Lev Vladimir Goriansky

{{Infobox person

| name = Lev Vladimir Goriansky

| image = File:Lev Vladimir Goriansky.jpg

| caption = Goriansky {{circa|1923}}

| birth_name =

| birth_date = 1894

| birth_place = Kharkov, Russian Empire

| death_date = 1967

| death_place = Andover, Massachusetts, U.S.

| resting_place = Forest Hill Cemetery, Northeast Harbor, Maine

| resting_place_coordinates =

| nationality = American

| spouse = Carola Eliot Goriansky 1896-1989

| known_for =

| education = Imperial Academy of Arts; Massachusetts Institute of Technology, B.S., M.Arch.; Harvard University, M.A. Fine Arts

| employer = Cram & Ferguson, Boston; Cross & Cross, New York

| occupation = Lieutenant Russian Imperial Navy, Architect, Artist

}}

Lev Vladimir Goriansky (1894–1967) also known as LVG, was a Russian naval officer. He later emigrated to the United States and became an architect and artist.

Early life

Goriansky was born in Kharkov, Ukraine, the second son of six children (Uri, Lev, Nicholas, Olga, Alexis, Benjamin) to Vladimir Goriansky and Anna Savitch. His father was an engineer and later appointed by Emperor Nicholas II as President of the Chamber of Control in Poltava. His mother's family was titled and owned a large country estate in Ukraine.{{cite book| title=Lev Vladimir Goriansky, Early Life 1894-1936 | author= Carola Eliot Goriansky| year=1978 | publisher = Privately printed}}

From an early age Goriansky was gifted and excelled in drawing. In 1910 at the age of sixteen he entered a competition to study for two years at the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg and was accepted. While studying art at school he lived with his uncle, Dr. Goriansky who had an apartment in the Winter Palace adjacent to the Hermitage Museum, allowing the young student time to investigate and appreciate many of the great works of the world.{{cite book| title=Lev Vladimir Goriansky, Early Life 1894-1936 | author= Carola Eliot Goriansky| year=1978 | publisher = Privately printed}}

Naval officer

In 1914 at the beginning of World War I, Goriansky entered the Russian Naval Academy to train as an officer. Upon graduation he was assigned to the Russian Cruiser Rurik (1906) of the Baltic Fleet.{{cite web | url = https://naval-encyclopedia.com/ww1/russia/rurik.php?amp=1 | title = Armoured Cruiser Rurik}} During the upheavals of the 1917 Russian Revolution, and after a murderess mutiny aboard his ship, Goriansky made his way towards Poland where he was stopped and placed into a detention camp. He would later manage to escape and return home to Kharkov before it fell in the revolution. He bid his parents farewell, and joined the loyal Black Sea Fleet in Sebastopol, where he would serve aboard the cruiser Kagoul as a Lieutenant under Admiral Osteletsky. During his travels in the Navy he made a stop in Constantinople, where he visited Haghia Sophia, which he would later write about.{{cite book| title=Lev Vladimir Goriansky, Early Life 1894-1936 | author= Carola Eliot Goriansky| year=1978 | publisher = Privately printed}} While stationed in Bizerte, he took the opportunity to board an American freighter and work his way to America, which would become his new home.{{cite book| title=Lev Vladimir Goriansky, Early Life 1894-1936 | author= Carola Eliot Goriansky| year=1978 | publisher = Privately printed}}

Architect

File:LVG Farmers Trust Building.jpg approved architectural drawing by Lev Vladimir Goriansky of City Bank Farmers Trust Building. Circa 1929, Goriansky Family Collection]]

Nicholas Roerich gave Goriansky his first job in America by helping remodel an old brownstone house which would become the Nicholas Roerich Museum. Roerich would later recommend Goriansky enrolling in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which he did in January 1922 and received his B.S. in Architecture in January, 1924. He found two good friends while studying there in Prof. William Emerson and Prof. Jacques Carlu, a French professor of art and design. While working part-time at Cram & Ferguson, Goriansky continued studying at MIT for his master's degree in architecture, which he received in 1925.

