Project
"Decorative metal: metal elements of traditional Ukrainian neck jewelry"
The exhibits of the Olena Kulchytska Art and Memorial Museum in Lviv
Project
"Decorative metal: metal elements of traditional Ukrainian neck jewelry"
The exhibits of the Olena Kulchytska Art and Memorial Museum in Lviv
In the creative heritage of the artist Olena Kulchytska, a special place is occupied by numerous drawings of Ukrainian folk costumes made during 1928-1946. Most of them (more than 100 drawings) were included in a unique publication of 1959, the album "Folk Clothing of the Western Regions of the USSR". These are watercolors and pen and ink drawings that document artifacts of folk art and, in particular, jewelry (embroidery, metal decorations, etc.).
The album featured samples of clothing from the western regions of Ukraine: Ternopil, Chernivtsi, Stanislav (Ivano-Frankivsk), Drohobych, Lviv, Volhynia, and Rivne regions, with the indication of specific settlements where the artist researched and sketched samples of folk costumes.
In 2018, the Lviv-based publishing house «Apriori” published Olena Kulchytska's album-catalog "Folk Clothing of the Western Regions of Ukraine".
Photos of Olena Kulchytska's works from the album «Folk Clothing of the Western Regions of the USSR»
A page from Olena Kulchytska's album-catalogue "Folk costumes of the western regions of Ukraine" (Apriori, 2018)
Olena Kulchytska's enamels in the exposition of the museum
Olena Kulchytska's significant achievements of 1903-1907 include works in the cloisonne enamel technique. Olena Kulchytska revived this unique technique in Ukraine, achieving a high artistic level and technical perfection in her works. The enamels presented at the museum's exposition are characterized by Secessionist imagery combined with elements of folk art. A prominent place among them is occupied by the triptych “Folk Art”, which is the embodiment of the artist's creative and life credo, inextricably linked to the fate of her people, their culture and art. In addition to the aforementioned triptych, during this period Olena Kulchytska also created a series of postcards named “Seasons” in the genre of landscape.
Before the First World War, Olena Kulchytska made a lot of jewelry using the hot enamel technique: buckles “Butterfly”, “Smerichka”, a necklace “Spider”, and brooches “Spikelets”, which are characterized by a bold generalization of the prototypes of native nature. The study of Hutsul folk art led to the creation of such works as “Belt” and “Bag”. The creative success of the young artist also includes “Cassette” (jewelry box), for which she received the highest award at the exhibition of the Chamber of Commerce in Vienna in 1907.
(According to the publication “Olena Kulchytska Art and Memorial Museum. A guide” (Lviv, 2012), by L. Kost)
Photos of Olena Kulchytska's jewelry from the Olena Kulchytska Art and Memorial Museum in Lviv
Project "Decorative metal: metal elements of traditional Ukrainian neck jewelry" is supported by the European Union under the House of Europe programme.