Academic Periodical Scientific Papers of St Petersburg Academy of Fine Arts'64. The Issues of the Russian Art Development

The article is devoted to the study of the interaction between handwritten and printed books in the single space of Russian book culture in the 16th– 17th centuries. The publications of the Moscow Printing House are studied as works of the book art. The features of the artistic form of Moscow editions, its change under the influence of the aesthetics of a handwritten book beginning with the publications of Ivan Fedorov and Peter Mstislavets till the books of Kondratiy Ivanov are considered. Particular attention is paid to the engraved illustration of a printed book and its relationship with the contour miniature; the subordination of book engraving to the aesthetics of the miniature, and in general, to an illuminated handwritten book, is shown. The author shows that the publications of the Moscow Printing House were completely in the aesthetic field of the handwritten book, organically fit into the handwritten type of Russian book culture in the 16th–17th centuries.

In the studies of the traditional church architecture, it is important to consider the church-building according to typological levels: the general compositional scheme, the type of the main volume of the church-building and those of aisle, variations of type, sub-variations and specific modifications. In different groups of architectural monuments, similar elements can reflect the type in one case, and a variant of the type in another. A careful study of the forms (and the sequence of analysis) determines “static” position of the church-building in the general classification, and the nature of “dynamic” changes determines the logic of the development of traditional Church architecture.

The article traces the history of the creation of the wall paintings and mosaics of the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral in Warsaw in 1905–1912. The author examines the theological program of the lost temple decoration, reveals its iconographic and stylistic features. The research focuses on the activities of the architect Leonty Benois, artists Vasily Belyaev, Nikolay Kharlamov and Viktor Vasnetsov. The objects of art criticism analysis are old photographs and materials from the Russian archives.

The article examines the works created by the artist Nikolay Kharlamov during the period from 1905 to 1908 for the now lost Warsaw Cathedral. The work is based on the analysis of the previously unpublished sources, including archival documents and photographic materials.

The article is devoted to a review of the stages and methodology of the work on reconstruction of the measured icon of Emperor Peter the Great in place of the lost for the St. Peter and Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg.

The 1958 World’s Fair in Brussels was the first major exposition after the end of World War II. Its main goal was to demonstrate how scientific progress improves the life of an ordinary person. One of the most notable and popular national pavilions at the exhibition was the pavilion of the USSR. Its architectural solution reflected the rejection of the Stalin’s style and the search for a new one, while the interior design demonstrated the main achievements of the Soviet state, from industrial machines to space satellites. The article discusses the history of the creation of the pavilion, its artistic solution, some details and the role of the pavilion as an instrument of propaganda in general.

Painting by artist V. Tropinin, discussed in the article, is being kept in the Museum of V. Tropinin and Moscow artists of his time in Moscow and is called Portrait of Samson Ksenofontovich Sukhanov. The portrait was acquired by the famous collector F. E. Vishnevsky in 1967. The signature of V. Tropinin and the year of painting – 1823, were found on the canvas, but the name of the picture was missing or poorly recognized. Originally the work was referred to as The Old Bricklayer and The Bricklayer. In 1968, without reference to archival materials, on the basis of an essay by P. Svinin’s “Adventures of Sukhanov, a Russian natural sculptor” portrait was attributed as The Portrait of an Old Bricklayer (S. Sukhanov). Half a century has passed, but no documentary evidence confirming that Sukhanov is depicted in the portrait has been found, and an analysis of archival materials related to the life of V. Tropinin and S. Sukhanov, gives the reason to doubt this.

