Palekh artist I. I. Golikov and his design of the book "The Word about Igor's Regiment": on the issue of Creative Borrowings

Lavrov Dmitrii Evgen'evich ORCID: 0000-0002-2607-7220 PhD in Art History Senior Educator, the department of Museology, Saint Petersburg State University 199034, Russia, g. Saint Petersburg, nab. Universitetskaya, 7-9, aud. 91 agitlak@mail.ru Other publications by this author

The phenomenon of the "artist's book", relevant to the entire art of the twentieth century, during the Soviet period found a vivid reflection in the Palekh folk craft. Throughout the 1930s and 1980s, Palekh's miniaturists constantly turned to illustrating artistic, patriotic and scientific publications. The famous Palekh artist Boris Nikolaevich Kukuliyev, who himself worked a lot and fruitfully in book illustration, in one of his interviews explained the reason for such close attention to this field of fine art: "We are convinced that the popularity of Palekh art came through the book… She is not waiting for the viewer. She goes to the people herself" ^[22], referring to the large print runs of illustrated books that can reach a significant number of readers.

However, the first experience of such an appeal by Palekh artists to the book business still remains unsurpassed. Such the first and most famous paleshan experience was the book "The Word about Igor's Regiment" by the publishing house "Academia" in 1934, entirely designed by the only artist – one of the founders of the art of Palekh lacquer miniature, Ivan Ivanovich Golikov.   

The publishing house “Academia” existed in 1921-1937 and specialized in fiction with exceptionally high requirements for the illustration and decoration of the book as a whole. At the end of 1931, the publishing house "Academia" decided to publish "The Word about Igor's Regiment". In January 1932, an exhibition of Palekh lacquer products organized by the All-Industrial Council and the Cultural Association took place in Moscow, which became the beginning of widespread recognition of this art in the USSR ^{[5, p. 20]}. The art editor of the publishing house Mikhail Porfirievich Sokolnikov (1888-1979) visited it, saw the famous miniatures of I. I. Golikov depicting battles, and after this visit he decides to give an order for the illustration of the "Word" to the paleshans and inclines to the choice of I. I. Golikov. Subsequently, in his memoirs, M. P. Sokolnikov claimed that the very idea of the candidacy of I. I. Golikov came to him at this exhibition of the All-Industrial Council: "Moving from showcase to showcase, I began to analyze the themes of Golikov's lacquers, and his "battles", Russian horsemen in ancient military armor, fantastic horses, a conditional landscape, the intensity of the plots and their heroics convinced me better than any conjectures that Golikov, and only Golikov, can and should do the "Word"" ^{[19, p. 34]}.

M. P. Sokolnikov's determination is also strengthened by the fact that he knew the enormous talent of I. I. Golikov before: in the autumn of 1921, at the A. N. Ostrovsky Theater in the Volga city of Kineshma, this artist created theatrical scenery for the performances "Thunderstorm" and "Snow Maiden", which M. P. Sokolnikov, who was then acting as the head of the local theater, liked extraordinarily. M. P. Sokolnikov, in particular, described his impression of these decorations in this way: "How beautiful they were, what an inescapable national beauty they carried, how well they helped to comprehend the types of Russian people, their way of life!" ^{[21, p. 6]}. Finally, the case is solved by the famous writer and patron of the Palekh craft Alexey Maximovich Gorky, who was at that time chairman of the editorial board of the publishing house. On February 29, 1932, A.M. Gorky, who was in Sorrento, wrote a letter to M. P. Sokolnikov with a recommendation to give an order "not to a group of variously gifted, but to one and the best master, which will give artistic unity to the design of the book" ^[20], meaning by this master I. I. Golikov.  However, in the opinion of the author of the article, an equally important reason for choosing I. I. Golikov, in addition to his unique "Battles", long–standing acquaintance with M. P. Sokolnikov and support from A.M. Gorky, was his versatility as an artist - unlike many paleshan, I. I. Golikov worked not only as a miniaturist and theater decorator, but also as an easel artist, and as a graphic artist (I. I. Golikov worked in the field of posters during the Revolution ^{[6, p. 17]}, and also illustrated political leaflets ^{[8, p. 37]}), and in the field of porcelain painting, and as a master of monumental panels. Thus, by the beginning of the 1930s, I. I. Golikov was, without exaggeration, a generalist: in the field of fine art, he could do everything.

