PAINTED BY ISAAC LEVITAN

ISAAC LEVITAN (1860-1900)
Mount Chkhara (5, 193m -17,037ft)
Russia, Georgia border

In The chain of mountains, 1897, Oil on canvas, Tetriakov Gallery

Thee mountain
Mount Chkhara (, 5,193 m - 17,037ft)  is a summit of the Greater Caucasus, on the border between Georgia and Russia. It is the highest point in Georgia, and the third highest peak in the Caucasus. It is located in the Svaneti region, along the Russian border, 88 km north of the city of Kutaisi, Georgia's second city. The summit is located in the central part of the Great Caucasus chain, south-east of Mount Elbruz (the highest mountain in Europe if we consider the Caucasus on the border with Asia). It is the easternmost summit and the highest point of the Bezengui wall, a wall which from Chkhara to Djangha dominates, 2,000 m high and 6 km wide, the Bezengui glacier to the north. It includes four peaks, from east to west: the northeast summit, 5,050 m, the eastern summit, highest point, the central summit 5,068 m, and the west summit 5,057 m. Its altitude varies significantly according to sources and maps.
It was climbed for the first time in September 1888 by the northeast ridge by the British John Garford Cockin with the Swiss guides Ulrich Almer and Christian Roth. This route is now the normal route, rated 4B-5A on the Russian side, or TD- on the Alpine side. The first complete crossing of the Bezengi wall, from Chkhara to the Lialver was carried out by the Austrians Karl Poppinger, Karl Moldan and Sepp Schindlmeister from March 23 to 28, 1931. Listed 5B in Russian dimension, it is one of the ridge crossings among the longest and most difficult in Europe.
The first ski descent, on the southern slope, was made in June 2008, by Jason Thompson, Seth Waterfall, and Tyler Jones.

The painter
Isaac Ilyich Levitan (Исаа́к Ильи́ч Левита́н) was a classical Russian landscape painter who advanced the genre of the "mood landscape". Levitan's work was a profound response to the lyrical charm of the Russian landscape. Levitan did not paint urban landscapes; with the exception of the View of Simonov Monastery (whereabouts unknown), mentioned by Nesterov, the city of Moscow appears only in the painting Illumination of the Kremlin. During the late 1870s he often worked in the vicinity of Moscow, and created the special variant of the "landscape of mood", in which the shape and condition of nature are spiritualized, and become carriers of conditions of the human soul (Autumn day. Sokolniki, 1879). During work in Ostankino, he painted fragments of the mansion’s house and park, but he was most fond of poetic places in the forest or modest countryside. Characteristic of his work is a hushed and nearly melancholic reverie amidst pastoral landscapes largely devoid of human presence. Fine examples of these qualities include The Vladimirka Road, 1892, Evening Bells, 1892, and Eternal Rest, 1894, all in the Tretyakov Gallery. Though his late work displayed familiarity with Impressionism, his palette was generally muted, and his tendencies were more naturalistic and poetic than optical or scientific.
 
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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MOUNT HERMON PAINTED BY VASILY POLENOV

VASILY DMITRIYEVITCH POLENOV  (1844-1927) 

Mount Hermon / Jabal Haramun / Har Hermon  (2,814m- 9,232 ft)

 Lebanon - Syria -Israel

 In At the foot of Mount Hermon,  1882, oil on canvas,  Tretiakov State Gallery, Moscow

