Exhibition: Nikolai Kostantinovich Roerich

In Costigliole, an exhibition dedicated to Nikolai Konstantinovic Roerich, organized by theCanelli-based Artes Association with a decade of activities, related to wellness and body care, will be open in the Misericordia Church from April 20, 2024 until June 30, 2024.

The Association also focuses attention on the lives of extraordinary men and women who have inspired generations.

This exhibition will feature Roerich’s works and a number of documents that testify to the fruitful activity of the Russian artist, who was active in the first half of the 20th century and is considered the “grandfather of UNESCO.”

He was the author of the Roerich Pact, signed at the White House in Washington in 1935, which enshrined the protection of cultural heritage worldwide.

A pact not only for the defense of culture in wartime, but for the preservation and development of culture in peacetime as well.

His legacy is multifaceted, represented by more than 7,000 works: paintings, mosaics, murals, sketches, landscape drawings.

The man’s life is legend: he was an artist, writer, explorer, archaeologist, philanthropist and peacemaker.

The artist

Born in St. Peters burg in 1874, educated at the Petersburg Academy and in Paris, he pursued legal studies to please his father, but at the same time also enrolled in the art academy.

And it is history and art that will be the muses guiding the life of this extraordinary man of knowledge.

Over the course of his life, which took him from Russia to America and finally to India, he wrote about 30 books and created more than 7,000 works and stage sets depicting scenes from ancient Slavic myths, themes and figures from world religions.

His wife Elena Ivanovna was a writer and instructor, and they shared the belief that “knowledge and beauty are the true pillars of evolution.”

His paintings portray spiritual progress, culture and its role in human evolution.

On display is a photographic documentation of the “History of the Roerich Pact,” the “Peace Flag,” and reproductions of his paintings with the original dimensions.

The Peace Flag conceived and designed by Roerich, who, deploring the destruction of artistic riches in World War I, conceived an international treaty for the defense and protection of artistic and cultural treasures in all nations, anticipating the Unesco statute and protection of art, by some 70 years.

The Peace Flag design shows three spheres surrounded by a magenta circle on a white background.

It is a very ancient symbol, found in art, architecture and archaeological finds, chosen as a landmark symbol for the protection of cultural property.

Roerich’s artistic language fits into the current of Russian Symbolism, with visionary works on the spirituality of man, dedicated to nature and in particular to the imposing beauty of the Himalayan mountains, the focus of his artistic production during the years of the adventurous expedition he led, until his death in 1947.