October 9, 2024

The Art of Palekh as a Unique Phenomenon of the World Art Culture

We are thrilled to present an article written exclusively for our project by Olga Alexandrovna Kolesova, the Director of the State Museum of Palekh Art.

The Art of Palekh as a Unique Phenomenon of the World Art Culture

The worldview basis of Palekh art is closely connected with the community of the Palekh people and their lifestyle. Once, the Palekh icon painters belonged to the peasant class. But by their way of life, interests, and views on the world around them, they can hardly be considered ordinary peasants. Many of them often, for long periods of time, had to live and work far away from their native places. Contact with various artistic traditions and customs developed an inquisitive mind and the ability to appreciate and understand the beautiful. This versatile knowledge allowed provincial masters to expand the iconographic framework of their own works, not to close themselves to well-tested compositional schemes, and not to limit themselves to the choice of standard pictorial elements. Hence, the desire of the Paleshans for sobornost, the universal scale of their figurative and compositional solutions, confirmed by the best works of Palekh icon painting from museum and private collections.

The birth of the new Palekh art of lacquer miniature cannot be called a mere coincidence, a concurrence of circumstances. The fact that such a miracle happened in Palekh is quite natural. The Paleshans were at the origin of artistic pursuits at the end of the XIX century, which led to the subsequent unprecedented upsurge of Russian culture. The result of new moods in society at the end of the XIX century was the active construction of churches in the so-called Russian-Byzantine, Neo-Russian style, a precursor of Art Nouveau. At that time, no significant project could be accomplished without the participation of Paleshans. The picturesque decoration of new churches attracted the attention of historical and archaeological societies, and the work of the Paleshans was observed by scholars and architects: I. E. Zabelin, V. V. Suslov, A. S. Kaminsky, N. V. Sultanov, M. P. Botkin, D. V. Ainalov, A. V. Prakhov, those who introduced new stylistic forms into contemporary art.

This cultural environment, which nourished all the future founders of the new Palekh art, became the powerful impulse that overcame the destructive consequences of the 1917 revolution. The revolution broke into the measured patriarchal life of the Palekh people, forcing many to abandon the craft of their ancestors. There remained those for whom the desire for creativity and professional self-realization was the main meaning of existence. Ivan Golikov was one of them.

The ideologists of the Silver Age of Russian culture believed that a creative person should be a spiritual leader, a kind of messiah, capable of leading and helping others to realize themselves. This is how we should perceive the phenomenon of Golikov and his significance in the art of Palekh. Golikov’s leadership was recognized by all Palekh artists, who were no less professional than he was and even surpassed Ivan Ivanovich in execution skills. Golikov had no doubt that new work could only be created on the basis of previous experience. Ivan Ivanovich did not abandon icon-painting traditions and heeded the advice of P. D. Korin and A.V. Bakushinsky to carefully study and use the best examples of Palekh icon-painting, which were kept in the local Church of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross.

Close cooperation with representatives of the capital’s academic and artistic intelligentsia became one of the most important factors in the success of the pioneering work of the former icon painters. The invaluable support of A. A. Glazunov (1884–1955) and consultations of A. V. Bakushinsky (1883–1939) helped the Palekh masters in their search for new opportunities for self-realization. A native of the local area, Professor Bakushinsky took an interest in the artistic endeavors of the Paleshans and strongly advised them to preserve the centuries-old traditions of icon painting. He spared no time for enlightening conversations, revealing to the artists the vast expanse of world art, tracing connections with Palekh icon painting.

Consolidation into a cooperative artel, and in a very short time, became the main condition for the participation of the Paleshans in the International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts in Paris in 1925. For this purpose, on December 5, 1924, in the Palekh house of A. V. Kotukhin, a meeting of future members of the Artel of Ancient Painting was held. Seven people became shareholders: Ivan Ivanovich Golikov (1887–1937), Ivan Mikhailovich Bakanov (1870–1936), Ivan Vasilyevich Markichev (1880–1954), Alexander Vasilyevich Kotukhin (1886–1961), Vladimir Vasilyevich Kotukhin (1897–1957), Ivan Ivanovich Zubkov (1883–1938), Alexander Ivanovich Zubkov (1885–1938). A. V. Kotukhin was elected chairman of the artel. A. A. Glazunov could not become a full member of the Artel because he was not a resident of Vladimir province. I. P. Vakurov (1885–1968) postponed joining the Artel for personal reasons. But both took part in the Paris exhibition. By the beginning of the exhibition, I. I. Golikov had finally found his unique symbolic image of the Red Plowman. It became the title image in the Soviet catalog of the exhibition. The Paleshans marked their participation in the exhibition with a colorful poster with the name of the artel. The name “Artel of Ancient Painting” is not accidental. It clearly defines the importance of ancient traditions in the work of the new Soviet artisans. The founders of the new art preserved and consolidated as a tradition the intellectual basis, the freedom of improvisation that distinguished the works of the Palekh masters from the general mass of Russian provincial icon painting.

