In 1975, Kuzmich graduated from the Belarusian Theatre and Art Institute (now Belarusian State Academy of Arts), where he then served as a lecturer of arts for a short period of time.
Career
Gallery of Aleksey Kuzmich
Gallery of Aleksey Kuzmich
Gallery of Aleksey Kuzmich
Gallery of Aleksey Kuzmich
Gallery of Aleksey Kuzmich
Gallery of Aleksey Kuzmich
Gallery of Aleksey Kuzmich
Gallery of Aleksey Kuzmich
Gallery of Aleksey Kuzmich
Gallery of Aleksey Kuzmich
Zhilunovich Str, 2. Minsk-Belarus Belarus 220026
Aleksey Kuzmich worked at Minsk Bearing plant from 1968 to 1969.
In 1975, Kuzmich graduated from the Belarusian Theatre and Art Institute (now Belarusian State Academy of Arts), where he then served as a lecturer of arts for a short period of time.
Aleksey Kuzmich was a Belarusian painter who devoted all his creative work to the chanting female beauty and created about 1000 paintings depicting the image of the Madonna. His canvases with Madonna’s faces are known far beyond Belarus, and he is often called the Belarusian Raphael.
Background
Aleksey Vasilyevich Kuzmich was born on June 1, 1945, in Polesian village of Mokhro, Brest region, Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic (now Mokhro, Brest region, Belarus), to Vasiliy Fedorovich and Alexandra Maksimovna Kuzmich. His father died soon after returning from the war, so his mother had to bring up her seven children alone relying on God, hard work and kind people.
The main recollections of Aleksey's childhood were connected with the most respectable man in the village, Rubanovich Anatoly Pavlovich, an artist and a friend of his father. It was Rubanovich who acquainted Kuzmich with art.
Education
On finishing nine classes at a secondary school, Kuzmich left for a distant Siberian town of Krasnoyarsk, where he entered V. I. Surikov Art School in 1962. He graduated from it three years later, specializing in Arts.
In 1975, Kuzmich also graduated from the Belarusian Theatre and Art Institute (now Belarusian State Academy of Arts), where he studied under the guidance of Boris Arakcheev, Nathan Voronov, and Petro Krokholev.
In 1965, Aleksey Kuzmich was drafted into the Rocket Forces of the Soviet Army, serving in the Krasnoyarsk Region. During that period, he was also engaged in the execution of art and design works and received the 1st category in freestyle wrestling and the 2nd category in weightlifting in the army.
The spell of service over, Kuzmich came to Minsk to enter the Theatre and Arts Institute (now Belarusian State Academy of Arts). Unfortunately, he got late for the entrance examinations and had to accept the job at the bearing plant. There, he learned that the Palace of culture at the plant had a nice art studio headed by A. V. Baranovski. The lad hurried to show his works to the master. Anatoly Vasilyevich praised them highly and admitted Aleksey to the studio. While at the studio, Kuzmich got a stronger belief in his talent.
Next year Kuzmich entered the Theatre and Arts Institute, where he stayed to teach after his graduation. However, in a short period of time, he realized that lecturing was not his predestination and left the institute to start his career of a full-time artist.
Since 1975, Kuzmich had been a participant of many art exhibitions. However, for a long period of time, he was not acknowledged and wasn't permitted to have shown for the only reason: on his pictures, the artist boldly represented the mystery of the spell of a woman's body.
In 1981, People's artist of Belarus L. Shmeljov and Honoured Art Workers, P. Krokhalev and I. Stasevich recommended Kuzmich to the Belarusian Union of Artists. The same year his personal exhibition was held. The pictures of Aleksey Kuzmich were exhibited by the State Museum of the Republic of Belarus and abroad.
From 1990, Kuzmich enjoyed great popularity and continued to hold his exhibitions extensively in Minsk, Vitebsk, Bobruisk, Baranovichi, Grodno, Mogilyov, Gomel, Brest and other towns of the republic as well as abroad.
Aleksey Kuzmich died on October 31, 2013, in Minsk, Belarus.
The artist's work is dominated by the image of the Madonna, through which he embodied the ideals of goodness, purity and beauty, a symbol of life and rebirth of Slavic spirituality, pain for the fate of spiritual civilization. Kuzmich’s paintings have characteristic features of icon imagery, while at the same time his Madonna’s faces personify a generalized image of sublime feminine sensitivity. The uniqueness of the Belarusian artist's work lies in the fact that he managed to combine what seemed to be incompatible - the sacral and secular. The white, the red, the blue, the green are artist's favourite colours. As he believed, these colours are the hymn to rebirth. He put the paints on the canvas not by separate dabs but with compactness, solidly. His pictures contain much light, warmth, softness, tenderness. Nothing evokes the feeling of something artificial, nothing irritates. First of all, Kuzmich was realistic and therefore he was precise.
It is also possible to divide the whole of the creative work of Aleksey Kuzmich into two stages. At the first stage, the artist opposes the Madonna to a woman the labourer and shock-worker condemned by the revolution and so-called social mode of life to the living conditions of a slave. The woman on the pictures by Kuzmich is depicted boldly, in a romantic and lofty way. Actually, he renovates in art-painting not only the woman the way she is by nature but the lost morality of the people.
At the second stage, the Madonna is depicted in a more real, earthly, historically concrete manner. The artist feels the necessity to show the tragedy of events at definite historical breakdowns.
Besides, Kuzmich also raised problems of a philosophical nature in his paintings: about the rationale of a man's presence on Earth, his moral obligation, the spiritual role of Slavic peoples in the evolution of the entire of mankind. His considerations about problems of spiritual perfection of a man, life in eternity and death during one’s lifetime have been fully implemented in his works.
Quotations:
"Now our state suffers a great need in restoration of spiritual values, and the highest goal of art is the affirmation of beauty, something divine in man. Art must light a Candle of Spirit for the whole world, because, as many years ago, people are always striving for spiritual light and love."
"It was a great pleasure for me to see so many different people at my exhibition. Diplomats, businessmen, students and children came here to look at my Madonnas."
Membership
In 1984, Kuzmich became a member of the Belarusian Union of Artists, and in 2002, he was elected a full member of the International Cyril and Methodius Academy of Slavic Education.
Personality
Quotes from others about the person
Alexey Kuzmich Jr.: "My father wanted to bring the ideas about ideals, goodness and pureness to people, and that compassion must be in the heart of every man."
Alexey Kuzmich Jr.: "My father is the only person in the world to devote all of his creative work to glorifying female beauty. By using the image of Madonna, he immortalised woman and devoted his entire oeuvre to her."
Interests
Travelling
Connections
Aleksey Kuzmich met Inessa Iosifovna in 1985 when she was a student of the Belarusian Technical Institute (now Belarusian National Technical University). Soon, the couple got married and gave birth to one son, Aleksey Kuzmich Jr.