Levin Joseph (1894-1979) Russian; New York School

Levin Joseph (1894-1979) Russian; New York School "Composition", oil on canvas signed lower right, 73 x 50 cm, circa 60s/70s JOSEPH LEVIN Crossing the 20th century (Saint Petersburg 1894- Mazan 1979) Joseph Levin was born in Saint- Petersburg in 1894. After the course of gymnasium study, he attended The Imperial Institute of Painting, directed by Roerich. His teachers are Resberg, Moscovici, Navozov and Fimon. Then he goes to New York, where the oldest of his brothers has lived since 1905 and where Joseph attends the National Academy of Drawing. In February 1917 he learns that the revolution has begun in Russia, he returns to Petrograd and works in the workshop of Resberg, his former teacher. Then in October, Levin leaves Petrograd and travels to Moscow. In 1919 he met the poet Sergei Essenin, the friend of his brother Vaniamin. In Moscow he frequents the painter Larionov and the whole group of the Russian avant-garde, he is conquered and adheres to the Imaginist Manifesto published by Essenin. In 1920, he went to Cita, in the Far East, where he faced the technique of fresco and where he won a competition to decorate the walls of the recreation room of the University of Penza. In 1922 he made a trip to China. He exhibits his paintings in Tianjin. The study of Chinese calligraphy increases the graphic character of his art. Levin returned to Moscow in 1923, resumed contact with S. Essenin, who arrived from Paris with Isidore Duncan. On Essenin's death, Levin watched over the body during transport to Moscow and made portraits of it, the original of which is in the Museum of Literature in Moscow. In 1926, he obtained a visa for a trip to Paris, where he remained until 1935. During his Parisian years he had a studio in the rue Baillou in Montparnasse where, in addition to paintings, he designed costumes and sets for Russian singers and ballerinas. In 1935, he moved to New York and opened a studio in Greenwich Village. He produced a series of lithographs there. His painting evolves towards abstract language. He elaborates his idea of the representation of the centrifugal force, symbol of the Universal Movement which he calls “Sur-conscientilism”. From 1950 until 1967 he exhibited his paintings in Paris, London, Amsterdam and in several American cities between New York and Washington. He returned to Moscow in 1969 with an exhibition at the Museum of Literature. In 1970 he settled down definitively in Paris with his wife Bettina, who had shared his existence for 43 years. In January 1979, at the Grifo Gallery in Rome, he produced an anthological exhibition “Sixty years of painting.” He lived his last years in Mazan (Avignon) and died in 1979. Joseph Levin was also a writer and poet. By Augusto Callegari