At the world exhibition in Paris in 1925, the Paleshans were a grand success. The Artel was awarded the Grand Prix. Honorary diplomas were awarded to I. M. Bakanov, A. V. Kotukhin, I. V. Markichev, I. P. Vakurov, A. A. Glazunov, I. I. Golikov. A. Glazunov, I. I. Golikov. I. P. Vakurov was also awarded the Gold Medal.

The Paleshans had already participated in international exhibitions. In 1924, Palekh miniatures were exhibited at the International Exhibition in Venice. The resonance was so wide that the Italian side offered the masters from Palekh to move to Italy to organize a miniature painting school with a lifetime pension. Italy will once again accept the works of the Palekh masters in 1927 in Milan.

The art of the Paleshans aroused genuine interest and high demand in the West. There, it was perceived as a unique phenomenon in the world art culture. The general opinion was expressed by the Norwegian writer, Nobel Prize winner Knut Hamsun: “I have never seen such a beautiful thing before, and I do not understand how it was done. If possible, I would ask for an explanation of this miracle.” Europeans were fascinated not only by the beautiful design of the pieces but, above all, by the unique painting technique, which was unfamiliar to them.

The color scheme of Palekh miniatures, as well as icons, followed the same pattern: the abstract nature of a single color spot, the presence of all the brightest colors of nature with the general consistency and restraint of the color solution. Due to the translucency of the lower layers of paint through the thin, transparent upper layers, as well as the different densities of the paint layer, there is an effect of mobility of the color spot, the overflow of one tone into another without marking visible boundaries. The subtlety of the painting of the Paleshans lies not in the elegance of the line drawing but in the leveling of tonal transitions. If we compare the techniques of the Paleshans and other masters of tempera painting, Palekh artists are without equal in transparency and number of colorful layers. Equally mobile and elusive are the golden highlights on top of the color spot. Gold in Palekh art is a key style-forming element. Its use is multifunctional.

Golden highlights enhance the plastic expressiveness of silhouettes and give volume to linear forms. As a technique of decorative art, gold enhances the ornamental merits of Palekh compositions. Gold plays an important role in the figurative solution of the Palekh miniature. Sometimes, its presence means only a symbolic imitation of sunlight. However, in the best Palekh works throughout the entire period of the existence of lacquer miniatures, gold retains its symbolic meaning of Divine light, canonizing the spiritual essence of Palekh art.

The art of Palekh miniature painting is firmly connected with the traditions of monumental painting. Local masters were known to be among the best artists of wall paintings and knew no equal in creating the finest miniatures. Such different types of painting skills coexisted in Palekh in parallel for more than a century and always had a mutual influence on each other.

The prevalence of large icons in the early icon painting of Palekh played a significant role in shaping the peculiarities of the Palekh style. Centrism, symmetry and closed compositional structure, majestic calm rhythm of lines, and colorful spots give monumental character to the best works of local masters throughout the history of the Palekh artistic craft, be it a complex multi-figure composition on an icon board or on a semi-finished papier-mâché piece.

In the first years of the Artel’s existence, caskets, cases for glasses, cigarette holders, bead boxes, powder holders, stamp holders, small boxes, and writing instruments were brought from Fedoskin. And only by the end of 1926, the production of semi-finished products in Palekh began. Their quality was not always at its best, and the Palekh artists were offered to switch to other materials: porcelain, wood, and metal. The artists themselves experimented, painting sea pebbles and glass. This also applied to the background. Paying tribute to the advantages of a black background, artists in the early years often painted miniatures on multicolored lacquer surfaces.

In Palekh art in the first decade of its rapid development, there was a unique situation in the relationship between individual and collective principles. The artel form of organization of Palekh artists, unified materials, and technical skills could not restrain the individual manner of the masters. Preserving the general concept of Palekh miniature, each author sought his own measure of linearity, decorativeness, ornamentation, and his original inimitable techniques and forms.

The lively atmosphere of artistic Palekh: communication with art historians, writers, journalists, creative discussions, support for each other in artistic pursuits, reflections on the fate and development of lacquer miniatures, gatherings with poetry reading and singing, contributed to the unprecedented rise of artistic skill and imagination of the Palekh artists.

In the new conditions of ideological struggle, in the orbit of which the art of Palekh artisans was involved, the former icon painters sought to free themselves from the constraining framework of the church canon, but the delicate intuition of true connoisseurs of beauty did not allow them to become destroyers of centuries-long Old Russian tradition.