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Baptism of Rus

Olena Kulchytska

Basic information

ID: ФМз-Г-IV-51
Author: Olena Kulchytska
Name: Baptism of Rus
Date of creation: 1938
Technique: woodcut
Material: paper
Dimensions: 28 x 20.3 cm (height x width)

Additionally

Type: graphic art
Genre: history painting
Provenance: Yaroslava Muzyka Fund

Information about author

Author: Olena Kulchytska
Artist's lifetime: 1877–1967
Country: Ukraine
Biography: Olena Kulchytska (September 15, 1877, Berezhany – March 8, 1967, Lviv) is an outstanding Ukrainian artist who worked in such types of art as painting, graphics, arts and crafts, carpet weaving, created majolica, book illustrations and postcards, bookplates, bronze and enamel products, furniture and interior design. She received her primary education in Lviv and began her art education at the Lviv School of Arts and Crafts (1901). Then, she completed her art training at the private studio run by Stanislaw Batowski-Kaczor and Roman Bratkowski (1901–1903). In 1907, she graduated from the Vienna School of Industrial Design. Olena Kulchytska's studies in Vienna coincided with the heyday of modern art in Austria, so her work is characterised by decorative form, a tendency to symbolic-allegorical interpretation of images, broad generalisations, and plane solutions. After graduation, the artist taught drawing for many years at secondary schools of Lviv and Przemysl. From 1940, Kulchytska headed the Lviv Ethnographic Museum's folk art department. Between 1945 and 1954, the artist taught graphics at Ivan Fedorov Ukrainian Polygraphic Institute (Ukrainian Academy of Printing), whose professor she became in 1948. In 1967, Olena Kulchytska was awarded the Taras Shevchenko Prize. The artist was famous for her graphic works. She performed engravings on wood, linoleum, and metal in the complex techniques of aquatint and mezzotint. Her following graphic thematic cycles are known: "From the History of Prince Times", "The Hardships of Ukrainian People", "Glorious Women of the Past", "Legends of Mountains and Forests", "Saints of the Ukrainian Church", "Portraits of Ukrainian Writers", "Folk Construction of the Western Regions of Ukraine". During her life, numerous engravings and watercolours by Olena Kulchytska were exhibited in Ukraine and abroad, particularly in Warsaw, Vienna, Prague, Berlin, Rome, Toronto, and Chicago.

Object description

The work is dedicated to the baptism of Rus by Prince Volodymyr Sviatoslavovych in 988. At the top right, the date "988–1938" is composed. The multi-figure composition depicts Prince Volodymyr holding a cross and a sword against the background of a mountain above a stylised river; behind him is a banner with a trident and a princely army. To his right, a crowd is depicted. One by one, people walk in the water, surrounded by light. On the left, a priest with a helping boy performs the rite of baptism.

Inscriptions

At the bottom right is the author's monogram. On the reverse side at the top right is an inscription in pencil: "1894".

Legal regulation

Borys Voznytskyi Lviv National Art Gallery