Description

Nicolai von Astudin (1847 Moscow – 1925 Oberlahnstein)

“View of Basilica Santa Maria Assunta in Camogli”

Material: Oil on canvas/carton
Dimension: 69 x 101 cm
Frame: Yes

About the Artist:

Nicolai von Astudin (Russian Николай Львович Астудин/Nikolai Lvovich Astudin) was a Russian landscape painter. There is slightly different information in German records about birth and death dates. According to the Munich registration sheet, his parents were Helene and Basil Astudin. He became widely known for his Rhine paintings and the numerous reproductions of his Rhine views. His work is an expression of the Rhine and Eifel romanticism of the early 20th century.

Astudin was the son of an officer and completed his schooling in Saint Petersburg. He then became a student of the landscape painter Armand-Théophile Cassagne (1823-1907) in Paris. Study trips took him to Finland, the Alpine countries and Italy. In 1875 he can be found in the Berlin address book, under Wartburgstr. 14.III. Already in 1876 and 1877 Astudin had exhibitions in Berlin. From 1882 he lived in Munich for a few years. In 1885, there is evidence of his participation in an art exhibition in Zurich with a Normandy painting. Astudin then lived in Kassel for a long time. In 1896 he married the painter Johanna Meineke from Braubach on the Rhine. In 1904/1905 Astudin lived in Bonn. His Bonn motifs include the Rhine Bridge of 1898 and the Godesburg. In 1912 he moved to Oberlahnstein, where he lived until his death. In this late phase he painted mainly Rhine motifs and repeatedly the castle Lahneck. In addition to oil paintings on canvas, engravings and watercolors, postcards based on the artist’s designs are best known and were on sale in Rhine souvenir stores from Mainz to Cologne until the 1970s. The artist’s paintings were also used as a source of inspiration.

For the 80th anniversary of his death, the city of Lahnstein organized a retrospective on September 18, 2005, at the Sporkenburger Hof.