By Milena Faustova
In advance of the 200th anniversary of Pushkin's birth European scholars
have come to Moscow to discuss the subject "Pushkin and Europe".
This is the first time that such prominent scholars as Danuta Pivovarska
from Krakow, Efim Etkind from Paris, George Niva from Geneva and Rolf-Dietrich
Kail from Bonn have met in Moscow to speak of Pushkin and Europe.
In a way France looks upon Pushkin as "its poet". Pushkin
had a perfect command of French. He translated into Russian Voltaire, Rousseau,
and Andre Chenier. He also wrote some of his poems in French and then translated
them into Russian. An excellent translator of Pushkin, Efim Etkind believes
that Pushkin was ahead of the French classical literature of the 19th century.
"I'm convinced," says Etkind, "that there wouldn't have
been the prose of Andre Gide if there hadn't been Pushkin's 'The Queen
of Spades'. Many French authors owe Pushkin more than we know. For example,
there wouldn't have been Proper Merimee's 'Carmen', this gem of French
literature, if long before this novel Merimee hadn't translated Pushkin's
poem 'The Gypsies'. On the whole the French prefer Pushkin's lyrical verses.
One of Pushkin's first translators, Prince Elim Meshersky created for the
French a Pushkin of his own. Meshersky had a fantastic ability to penetrate
deep into the texts he dealt with. He invented his own things but so that
the French reader took them for granted. For example, translating Pushkin's
famous "Frost and the sun, what a wonderful day", he introduced
a clearly erotic element, no more than implied in the original. His fluent
pen turned Pushkin's "wonderful day" into a passionate night
of love, which appealed to the amorous nature of the French admirers of
Russian classical literature."
In Poland Pushkin's work gained fame in his lifetime. Many compared
him with Adam Mickiewics. "Pushkin's popularity was boosted by a legend
that he was a friend of Mickiewics'," says Krakow University Professor
Danuta Pivovarska. "That was what shaped public opinion in Poland
about Pushkin as a genius of the entire Slav people. But it was thanks
to Mickiewics, one of Pushkin's first translators, that Pushkin's name
ranked next to the name of Byron. Both Pushkin and Mickiewics were fond
of Byron's poetry and translated it into their languages." "Ordinary
poets believed it impossible to re-create the beauty and innovative character
of Byron's verses," wrote the Polish Pushkinist Vladimir Spasovich
in the middle of the 19th century. "Only Pushkin in his verses could
reveal the miracles in Byron's poetry not seen by ordinary versemongers."
For Germans Pushkin was a worthy successor to Goethe's work. They took
delight in reading Pushkin's "Scenes from Faust", "The Queen
of Spades", "Mozart and Salieri" and philosophical verses.
But this was the case in the 19th century.
In the 20th century, the German Pushkinist Rolf-Dietrich Kail says
that in his country Pushkin fell victim to the political and particularly
military events of the century. "World War One and then Two stopped
all attempts at any regular study of Pushkin's work in Germany. The war
events of those years did not make for a better understanding of Russian
literature, including Pushkin. Therefore, for many years Pushkin was known
to the wide public in Germany mainly by the operas of Tchaikovsky and Mussorgsky.
After 1945 Russian was taught as the first foreign language, but many took
it as an enforced subject. In general, Germans were reluctant to study
Russian culture and literature."
Nearly half a century later there came a new wave of interest in Pushkin,
whose name is inseparably linked with Goethe. This is manifested in the
Russian-German festival "Pushkin and Goethe", which has just
ended in Moscow. The round table "Pushkin and Europe" took place
as part of this festival.
We can see that each European country has a Pushkin of its own. But
"Pushkin is such a great phenomenon in Russian culture that his influence
has long gone beyond Russian borders," says the Swiss Pushkinist,
translator of nearly all of the poet's verses, George Niva. "I believe
we cannot look upon Pushkin as an author writing in one form only: lyrical
poetry, prose or dramaturgy. He must be read and translated as a whole
with his brilliance, talent and superb style."
AN EXHIBITION OF AVANT-GARDE ARTIST
IVAN KLYUN
By Olga Bobrova
"Return
of Names" is the title of a program launched by the Tretiakov Art
Gallery in Moscow, which is meant to revive the names of many wonderful
Russian masters forgotten for decades for different reasons. Among such
artists is Ivan Klyun (1873-1943) whose exhibition is now open at the Tretiakov
Gallery.
Early this century Ivan Klyun, an outstanding figure in Russia's artistic
environment, participated in the most notorious and really historic avant-garde
exhibitions. He stirred the enlightened public by his futuristic manifestos.
His landscape watercolors embody the poetics of symbolism. Another branch
of his painting was impressionist, in the 1910-20s he went in for cubism-futurism,
and later his surrealistic and realistic canvasses appeared. Klyun's auto-portraits
are executed in absolutely different styles ranging from cubism to psychological
realism.
Little is known about the artist's life. Klyun was closely linked with
Moscow: early this century he studied at the Rerberg Art School, at the
turn of the 20s taught at the Free Art Workshops and in the middle of the
20s became one of the organizers of the Museum of Painting Culture created
as a center of modern art. The museum acquired several of Klyun's canvases
of the period of his passion for avant-garde.
