Ivan Bilibin

Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin (Russian: Ива́н Я́ковлевич Били́бин, IPA: [ɪˈvan ˈjakəvlʲɪvʲɪt͡ɕ bʲɪˈlʲibʲɪn]; 16 August [O.S. 4 August] 1876 – 7 February 1942) was a Russian illustrator and stage designer who took part in the Mir iskusstva, contributed to the Ballets Russes, co-founded the Union of Russian Painters (Russian: Сою́з ру́сских худо́жников) and from 1937 was a member of the Artists' Union of the USSR. Ivan Bilibin gained popularity with his illustrations to Russian folk tales and Slavic folklore. His work was throughout his career inspired by the art and culture of Old Russia.[1]

Portrait of Ivan Bilibin by Boris Kustodiev, 1901
E. S. Pits-Bilibina; portrait by Konstantin Somov

Biography

Ivan Bilibin was born in Tarkhovka, a suburb of St. Petersburg. He studied in 1898 at Anton Ažbe Art School in Munich, where he was heavily influenced by Art Nouveau and the German satirical journal Simplicissimus,[2] and then under Ilya Repin in St. Petersburg.[3] After graduating in May 1901 he went to Munich, where he completed his training with the painter Anton Ažbe.

In the period 1902 to 1904, working under the Russian Museum (Museum of His Imperial Majesty Alexander III) he traveled to the Vologda, Olonetsk and Arkhangelsk Governorates, performing ethnographic research, and examining examples of Russian wooden architecture.[4] He published his findings in the monograph Народное творчество русского Севера [Folk Arts of the Russian North] in 1904. Old Russian art had a great influence on his works. Another influence on his art was traditional Japanese prints and Renaissance woodcuts.[5][1]

After the formation of the artists' association Mir Iskusstva, where he was an active member, his entry into the newspaper and book graphics scene began with a commission for the design of magazine Mir Iskusstva in 1899, later contributing essays on Russian Folk art.[6] Artistic design of other magazines such as Dog Rose (Шиповник) and expenditure of the Moscow publishing house followed. Bilibin gained renown in 1899, when he released his illustrations of Russian fairy tales. During the Russian Revolution of 1905, he drew revolutionary cartoons, especially for the magazine Zhupel (Жупелъ), which in 1906 became prohibited because of his illustration depicting Tsar as a donkey.[7] He would further serve as the designer for the 1909 première production of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's The Golden Cockerel.

In 1911, Bilibin was hired by the State Paper Manufacturing Section to illustrate ball programs, exhibition and book posters, postcards for the Red Cross's Society of St Eugenia and envelopes and stationery with the Russian Bogatyrs.[8]

After the October Revolution in 1917, Bilibin left Russia when the revolution proved alien to him. He moved to Cairo and Alexandria where he painted for the Greek colony. Hungry for a new exotic environment, 1920 Bilibin went to stay in Egypt. In Cairo he specialized in the Byzantine-style art that was in demand by the Greek colony for icons and frescoes. He was also enraptured by the architecture of mosques and its ‘head-spinning ornamentation’. Bilibin then settled in Paris in 1925, where he took to decorating private mansions and Orthodox churches.[3] He still longed for his homeland and, after decorating the Soviet Embassy, he returned in 1936 to Soviet Russia. Bilibin died during the Siege of Leningrad, starving within the city when he refused to leave,[4] and was buried in a collective grave.

Marital life

In 1902 Bilibin married his former student, the Irish-Russian painter and illustrator of children's stories[9] Mary Chambers (Мария Яковлевна Чемберс). They had two sons, Alexander (1903) and Ivan (1908). In 1912 he again married a former student, the art school graduate Renée O'Connell (Рене Рудольфовна О'Коннель), granddaughter of Daniel O'Connell. In 1923 he married the painter Aleksandra Shchekatikhina-Pototskaya (Александра Васильевна Щекатихина-Потоцкая), with whom he had a joint exhibition in Amsterdam in 1929.

Publications
  • Bilibin, Ivan (1904), Народное творчество русского Севера [Folk Arts of the Russian North] (in Russian)
Folktales published by the "Department for the Production of State Documents"
Illustrations of Pushkin's tales
Other
  • Roslavlev, A.S. (1911), Сказки [Fairy Tales] (in Russian)
  • Поди туда — не знаю куда, принеси то — не знаю что… [Go there - I do not know where, bring that - I do not know what ...] (in Russian), 1919 , unpublished
  • Contes de l'Isba [Tales from a Hut] (in French), 1931
  • Carpenter, Francis (1932–1933), Tales of a Russian GrandmotherCS1 maint: date format (link)
  • Contes de la couleuvre [Tales of the Snake] (in French), 1932
  • Conte du petit poisson d'or [Tale of the little Golden Fish] (in French), 1933
  • Le Tapis Volant [The Flying Carpet] (in French), 1924
  • Le farouche Abd-el-Kader (in French), 1936
  • Adhémar de Montgon. Henri IV (in French), 1936
  • Anderson, H.C. (1937), The Little Mermaid (in Russian)
  • Percheron, M. (1937), Moscou (in French)
  • Tolstoy, A.N., Петр Первый [Peter the Great] (in Russian)

References
  1. "The Art of Ivan Bilibin : Textualities". Retrieved 2019-10-07.
  2. Jose Alainz, Komiks: Comic Art in Russia, 2010, p.26
  3. Janina Orlov, 'Ivan Bilibin' in Donald Haase, The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Folktales and Fairy Tales: A-F, p.121
  4. Isaeva, Ksenia (16 Aug 2016), "Russian fairy tales in the works of Ivan Bilibin", www.rbth.com
  5. Maria Peitcheva, Ivan Bilibin: Drawings Colour Plates, 2016, p.1
  6. Richard Taruskin, 'From Subject to Style: Stravinsky and the Painters' in Jann Pasler, Confronting Stravinsky: Man, Musician, and Modernist, 1986, p.26
  7. Hardeman, Hilde (1987). "The Publishing-House Z. I. Grzhebin" (PDF). Solanus. New Series. 1.
  8. Elena Litovchenko, 'Late Nineteenth Century Cover Designs from the Collection of the Research Museum of the Russian Academy of Fine Arts' in Alla Rosenfeld, Defining Russian Graphic Arts: From Diaghilev to Stalin, 1898-1934, p47-48
  9. Rosalind P. Blakesley, 'The Venerable Artist's Fiery Speeches Ringing in my Soul', in J.B Bullen, Internationalism and the Arts in Britain and Europe at the Fin de Siècle, p.101
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