Ivan Aivazovsky was very fond of the Crimea. All his life and work were related to Feodosia. The artist was only 28 years old, when he decided to leave St. Petersburg for Feodosia and dedicate his paintings to the generous Crimean nature. He made many vivid and deep pictorial representations of his motherland. Art historians note that even when depicting the Italian coast Aivazovsky gives it features of the Black Sea. The artist Ilya Ostroukhov, who visited the master in the last period of his life, recalls: ‘I examined carefully three paintings by the famous artist, and it seemed to me that despite correct Biarritz coastlines the surf was not of Biarritz, of an ocean, but it was ours, Crimea, Black Sea surf’
Aivazovsky himself repeated many times that the Crimean ‘magnificent nature, majestic sea, and picturesque mountains are giving so much high poetry to an artist…’ Leaving for Feodosia in 1845, he dreamed of establishing a school for beginning artists in his hometown. Eventually, his workshop really turned into a place, which young people were eager to enter to study painting. His house had a beneficial artistic environment, where several generations of artists who devoted themselves to the Crimean nature grew up and matured.
Many pictures by Aivazovsky dedicated to Crimea are full of lyrics. They include Evening in the Crimea. Yalta and Morning in a bay. The same poetic spirit is felt in the Crimean landscape that is an airy and delicate-in-colour picture painted in the 1850s. In the center of the composition we can see poplars that, from a distance, resemble evergreen cypress trees, a cart, and a piece of the bay with a ship in the road. Aivazovsky liked to paint such chamber pictures reflecting daily life. The picture is infused with delicate lyrical feelings. The artist managed to convey soft yellowish-orange light and leisurely atmosphere of a hot day. He often painted views of the coasts of Yevpatoria, Yalta, Koktebel, and Sudak.