"In art only form is what matters," with such a manifesto
Ivan Klyun came out in 1915 at a futurist exhibition, where for the first
time the famous "Black Square" by Kazimir Malevich was displayed.
The painting came to symbolize a new style, suprematism. Malevich and Klyun
met when they were young and remained friends for the rest of their lives.
For Klyun the 30s were the most difficult years, a period of tough ideological
pressure and imposition of realism.
"All his life Ivan Klyun fought for the artists' right to create
according to the laws of their own art," recalls Klyun's granddaughter,
Svetlana Soloveichik. "He was far from official art and considerations
of immediate interests and never betrayed his ideals, even in the most
severe years of the persecution of art."
In the 90s another wave of world interest in Russian avant-garde washed
ashore the name of Ivan Klyun. In 1992 the exhibition "The Great Utopia"
took place in New York followed in 1996 by a similar exhibition in Munich.
In 1995 an exhibition from the collection of the well-known collector George
Kostaki was held in Athens. All the exhibitions featured works by Ivan
Klyun. Thanks to George Kastaki's generous gift, the Tretiakov Gallery
owns the fullest collection of artist's works and archives.
The editor-in-chief of the "Russian Avant-Grade" publishing
house, art critic Andrei Sarabianov regards Ivan Klyun as a figure of international
significance: "Like many of the Russian avant-gardists, Klyun was
a precursor of what later took root abroad. Klyun was the creator of the
idea of mobiles - moving sculptures. He invented them in 1918. We have
their sketches. Only 20 years later mobiles appeared in America."
"THE EMPRESS' GUARDS
UNIFORM"
An exhibition of the Russian court costume
By Lyubov Kuznetsova
Moscow's
Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts is holding the exhibition "The Russian
Court Costume". In his book "Historical Portraits" the outstanding
Russian scholar of the turn of the 20th century Vasily Klyuchevsky points
out: "People of past years could not be so original and inventive
in their tastes as we are. They copied conventional colors and styles of
clothes". This statement also applies to the exhibition of the court
costume from the collection of the Hermitage in St. Petersburg. Each of
the 45 exhibits currently on display in Moscow is not only a work of art
but also a document of its epoch speaking volumes of its owner. All the
costumes are in excellent form. According to experts, even the fabric has
not faded despite its age of two and a half centuries. The exposition starts
with two costumes of Peter the Great made for him abroad. The czar was
an ardent devotee of western styles and introduced them to Russia in the
18th century by 
decrees.
In general, in the 18th and 19th centuries the clothes of the nobility
were a matter of state concern. The 1834 code of laws of the Russian Empire
has one law related to the clothes of the aristocracy.
"The law regulated the style, color and texture of fabrics,"
says an expert of St. Petersburg's Hermitage, the curator of the costume
collection, Tamara Korshunova. "All the dresses of court ladies ought
to be executed from velvet combined with satin, and decorated with gold
or silver embroidery. This form survived until the 1917 revolution. The
Empress' lady-in-waiting, for example, was obliged to have a dress from
red velvet with gold embroidery. Silver brocade and silver embroidery were
meant for ladies most closely related to the royal family. These rules
were not to be violated. There was a lady's uniform whose style and even
the length of the train were defined by decree."
The exhibition features army style dresses of Empress Catherine the
Great. She came to power in 1762 as a result of a 
palace
coup carried out with the support of the guards. As a sign of gratitude
to the military, Catherine ordered uniform-style dresses in which she appeared
at military parades and received military leaders. This was not only her
policy but her ideology. The Empress wrote to her foreign addressees: "I
have the best army in Europe". Among her contemporaries was the great
Russian military leader Alexander Suvorov, whose costume is also on display
at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow.
The Russian court impressed foreigners by its splendor. Not only the
clothes of courtiers were luxurious. Liveries of lackeys, messengers and
other servants were decorated with gold and the Emperor's coat-of-arms.
Gold and silver threads 
and
cords, silver wire flattened into a ribbon, steel polished disks and, of
course, pearls and beads were used for finishing. Naturally this made garments
very heavy. Once Grand Princess Maria Pavlovna from the Romanov family
fainted at her own wedding, so heavy was her ceremonial dress. This took
place in Stockholm early this century. Perhaps this was a bad omen. At
any rate, her marriage to a Swedish prince turned out to be unhappy.
The exhibition in Moscow features only a small share of several thousand
historical costumes in the collection of St. Petersburg's Hermitage. These
do not go on display very often, which is dictated by the conditions of
preserving them. In recent years part of the collection has been shown
in Tokyo, Washington and Florence. Very often it's impossible to identify
the owners of costumes. For example, in the mid-18th century Empress Elizabeth,
who was a stylish woman, staged the so-called masquerades without masks.
Men were supposed to appear in full female attire, and vice versa.
Photo:
Gentleman's formal suit of corded silk. 1785-90
Coat of black velvet. Late 17th century
Catherine II's full regimental gown as Honorary Colonel of the Horse
Guards. 1770-80
Grey silk dress. 1880-90 .
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