The mountain
Mount Hermon or Jabal Haramun or Har Hermon  (2,814m- 9,232 ft), in arabic  جبل الشيخ or جبل حرمون‎‎,  in hebrew הר חרמון‎‎,  is a mountain cluster constituting the southern end of the Anti-Lebanon mountain range. Its summit straddles the border between Syria and Lebanon and,is the highest point in Syria. On the top, in the United Nations buffer zone between Syrian and Israeli-occupied territories, is the highest permanently manned UN position in the world, known as "Hermon Hotel".The southern slopes of Mount Hermon extend to the Israeli-occupied portion of the Golan Heights, where the Mount Hermon ski resort is located. A peak in this area rising to 2,236 m (7,336 ft) is the highest elevation in Israeli-controlled territory.
Mount Hermon is a sacred moutnain mentionned in many sacred texts and epic tails.
The Epic of Gilgamesh mentions that Mount Hermon split after Gilgamesh kills Humbaba, the Guardian of the Cedar Forest. One translation of Tablet V states, "The ground split open with the heels of their feet, as they whirled around in circles Mt. Hermon and Lebanon split."
In the Book of Enoch, Mount Hermon is the place where the Watcher class of fallen angels descended to Earth. They swear upon the mountain that they would take wives among the daughters of men and take mutual imprecation for their sin (Enoch 6).
The mountain or summit is referred to as Saphon in Ugaritic texts where the palace of Ba'al is located in a myth about Attar.
The Book of Chronicles also mentions Mount Hermon as a place where Epher, Ishi, Eliel, Azriel, Jeremiah, Hodaviah, and Jahdiel were the heads of their families.
 R.T. France, in his book on the Gospel of Matthew, noted that Mount Hermon was a possible location of the Transfiguration of Jesus.
Various Temples of Mount Hermon can be found in villages on the slopes. There is a sacred building made of hewn blocks of stone on the summit of Mount Hermon. Known as Qasr Antar, it is the highest temple of the ancient world and was documented by Sir Charles Warren in 1869. An inscription on a limestone stele recovered by Warren from Qasr Antar was translated by George Nickelsburg to read "According to the command of the greatest a (nd) Holy God, those who take an oath (proceed) from here."
Eusebius recognized the religious importance of Hermon in his work Onomasticon, saying "Until today, the mount in front of Panias and Lebanon is known as Hermon and it is respected by nations as a sanctuary". It has been related to the Arabic term al-haram, which means "sacred enclosure". Another Greek inscription found in a large temple at Deir El Aachayer on the northern slopes notes the year that a bench was installed "in the year 242, under Beeliabos, also called Diototos, son of Abedanos, high priest of the gods of Kiboreia".
In Psalm 42, which leads the Psalms of the northern kingdom, the Psalmist remembers God from the land of Jordan and the Hermonites. In Song of Songs 4:8, Hermon is an instance of an exotic locale, and the Song of Ascents as well as Psalm 133:3 make specific reference to the abundant dew formation upon Mount Hermon.
According to the controversial research by Professor Israel Knohl of the Hebrew University, in his book "Hashem", Mount Hermon could be actually the Mount Sinai mentioned in the bible, with the biblical story reminiscent of an ancient battle of the northern tribes with the Egyptians somewhere in the Jordan valley or Golan heights.

The painter 
Vasily Dmitrievich Polenov (Васи́лий Дми́триевич Поле́нов) was a Russian landscape painter associated with the Peredvizhniki movement of realist artists. A native of St. Petersburg, Polenov studied under Pavel Chistyakov and at the Imperial Academy of Arts from 1863 to 1871. He was a classmate and close friend of Rafail Levitsky, a fellow Peredvizhniki artist and famous photographer.
Polenov was a pensioner of the academies of arts in Italy and France, where he painted a number of pictures in the spirit of Academism on subjects taken from European history, such as "Droit du Seigneur" (1874) Tretyakov gallery; at the same time he worked a lot in the open air.
Polenov took part in the Russo-Turkish War (1877-1878) as a war artist. Returning from the war, he joined the Peredvizhniki, taking part in their mobile exhibitions. His works won the admiration of Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov, who acquired many of them for his gallery.
In the late 1870s, Polenov concentrated on painting landscapes in the realist tradition of Aleksey Savrasov and Fyodor Vasilyev. He attempted to impart the silent poetry of Russian nature, related to daily human life. He was one of the first Russian artists who achieved a plein air freshness of color combined with artistic finish of composition (The Moscow courtyard, 1878; The Grandmother's garden, 1878; Overgrown pond, 1879). The principles developed by Polenov had a great impact on the further development of Russian (and especially Soviet) landscape painting.
Polenov's sketches of the Middle East and Greece (1881–1882) paved the way for his masterpiece, "Christ and the Sinner" (1886–87), an interesting attempt to update the academic style of painting. In his works of the 1880s, Polenov tended to combine New Testament subjects with his penchant for landscape.
Polenov was elected a member of the St.Petersburg Academy of arts in 1893, and named as a People's Artist of the USSR in 1926. For many years, he coached young painters in the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. His pupils included Abram Arkhipov, Isaac Levitan, Konstantin Korovin, Emily Shanks and Alexandre Golovine.