Ivan Karpoff (Novocherkassk, 1898 – Milan, 1970), Sunset in Dacia

Ivan Karpoff (Novocherkassk, 1898 – Milan, 1970) Sunset in Dacia Oil on panel, 90 x 120 cm Signed lower left: Karpoff Ivan Karpoff is an artist of Russian origin who, from childhood, showed a strong inclination towards graphic arts. Trained in his homeland, he moved to Milan in 1925 thanks to a scholarship that allowed him to graduate from the Academy of Fine Arts, where he attended the courses of Ambrogio Alciati (1878-1929), a skilled portraitist who drew inspiration from the Scapigliatura painter Tranquillo Cremona (1837-1878). Unlike his master, however, Karpoff focused more on painting forest, mountain, and marine landscapes, often depicted during heavy snowfall and at sunset. Karpoff can be considered, in all respects, an Italian artist, particularly from Lombardy. His painting, indeed, which does not fail to depict views of the Milanese countryside, draws influences from Lombard painters such as Eugenio Gignous (1850-1906) and Leonardo Bazzaro (1853-1937). His paintings, therefore, are characterized by impressionistic brushstrokes of 19th-century taste, but also stand out for their great skill in rendering reflections and plays of light. Karpoff's painting is not devoid of nostalgia for his homeland, Russia, which is evident not only in his pictorial technique but also in that sense of solitude and suspension that pervades the plains he depicted during the winter season, covered in snow, thus evoking Slavic romanticism. The painting examined here encompasses all these characteristics. The snow-covered landscape, depicted at sunset, is that of the Hungarian countryside, another place that frequently appears in Karpoff's repertoire. The work is distinguished by the beauty of the rendering of the rosy and silvery reflections of the snow mantle that covers and immobilizes the vegetation, by the intense, almost petroleum green of the body of water at the center of the canvas, and by the rapid touch of brushstrokes with which Karpoff creates the trees, the small wooden cabin, the human figure, and the horse. Despite the presence of living beings, the aforementioned sense of suspension and solitude is not absent; on the contrary, it is fueled precisely by the snow mantle that immobilizes nature. Numerous works depicting snow-covered landscapes signed by Karpoff are present on the art market, and the Fondazione Cariplo also owns his 'Naviglio d'Inverno' (Winter Canal).