 Muscovites are already familiar with the creativity of the artist N. Kabanov for a long time. His paintings have been more than once demonstrated at the numerous exhibitions at home and abroad. Works of Kabanov are distinguished by that high quality manner which is characteristic for the Moscow painting school, the artist belongs to the masters who devoted themselves to one genre, one theme. This genre is a view, to be more exact - city view. This theme – city of Moscow, which is really inexhaustible for art and which attracted, attracts and will attract artists. Mainly on the artist's works - the central sites of Moscow, its throwing back history, embodied in the architecture, buildings and monuments.
Kabanov's works are distinguished by bright individual vision and deep feelings. That is why such familiar Moscow sites as Klimentovsky pereulok, Yauzskie Vorota, Trubnaya ploshad and Pushkinskaya street appear in front of the onlooker both recognizable geographically and unexpectedly new, transformed by the poetic vision of the artist. They as if get new life, new meaning being passed through the lyric vision of the artist.
The viewer looking at the masterpieces of Kabanov gets the imagination that he himself has seen the depicted place just like it is painted, without noticing that he is looking at this place by the eyes of the artist. That is the reason of the unusual convincingness of his works which is considerably promoted by the chosen by the artist state of nature, of light and air. The majority of the city views were painted early in spring or in autumn, when the light is mild and there are no sharp shades. At that time there is no green, and the buds have just started swelling or the trees have thrown down the leaves, revealed the branches, and the mist hides the clear-cut shapes of buildings and bright spots of color. Such state of nature allows the painter to avoid intensive and shrill color compositions. The color range of his paintings is based on semi-tones, tints, rich versions, deep pearly-gray, ashy, violet-blue-gray touches conveying the moist in the air, its material tangibility and as if softly shrouding the buildings in.
The artist N. Kabanov loves his city. He has a talent to see it and to reveal its poetic beauty to the others. He has a talent to portray this feeling of beauty in his works, to involve the audience in the contemplation of the city views and to give rise to the feeling of participation.
|