With Cram & Ferguson he worked on the designs for the walls of the Baptistry of Cathedral of St. John the Divine. By 1929 he was working with Cross & Cross in New York City. Notable projects of that period include working on the City Bank-Farmers Trust skyscraper in Manhattan, New York (20 Exchange Place) and being instrumental in the exterior design of the upper half of the building and the concept of the flat top, among the first in NYC. At the time of completion it was the tallest stone clad building in the world.{{cite web | url = https://www.nytimes.com/1992/12/20/arts/architecture-view-st-john-the-divine-it-can-t-go-on-it-goes-on.html | title = Saint John the Divine | work = The New York Times | author = Hurbet Muschamp | date = 20 December 1992}}{{cite web | url = http://s-media.nyc.gov/agencies/lpc/lp/1941.pdf | title = City Bank-Farmers Trust Company Building | publisher = New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission | date = 25 June 1996}}{{ cite web | url = https://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/20/realestate/20scap.html?mtrref=www.google.com&gwh=AA9A7E4AA2DEE948CDFB49748A6CC7F5&gwt=pay | title = An Early Tower That Inspired Greatness | work=The New York Times | author = Christopher Gray | date = 20 July 2008}}

In 1955, Goriansky designed a family summer home at Pebble Beach, on Peabody Drive, in Northeast Harbor, Maine.

File:Pebble beach 1.jpg|Pebble Beach house, 2018

File:LVG House Living Room.jpg|Living Room 2018

File:LVG House Living Room 1956.jpg|Living Room 1956

Artist

File:LVG Crane Beach 1949.jpg

With the onset of the Great Depression, Goriansky's professional career as an architect would come to a close. He would spend 1932-1934 studying at Harvard and receiving his master's in Fine Arts, and then traveling, studying, and sketching in Europe between 1934 and 1936. Between 1936 and 1956 he worked as a professional artist drawing and painting a diverse body of work, numbering over several hundred pieces. Ranging from spiritual and biblical themes, to still lifes, landscapes, figure studies and architectural renderings, signing his works LVG / BTS in a red square.{{cite book | url = http://www.islandinstitute.org/working-waterfront/art-of-acadia-the-little-brothers-on-mount-desert-island | title = Art of Acadia | publisher = Down East Books | author = David and Carl Little | date = 2016 | pages = 195, 203 | isbn=978-1-60893-474-4}}{{cite book | url = http://archive.org/details/hungryeye00pipe/page/n13 | title = The Hungry Eye: An Introduction to Cosmic Art | publisher = Devorss | author = Frank Piper | date = 1956 | pages = 27,37,44,75,131 | isbn=9781258147167}}

During this period he published:

1938 - The Fine Arts: Some Thoughts on Higher Education: A Resume of Personal Experience and Investigations, Search for Truth. La Merite Francaise, Paris (prize).
1941 - Haghia Sophia: Research in the Line of Dynamic Philosophy as to the Nature of the Great Enigma. (Andhra Research University Pamphlets, Vizianagaram City, South India).

Works

File:LVG BofaNH.jpg|Birth of a New Humanity, by LVG, oil on panel, 1940s, 47"x 83", Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG B7.jpg|Bouquet # 7, by LVG, oil on canvas, 1940s, 24" x 30", courtesy Jan L. Goriansky

File:LVG Seaside.jpg|Seaside, by LVG, oil on canvas, 1940s, Goriansky Family Collection

File: The Fallen Angel.jpg|The Fallen Angel, by LVG, oil on paper, 1944, 33" x 43",Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG 185.jpg|LVG Self Portrait, by LVG, oil on panel, 1935, 15" x 21", Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG 147.jpg|Card Game, by LVG, oil on canvas, 1940s, Goriansky Family Collection

