MARINA LOPATO

Doctor of Arts, Head of the Metal and Stone Crafts Section,
West European Arts Division, State Hermitage Museum

AN UNUSUAL COLLECTION

Fine gemstone carving plastic arts, which made a name for itself in the works by Karl Faberge, were inspired with a new life in Saint-Petersburg almost a century later. By the beginning of this century, a well-formed gemstone carving school had been established there, characterized by its unique features, diversified trends and artistic quest. The highly professional skills developed in this quest provides for a full use of the school’s intellectual resources.
Early 1990’s saw a lot of craftsmen carving various stone compositions, figures, flowers... A group of artists “with faces of an uncommon expression” soon became differentiated from the others. Those were Evgeny Morozov, Gennady Pylin, Sergey Shimansky, Slava Tulupov, Sergey Stankevich, Alexander Levental and Alexander Kornilov. Their first brilliant works dated 1990’s certified that they considered gemstone carving as an independent art rather than a trivial craft catering for lowbrow tastes. Gemstone carving has become an art of minor forms, in which those artists expressed their ideas and created images with an intrinsic philosophic content reflecting the perception of the world by man at the end of the 20th century. Their elegant and refined works fully revealed a skill in work with forms and figures, an ability to express the natural beauty of colored stones. Those were such works as the Wolfman and the Beast by Gennady Pylin, the Jester on a Dandelion by Sergey Shimansky, the Mushroom by Evgeny Morozov, the Fish by Slava Tulupov and a number of other creative items, some of which have been forgotten or, reassuringly, scattered among private collections. They have become landmarks for the next generation of gem carvers to learn from, to admire and, if not to imitate, but at least to make something of a similar quality.
Where are those works now? Have they been preserved for us and generations to come as memories of the “stormy and stressful times” of the 1990’s? Works of art are known to retain their appeal if they carry something important for all generations, and if the sentiments embedded by the artist are shared by those living in the following times. A whole range of works by Saint-Petersburg artists has ended up in the collection of Maxim Artsinovitch. They have not just ended up, though. He has searched for them in private collections; he has deliberately collected them obviously aware of the risk that none but him can preserve the integrity of those symbols of his time, of those artifacts marking the formation of the Saint-Petersburg school of gemstone carving plastic arts. Those works still comprise his collection of colored hard stone miniatures, the one of its kind in Russia.
One of the legendary, foremost works by Evgeny Morozov is the Mushroom, more precisely, a cane with a mushroom-shaped handgrip (1994). The cane is remarkable for its harmony of material, image and intended purpose within one object being at the same time laconic and simple. The artist made a splendid use of mocha stone for the mushroom. This is precisely the only material appropriate here. The craftsmanship is not flawless; however one should bear in mind that the cane is dated by the beginning of the 1990’s, a period of shortage of tools and lack of precise crafting technologies. The metal part was also produced by the author. A special value is added by the fact that Evgeny Morozov has made only five or six colored hard stone compositions. Thus, the Mushroom is so to say a rare thing by definition …
Artsinovitch’s collection contains one of the best pieces by Sergey Shimansky, reflecting his obsession with Art Nouveau and Art Deco. The composition and image solution has been evidently inspired by works of art of that age. A superb rauch topaz crystal used by the artist has a light, hardly visible smoky tint. The craftsmanship is splendid even by the current standards, while from the point of view of 1995 the work is absolutely flawless. Finishing is precise and meticulous. Thus, the jester’s garments are covered with a checker-work drawing; the dragonfly’s wings are finely combed, etc. To achieve this, the author applied free diamond paste on a thin tin rotating wheel, a technique which was innovative at that time and required great experience and skills. The craftsman also made a wide use of combinations of matt and polished surfaces. The dandelion is exquisitely based on a surprisingly simple artistic solution. This work in general bears an undoubted impression of Shimansky’s personality as an artist and a craftsman. It reveals maturity and cohesiveness of the composition, a genuine flow and attention to details. I believe this is his best work in the collection.