In May 1932, the Palekh Artel of Ancient Painting received an official order from the publishing house "Academia" for the decoration of the "Word" ^{[3, p. 53]}, and I. I. Golikov was accepted for its execution. We must pay tribute to the publishing house: in the field of creativity, it gave almost complete freedom to the Palekh artist – a striking contrast compared to other organizations that took care of Soviet lacquer crafts during this period ^{[7, p. 396]}; in fact, the only requirement of the publishing house was to create a stylization for an old Russian handwritten book. Throughout the summer of 1932, I. I. Golikov worked on the design of the publication. On September 25, 1932, at a meeting with A.M. Gorky (in the Hills near Moscow), I. I. Golikov shows ready–made illustrations for the Word on 10 small plywood panels and receives the highest rating from A.M. Gorky: "The impression made by Golikov's Igor is unforgettable" ^{[4, p. 30]}, wrote about This was said by the writer E. F. Vikhrev, who was present at the meeting.

In total, the artist's work on the "Word" takes about a year and a half of hard work. In 1934, the book, which became one of the most famous and rare editions of Academia, was printed in Goznak with a circulation of 3,300 copies ^[15], and in the same year I. I. Golikov (along with the oldest Palekh artist I. M. Bakanov) was awarded the title of Honored Artist of the RSFSR ^[9]. This award was the first in the history of the Palekh craft official recognition by the state of the merits of the artist – not the owner of the workshop, but an individual for his personal creative achievements – and the publication "Words about Igor's Regiment" designed by I. I. Golikov gave rise to a whole series of talented sequels. Palekh artists, before that, according to M. P. Sokolnikov, "never dreamed of working in a book" ^{[19, p. 36]}, only during the 1930s issued many publications, extraordinarily enriching this area of Soviet fine art. Publications such as A.V. Bakushinsky's monograph "The Art of Palekh" in the design of I. M. Bakanov ^[1]; A.S. Pushkin's fairy tales (in the form of five separate books, each of which was designed by a Palekh miniature painter) ^[10-14]; collection "Epics, Antiquities" edited by S. K. Shambinago in the design of the group Palekh artists ^[2], as well as many other publications of this time were included in the golden fund of the Soviet classics of bookmaking, and still represent a great collector's value.

In the subsequent period, attempts were made to republish Palekh's "Words about Igor's Regiment" in 1934, but their experience cannot be considered successful: for example, the facsimile republication of Golikov's masterpiece, undertaken in 1959 by the State Publishing House (with a circulation of 30,000 copies), was carried out without illustrations and with incorrect proportions of the handwritten text ^[16]. Attempts were also made to appeal to other paleshans to illustrate the ancient Russian monument: for example, the Palekh miniaturist Roman Leonidovich Belousov in 1973 fulfilled the order of the Yaroslavl Upper Volga publishing house to illustrate the "Word" ^[17], and in 1986 for the publishing house "Soviet Russia" the experience of I. I. Golikov was repeated by the Palekh artist Raisa Alekseevna Smirnova (Pronina) ^[18], however, these appeals, talented in themselves, certainly cannot be put on the same level as the innovative work of I. I. Golikov.  

What did the Palekh master do? As already noted, the initial requirement of the publishing house "Academia" was stylization for an old Russian handwritten book. I. I. Golikov creates, in fact, the entire book – from the drawing of the binding cover and sheet miniatures to each letter of the "Word", because he rewrites the entire text of the monument by hand, using teratological ornament in the screensavers, characteristic for ancient Russian books of the XIII-XIV centuries.

So, I. I. Golikov created the binding, flyleaf, title page, screensavers, letters, endings; the whole text of the "Word" was rewritten by hand with a semi-post, reworked by the artist. The most valuable contribution of I. I. Golikov to the design of this edition were 10 sheet miniatures made on small plates measuring 36x24 cm, which are in the Moscow State Tretyakov Gallery ("Boyan", "Igor's Meeting with Vsevolod", "Eclipse of the Sun", "Igor leads the army to the Don", "The Battle of the Russians with Polovtsy", "Igor's capture", "Svyatoslav tells the boyars about his dream", "Svyatoslav's Golden Word", "Yaroslavna's Lament", "Igor's Escape from captivity").

