Vladimir Tomilovsky

Vladimir Petrovitch Tomilovsky (Russian: Владимир Петрович Томиловский) (March 22 (April 4), 1901 – June 17, 1991) was a Russian landscape painter. His works primarily depicted the nature of Siberia and Lake Baikal.

The final rehabilitation from his political accusations reached Tomilovsky only in 1982. The real reason for his prison sentence was finally disclosed in the KGB archives – it was his belonging to the Russian Army General’s family which was the true cause of his camp sentence. Up till his death in 1991, Vladimir Tomilovsky worked in his studio in Irkutsk where he produced well over a thousand paintings. Tomilovsky died on June 17, 1991 in Irkutsk at the age of 90.

On the day after Germany started the war against the Soviet Union, Tomilovsky submitted his application as a volunteer to enter the Soviet Army but got refused. In order to help, he started working on creation of the agitation posters in the workshops of ‘Agit-OKNA TASS’. During the war period Tomilovsky produced a number of posters and drawings in the local newspapers in order to support the anti-fascist movement. In 1943 Tomilovsky was elected as the Chairman of the Irkutsk branch of the Union of Soviet Artists. He was working in this position until the end of the war. Starting from 1946, for six times in a row Tomilovsky was elected as Head of the Audit Committee of the Union of Artists in Irkutsk, each time for the duration of two years. Between 1956 and 1961 he was appointed as the Chief Artist of the city of Irkutsk. Since that period, Tomilovsky was a permanent member of the Audit Committee of the Irkutsk Union of Artists. Helping young artists was considered to be one of his main priorities at work.

Tomilovsky moved to Moscow in 1930 to continue his art education, in the Moscow Academy of Arts. His studies were postponed as he had to make a living and he started working as an artist in the city’s committee of fine art. In 1934 Vladimir Tomilovsky was taken by the vortex of political repressions as got accused of attempt of Sergey Kirov’s life (C.М. Киров) under the article 58. Following this accusation, Tomilovsky spent 2,5 years in the prison camp and was released in 1937 without a right to reside or even visit Moscow. That is why he decided to move back to Irkutsk where his family was waiting for him. Shortly after his return to Irkutsk, Vladimir Tomilovsky became a member of the Union of Artists of the USSR.

After graduation from the military school in 1917, Vladimir Tomilovsky started his service in the engineering division of the Admiral Kolchak’s army; however, his life took a sharp turn when he entered the Red Army in 1919 and served there up till 1924 leaving the military service with the rank of Chief of Staff at the 14th cavalry squadron of the special purpose division. Following his military service, from 1920 to 1921, Vladimir studied painting in the art studio in the city of Tomsk (Siberia). From 1926 to 1930, he continued art studies in Irkutsk courses of painting art which were given by Ivan Kopylov (Иван Лаврович Копылов), an alumnus of the Paris Art Academy. In the meantime, Tomilovsky married Tatyana Kazakova (Татьяна Алексеевна Казакова) in 1924, and on May 10, 1927 their daughter Maria was born.

A new turn signified the late period of Tomilovsky’s creative live. His art became more laconic and the themes of endless cosmic eternity and the momentary human life became more pronounced. One can find these reflections in the works like ‘The Great Martian God’, where Tomilovsky depicted the supernatural forces, the universal mind, and the planet of Earth at its origin. In the late works of the artist, one would not find admiration of the Soviet construction sites anymore. Instead, the message about the fragility of our planet and its nature in front of relentless urbanisation and environmental concerns sounds stronger. The painting called On the edge of the 21st century is a vivid example of these concerns. An Irkutsk-based writer Larisa Lankina wrote in one of her articles that ‘the planet of Earth in Tomilovsky’s art resembles a fragile Christmas ball seen by the artist from the emptiness of the outer worlds; and it becomes the symbol of the human responsibility for its future’.

Vladimir Petrovitch Tomilovsky was born in the township of Novogeorgievsk (Новогеоргиевск) in the former province of Warsaw of the Russian Empire on April 4, 1901 in the family of a Russian military officer. Tomilovsky’s grandfather was a General of the Russian Army and his father – Pyotr Petrovitch Tomilovsky (Петр Петрович Томиловский) - was a Colonel of the Russian Army and one of the first hot air balloons aeronauts. His mother – Maria Tomilovskaya, whose maiden name was Marie Pitz-Noirot – was born in Paris and went to Russia as a French language teacher. The family had four children: Nadezhda, Vladrimir, Pyotr, and Maria. Due to dislocations of the military missions, the family had to move a lot so Vladimir Tomilovsky spent his early years in the city of Ulan-Ude in Siberia. At the age of nine, Tomilovsky was sent to the military school in the city of Irkutsk in Eastern Siberia, where the family resided at that time. Drawing became the favourite subject among all the school disciplines for young Vladimir.