The article analyzes the origins and organizational features of the artistic practical workshops of the Drawing School of the Society for the Encouragement of the Arts. The author considers the process of transition of the School under the patronage of the Society and the formation of the structure of art and industrial education in it, which integral part practical workshops have become. It is noted that the establishment of such workshops became possible only at the turn of the 19th and early 20th centuries, when painting, decorative and modelling workshops appeared, and then the art-printing and other workshops of the School. Archival documents covering the activities of the workshops are given. Such an angle of research provides a prospect for further study of practical workshops and comprehension of some important aspects of domestic art education of the early 20th century

At the end of May 2022, 150 years have passed since the opening of the Polytechnic Exhibition in Moscow. This exhibition was the first experience of pavilion construction, which became one of the leading examples of this kind not only in Russia, but also in the world practice. It was organized by the Society of Lovers of Natural Science, Anthropology and Ethnography at Moscow University and was dedicated to the 200th anniversary of the birth of Peter the Great, the founder of Russian industry.

The article considers the paintings by A. E. Kotzebue, made during the years of his studies at the Imperial Academy of Arts as educational works, but being intended for private persons. The author suggested that the practice of students working on private commissions could be rather common.

The article is devoted to the attribution of the portrait made by Alexander Makovsky. The author proves the sitter to be Konstantin Makovsky, the youngest son of the famous genre painter and blood brother of Alexander Makovsky, a well-known architect in the future, who played a significant role in creating the architectural appearance of our city

An attempt to formulate a new interpretation of the process of style development in the Russian painting of the 1900s – 1930s through the prism of expressionism is extremely important, as well as to trace the expressionistic line of development of Russian art in the 20th century. It reveals itself not only in the first, but also in the second half of the century in the works of official and unofficial art, and on closer examination it turns out to be closely related to the fate of the development of domestic and European fine art up to the present time. Therefore, expressionism can claim to be a grand style in the art of the 20th century.

The article examines the origin and development of the idea of the Transfiguration of the human spirit in the works of Russian artists Alexander Ivanov and Vasily Chekrygin on the example of monumental images of biblical sketches by Ivanov and sketches of frescoes by Chekrygin from the cycle „Resurrection of the Dead“. An attempt is made to show the continuity of the idea of transformation in Russian art and the peculiarities of its interpretation, starting from the middle of the 19th century and up to the avant-garde era of the early 20th century.

This article considers a range of problems related to studying the historio­graphy of Nikolay Akimov’s scenography. The researchers’ attitude towards the artist’s legacy largely depended on the USSR’s political climate and the development of national art history. Akimov’s creative work, one of the country’s biggest theatrical phenomena, was often criticized during Soviet times as tending toward formalism. During the 1970s, Russian art history experienced a change of values, and the artist’s legacy began to be seen as the obvious link between the Russian avant-garde movement of the first third of the 20th century and the underground art of the 1950s–1970s.

In the article, the image of a northerner in the art of artists of Siberia of the 20th century is considered in the genre aspect, on the example of portraits. Typology of portraits of northerners is analyzed, subject specificity and essential features of composition, and colour-scheme are revealed. The author examines the main lines of the development of portrait of northerners such as overcoming of tradition of character-in-costume portrait, the search for typical image with the rise of attention to personality, the appearance of a portrait-picture. The author makes a conclusion that artists of the Siberia in the 20th century turned away from ethnography, characters of portraits became not only representatives of indigenous people but also people who were engaged in the industrial development of the North. The main problems of portraits of northerners of Siberian artists in the 20th century is interconnection between tradition and the present.

The author examines the oil-painting self-portraits of artists of the 1960s with the motive of death, analyzes the variants of its development (as a separate subject or in a series of scenes of hagiographic-descriptive character), makes an attempt to find the reasons for the appearance of such works.

This article examines the influence of the oral poetic epic Abay Geser on the work of modern Buryat artists and calligraphers

The exhibition of diploma works of graduates of the St Petersburg Repin Academy of Arts takes place every year in the Research Museum of the Russian Academy of Arts. This year it was supplemented with diplomas made at the Moscow State Academic Art Institute named after V.I. Surikov at the Russian Academy of Arts. The exposition reflected the state of the academic school, demonstrating the main trends of its development, and showed the best works of young authors performed under the guidance of their mentors.