What unusual and new did the Palekh master do in these sheet miniatures, in comparison with his previous work? Before that, I. I. Golikov had never worked on sketches, but immediately created a ready-made thing ^{[4, p. 26]}, however, when working on the "Word", he makes dozens of preliminary drawings. In the opinion of the author of the article, I. I. Golikov, when working on the edition of "Words", seeks to get away from the lacquer miniature, so that Palekh is now associated not only with the casket, since in the process of I. I. Golikov's work on the "Word", one can observe a gradual departure from the traditional Palekh technique: for example, there is no gold in the finished illustrations of I. I. Golikov, traditional for Palekh (interestingly, there is still gold in the preliminary Golikov drawings ^{[4, p. 30]}). Another example is changing the background of the binding cover of the edition of "Words" from black in the sketch (which would give the book the appearance of a lacquer box) to red in the finished drawing (subsequently, the publishing house "Academia" voluntarily decided to change the color of the binding to black, which significantly distorted the artist's idea).

However, the numerous creative borrowings that I. I. Golikov resorted to in the process of working on the "Word" should be considered rather a Palekh tradition. So, in the illustration "Igor leads the army to the Don", one can see the impact of the famous Moscow icon "Blessed is the army of the Heavenly King" of the middle of the XVI century: the tiered arrangement of strings of military detachments, the technique of increasing the size of characters important for understanding the meaning. It should be noted that in the library of I. I. Golikov there was a magazine "Sofia" for 1914 with reproductions of this icon; in addition, it was during the work of the Palekh miniaturist on the "Word" that this icon appeared in the permanent exhibition of the State Tretyakov Gallery.

The impact of the icon "Blessed is the army of the Heavenly King" can be traced in another Golikov sheet – "Eclipse of the Sun". So, the compositional technique borrowed directly from this icon is the three stripes of Russian horsemen, as well as icon-painted slides on their way. Steppe and hills, it would seem, are mutually exclusive, but in iconography, hills are a sign of a desert, an empty, alien place that still needs to be conquered and mastered: in this sense, the appearance of slides in the image of the Don steppes seems quite justified. In addition, such a slide in the middle of the sheet is also characteristic of the miniature "The Battle of the Achaeans with the Trojans" of the XVI century Chronicle Arch, which I. I. Golikov also studies.  

            The iconographic source of the sheet "Svyatoslav tells the boyars about his dream" is the fresco "Joseph interprets Pharaoh's dreams" of the Vatican Loggias by Raphael. It is possible to compare the similar figures of Joseph, pointing to the Pharaohs a dream in a circle, with the figure of Prince Svyatoslav (mirrored inverted compared to the original), showing the boyars standing next to him a scene from his dream. Interestingly, in this sheet, I. I. Golikov literally conveys the content of the text of the "Word" with the help of traditional icon-painting slides: "And Svyatoslav had a vague dream in Kiev on the mountains."

The miniature "The Golden Word of Svyatoslav" also has its own prototype: the name is quite a traditional form of composition of Ecumenical church Cathedrals, which were constantly painted on their icons by Palekh icon painters before the Revolution. In addition, the images of the seven Ecumenical Cathedrals are located on the western wall of the summer chapel of the Holy Cross Church in Palekh, and it is known that I. I. Golikov in the summer of 1932, preparing for the creation of the design of the "Word", often spent time in this Palekh temple ^{[4, p. 30]}.

It should be emphasized that if creative borrowing destroys the weak, then real talents rather enrich their individuality with them. With the publication of the Golikov book, undertaken by Academia, the gallery of artistic images created around the "Words about Igor's Regiment" includes a group of completely new, original or creatively revised ones created by the Palekh master I. I. Golikov, who had never worked on the design of the book before (as in the early 1920s, the same I. I. Golikov, having no experience with lacquer painting, created the phenomenon of the Palekh lacquer miniature). With his uniqueness and originality, he occupied one of the most prominent places in this gallery.