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How an Immigrant Russian Artist’s Home Became the Taos Museum of Art  above photo: Courtesy Taos Museum of Art The unique town of Taos, New Mexico has long been known as an artist’s community featuring museums and galleries, southwestern adobe houses, and fine restaurants serving southwestern cuisine. Rod Collman, President of sdg Architecture in Dunedin, Florida, introduces us to a legendary Taos home and museum.
His name was Nicolai Fechin. Born in 1881 in Kazan, Russia, Fechin became a gifted artist at an early age. He attended the Imperial Academy of the Arts in St. Petersburg and supplemented his art by teaching. When he was invited to show his paintings in an international exhibition at the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, his work gained an international reputation in America and Europe. This would serve him well when he, his wife Alexandra, and daughter Eya fled political unrest and deprivation following the Russian Revolution. The family immigrated to the United States, aided by American patrons. His modern impressionistic portrait paintings enjoyed exhibitions and strong sales, and while teaching at the New York Academy of Art, he continued painting, sculpting, and printmaking. Fechin was known as the Tartar Painter; early portrait subjects included Vladimir Lenin and Karl Marx.
above left: Detail of exterior window wood trim above right: Fechin's painting studio with north-light windows "Doctors diagnosed Fechin with tuberculosis and advised him to go to the southwest United States for its dry, warm climate," said Collman. "The family found the burgeoning art colony of Taos and eventually bought a two-story adobe house. The Native Americans and the mountains of northern New Mexico reminded the artist of his home in Siberia. Fechin enthusiastically embraced the people and landscapes of the area as his subjects and painted portraits of celebrities of the time. These included American frontier novelist Willa Cather and Frieda Lawrence, a German literary figure who was the wife of D.H. Lawrence and distant relative of World War I air ace Manfred von Richthofen."
 above: Living area with adobe brick fireplace "He soon decided the house was too small and began a three-year expansion,” said Collman. “His father was a wood carver and gilder who taught the young artist how to use his hands to make beautiful objects. Fechin detailed the home with hand-carved wood elements, blending the Tartar architecture of his native Russia with the pueblo architecture of the southwest United States. What captivated me was the level of detail in the organic architectural features, and the hand-made structural elements, trim, and furniture. This encouraged me to share photographs of the marvels of the Fechin House, which became the Taos Museum of Art.”
above left and right: Interior structure details
Unfortunately, this period of expanding and detailing the house put tremendous stress on the Fechin family, leading to Nicolai's divorce from Alexandra in 1933. Fechin left the house never to return. Alexandra continued living in and caring for the home in Taos while the artist moved to southern California with their daughter, Eya. He traveled internationally and died in 1955.
Nicholai Fechin's easel, painting table, and a collection of his paintings are permanently housed at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The Fechin Center in Kazan, Russia exhibits the largest collection of his work. To see a virtual tour of the Taos Museum of Art and Fechin House, visit their website at www.taosartmuseum.org.
For a description of Fechin's painting technique and samples of his pre-American portraits, go to http://www.ruthiev.com/nicolai-fechin/. A video of 320 of Fechin's impressionist paintings of people and landscapes is available at Nicolai Fechin: A collection of 320 paintings (HD) (youtube.com)
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