File:Tranquility within the Fog.jpg|Tranquility within the Fog, by LVG, watercolor, 1950, 17" x 23", Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG architectural drawing.jpg|Evening at the Theater , by LVG, drawing with colorant, 1924, Francis Ward Chandler Prize (MIT), 22" x 34" , Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG European Building Study.jpg| European Building Study 21, by LVG, pencil and charcoal on paper, 1934, 8 1/2" x 9", Goriansky Family Collection

File: LVG Drawing.jpg|Male Study 26, by LVG, charcoal on paper, 1920s, 14" x 16", Goriansky Family Collection

File:Breaking Camp I.jpg| Breaking Camp, by LVG, drawing and gouache, Goriansky Family Collection

File:Cabaret I.jpg|Cabaret, by LVG, 1935, gouache, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Cathedral Study.jpg| Cathedral Study 17, by LVG, 1929, drawing and gouache, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Figure Study 17.jpg|Figure Study 17, by LVG, 1923, pencil and charcoal, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Flower Study 4.jpg|Flower Study 4, by LVG, charcoal, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Painting Day at the Beach.jpg|Day at the Beach, by LVG, 1935, drawing and gouache, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Figure Study 23.jpg|Figure Study 23, by LVG, pen and charcoal, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Venice 13.jpg|Venice 13, by LVG, 1935, drawing with gouache, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Notre Dame Gargoyle.jpg|Notre Dame Gargoyle, by LVG, 1936, drawing with gouache, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Venice 24.jpg|Venice 24, by LVG, 1934, drawing with gouache, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Figure Study 42.jpg|Figure Study 42, by LVG, 1923, pencil, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Cathedral.jpg|Cathedral Study 9, by LVG, 1925, charcoal, Goriansky Family Collection

File:European Cathedral 3.jpg|European Cathedral 3, by LVG, 1940, oil on canvas, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Figure Study 27.jpg|Figure Study 27, by LVG, 1924, pen and chalk, Goriansky Family Collection

File:Praying for Humanity.jpg|Praying for Humanity, by LVG 1945, 18" x 26" Oil on Board, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Bouquet 16, 19.5 x 23.5 Oil on Canvas.jpg |Bouquet # 16 by LVG, 1950, 20" X 23", Oil on Canvas, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG Virgin of Vladimir 21"x 27" - Oil on Panel.jpg|Virgin of Vladimir by LVG, 1940, Goriansky Family Collection

File:LVG European Garden 13 x 15 - Oil on Canvas.jpg|Florence Garden, by LVG, 1935, Goriansky Family Collection

Personal life

In 1927 in New York City, Goriansky married Carola Eliot from Brookline, Massachusetts. She was the daughter of Charles Eliot and Mary Yale Pitkin from Philadelphia (1865–1946); the marriage produced two sons.{{cite book| title=Lev Vladimir Goriansky, Early Life 1894-1936 | author= Carola Eliot Goriansky| year=1978 | publisher = Privately printed | url =https://nehlibrary.net/digitalarchive/items/show/5211 }} In 1942 the couple purchased 148 Main Street in Andover Massachusetts, where the family lived until 1990.{{ cite web | url =https://preservation.mhl.org/148-main-street | title = 148 Main Street | publisher = Andover Historic Preservation}}

References

Museum links

[https://web.archive.org/web/20190704001923/https://collection.farnsworthmuseum.org/objects/1764 Farnsworth Art Museum]
[https://worcester.emuseum.com/objects/5072/figure-shading-his-eyes?ctx=5022d028-c91d-41c0-b109-d053416e9926&idx=0 Worcester Art Museum]
[https://www.harvardartmuseums.org/collections/person/22973?person=22973 Harvard Art Museums]

Category:MIT School of Architecture and Planning alumni

Category:Harvard University alumni

Category:1894 births

Category:1967 deaths

Category:Imperial Russian Navy personnel

Category:Imperial Academy of Arts alumni

Category:20th-century American painters

Category:20th-century American architects

Category:White Russian emigrants to the United States