Terra sebv s acta mvsei sabesiensi s

L. G. Safiullina, G. I. Batyrshina 

 

76

her hand in an indignant gesture. The drunken step of  the woe-begotten 

performer lacks secure footing - his leg, raised for stepping, threatens 

complete loss of  balance. One moment more and the sot will be on the 

ground, yet even in this precarious moment, he keeps hold of  the violin, 

continuing his endless play-acting. This work is interesting both from the 

viewpoint of  depicting a “pre-zero-gravity state,” and the musician’s 

appearance, endued with a beast-like face and powerful paws at the painter’s 

pleasure. Possibly, it is a metaphor for the unenviable state of  the drunkard, 

gradually losing human features and grasping the violin as his only source 

of  salvation. 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

Fig. 8. Circus Maximus, 1968. Oil on canvas,

169.7/160 cm. Private collection 

Fig. 9. A Violinist at Night, 1939. 

Paper, pen, 43.2/28 cm. Private 

collection 

Fig. 10.  A Violinist, 1926-1927. Paper, gouache, 49/ 

64 cm. Private collection

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Musical Images as a Reflection of the Artistic Universalism of Marc Chagall 

 

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However, this beast-musician in Chagall’s art is not merely a 

paradoxical image. Lyrical images of  animals playing music or carefully 

holding instruments are frequently encountered in his works: a swine and a 

horse with a violin (A Clown and a Nude with a Bouquet,  Horsewoman), a 

donkey-violinist (Strolling musicians), a fantastic flute-playing animal (Clowns-

Musicians), a cello-playing goat (Newly Married and an Eiffel Tower) and others. 

A pathetic animal-violinist with a trustingly raised muzzle dissipates the 

strain, condensed to the limit, in the picture The Angel’s Fall (fig. 11), which 

contains overtly eschatological motifs. The simple melody of  the performer, 

as if  directly addressed to the throwing down of  blood red Lucifer, 

consoles, brings hope for a possible favourable outcome. Burenina 

interprets the theme of  falling in this picture as “the underside of  the flying 

theme,” and in the image of  Lucifer she sees another confession, of  how 

“the painter is falling head-down to earth.”

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In Chagall’s artistic world, flying cow-violinists play music in the sky 

above Vitebsk (The Cows above Vitebsk,  fig. 12) as does the mysterious 

monodactylous winged fish in the pre-sunset twilight (Time is the River without 

Shores, fig. 13).

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24 

Burenina 2004. 

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 Emily Genauer interprets the content of this picture in the following way: “The title of 

this painting, paraphrasing a metaphor that can be traced back to Ovid, illustrates the 

affinity between Chagall’s pictorial conceptions and poetry.… [T]he big elements of this 

picture - the fish and the clock - are set against a blue-suffused riverscape. Only here we 

find nostalgic recollections of home in Vitebsk - the winged fish, Uncle Neuch’s violin, the 

old family pendulum clock” (Genauer, Chagall 1956). 

Fig. 11. The Angel’s Fall, 1923-1947. Oil on canvas,

148/189 cm. Private collection 

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L. G. Safiullina, G. I. Batyrshina 

 

78

 

                    

 

 

 

 

 

A goat with thrust-out chest, wearing 

a two-piece outfit on whose shoulder a 

small woman with flowers has made 

herself  comfortable, is ready to touch the 

strings of  his green violin (Spring,  fig. 14). 

As with the fish (fig. 13) one of  his hands 

is human, while the other is represented as 

a bifurcated hoof. Thus, music is 

interpreted as a guide between the earthy 

and high-minded, low and high, real and 

imaginary. It erases the boundaries between 

the world of  people and animals, destroys 

the barriers, appeals to consensus and unity.  

One of  the most capacious of  

Chagall’s pictures, demonstrating a thesis 

about the unity of  all living things, is A 

Violinist  (fig. 15). It depicts a musician, full 

of  inspiration, playing a cello which is 

represented as his own body.

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 In this way, Chagall underlines the continuity 

between the artist’s fate and his talent, the inseparability of  the musician’s 

                                                 

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 The main hero of this picture again holds the bow incorrectly in the left hand, as does his 

duet partner. 

Fig. 12.  The Cows above Vitebsk,

1966. Oil on canvas, 116/89 cm. 

Private collection 

Fig. 13. Time is a River without Shores

1930-1939. Oil on canvas, 40.5/32.3 cm. 

New York, The Museum of 

Contemporary Art 

Fig. 14. Spring, 1938.  

Lithography, 35/26 cm. 

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