Alexander Golovin designed the sets for seven theatrical productions on Spanish themes, including Dom Juan and Carmen. They were both directed by Vsevolod Meyerhold. Their stylistics differ from Golovin s other works in their laconism and simplicity. The artist wrote that he wanted to present the real, unadorned Spain, with its narrow streets, dusty squares, signboards and stunted vegetation. The everyday provincial setting was supposed to heighten the viewer s perception of the dramatic events in an everyday provincial town.

Golovin Alexander

Golovin, Alexander Yakovlevich
1863, Moscow - 1930, Detskoe Selo (Leningrad Region)
Theatrical designer, painter, graphic artist. Studied under Illarion Pryanishnikov and Vasily Polcnov at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture (1881-89) and at the Academic de Filippo Colarossi (1889) and Academie Witti (1897) in Paris. Academician (1912). Member of the World of Art (1902) and the Union of Russian Artists (1903). Contributed to the exhibitions of the Society of Travelling Art Exhibitions (1893, 1895), Moscow Fellowship of Artists (1894, 1901-02), World of Art (1899-1903, 1906, 1911-12, 1924), Union of Russian Artists (1903-09, 1916), New Society of Artists (1907, 1908), Expositions Universelles in Paris (1900; gold and silver medals) and Brussels (1910), Esposizione Internazionale in Venice (1907) and Rome (1911) and the Exhibitions of Russian Art in Paris (1906) and Berlin (1906). Designed for the Bolshoi Theatre and Moscow Arts Theatre in Moscow, Mariinsky and Alexandrinsky Theatres in Si Petersburg and Sergei Diaghilev''s Saisons Russes (1908,1910).