Works by Gennady Pylin look serious, even somewhat gloomy. Such is the figurine of the Wolfman (1992), a characteristic landmark of his early creative period, which reveals mysticism with a pronounced touch of symbolism and has a slight “drawing-room” flavor. Nevertheless, this Wolfman is beyond any doubt the brightest and the most memorable character created by the artist. The figurine is made of a magnificent piece of clear and deeply-colored morion. However, this work shows that as early as then Pylin aimed at multiple compositional solutions. Of a special note is an extremely high level of craftsmanship both as concerns carving of the figurine and its decoration.
The Wolfman is conceptually paired with the Beast (1999), a peculiar illustration of animality in human beings: the man-wolf, the woman-cat … The feminine figurine is distinctive by a more interesting and detailed composition. This compositional solution used by Pylin was probably inspired by the stone’s form. Incidentally, a so-called “curtain”, a kind of a crack in quartz minerals, passed through the raw stone. In the figurine it is obvious in the left arm’s elbow joint. However, there is nothing wrong with this deficiency. In his Beast, Pylin used the technique of depicting nudity in stone through a contrast of matt and polished surfaces, a classical practice in Saint-Petersburg. As a matter of fact, those were Pylin and Kornilov, who canonized this technique. In the Wolfman, though, Pylin applied no matting, obviously wishing to show the beauty of morion.
The figurine abounding with small delicate details is indeed crafted in a masterly manner. Art experts believe that there are no more than ten or twelve stone-carvers of this level in the world now.
Unlike the previous works, the Cat-Behemoth (2000) is based on quite a different approach. Pylin drew near the “blocked miniature” as much as possible, which is essentially uncharacteristic of him. Similar to all works by this artist, the Cat-Behemoth is distinguished by a virtuosic craftsmanship, a heightened accent on details and a neat finishing. Especially remarkable from the technical point of view is the chair crafted with great care and precision. Amazingly beautiful are fur “combing” lines on the figurine’s body. The author may be criticized for a certain compositional fragmentation or an excessive bent on narration. But the “literal infernality” is of great demand, and this is one of the most popular works by Pylin.
Dated by another period of Gennady Pylin’s creative activity is the figurine Tengo (2003). Starting from the beginning of 2000’s, Oriental motifs appear in his works. The most pronounced is the influence of the netsuke stylistics. In this context, the composition called Tengo from Artsinovitch’s collection is highly illustrative.
Tengo is a character of the Japanese mythological pantheon. It is a winged creature with an avian head and a human body, though covered with feathers. The Tengo has numerous guises: it can feature as a patron of the dignified, first of all Buddhist saints, but it can also intimidate and fool travelers, abduct children, etc. By the end of the Kamakura age, the Tengo had become the main symbol and critical tool used in the Japanese literature to expose the peccancy of the Buddhist clergy. By a stretch of imagination the Tengo can be compared with the Slavic Leshy (forest spirit)…

The Tengo created by Pylin has vivid, magnetic eyes, which capture the onlooker’s attention. This character is remarkable for its amazingly keen expression, the main strong point of this work. The palette of stones used by the author includes an outstanding, highly opalized cacholong with a lilaceous tint. The nest with a Tengo hatched out of its egg is made of solid petrified Arizona wood.
A prominent craftsman of the Saint-Petersburg school, though a long-time U.S. resident, is Slava Tulupov. His composition called the Fish (1995) is mainly remarkable for its natural material and the subject it embodies. The grey chalcedony with a pronounced fine pattern and various inclusions has been ideal for making an ocean fish purporting to look natural. The high level of Tulupov’s craftsmanship has been manifested in the delicate and fanciful pattern that he has used to imitate fish scale. And indeed, the figurine is carved professionally and, as the word is, expertly. This is a wonderful specimen of animalistic arts.
Another item by Tulupov, the Frog (2000), is interesting by its decorative finishing technique. Complicated, fanciful patterns cover the whole of the figurine’s surface. The figurine is made of dark green, almost black nephrite from British New Columbia. This material, unlike classical grades of nephrite, is quite suitable for fine carving. The composition is well-crafted with a scrupulous and precise attention to details.
A large portion of items collected by Maxim Artsinovitch relates to Saint-Petersburg’s best gemstone carving samples of the 1990’s. Those are pieces by talented craftsmen, whose creative work has formed the very idea of the Saint-Petersburg gemstone carving school. Many of the items (the Jester on a Dandelion, the Beast, and the Mushroom) have an undeniable artistic value. Besides, they are already objects of great rarity. Thus, for example, works by Pylin dated 1990’s are actually unobtainable now.
The traditions set up by these artists have been successfully continued by craftsmen of the next generation, such as Sergey Falkin, Alexander Veselovsky, Anton Ananiev and Vladimir Putrin. The works dated the 1990’s served as the ground, or the “soil”, for them to grow professionally. This is probably why the best items by Ananiev and Veselovsky also figure prominently in this collection, which thus can definitely claim the role of a retrospective illustrating the whole history of Saint-Petersburg fine gemstone carving...
A special praise goes to Maxim Artsinovitch, who has found these masterpieces and acquired them for his collection. Collecting modern art is always associated with certain risks. It is not enough to have an appreciation of art and to be an expert in an area, which for some reason has attracted the collector. The collector must have an insight that “leads” him to the “right” acquisitions, i.e. those carrying a kernel of the future while at the same time reflecting the past and the present. Not every collector dares to buy works by modern artists, much less gemstone carving arts, which are still not properly understood by many. Figurines by Carl Faberge are much more habitual. In this respect, what has been done by Maxim Artsinovitch appears to be particularly brave and worthy of respect, especially if one takes into account that in his collection he has been guided not by opportunistic considerations, but artistic and historical values of works by Saint-Petersburg artists.