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4УДК: 7.05"19/20"(082) 73/76(082) ББК: 85.1(4)6; 85.123(4)6 DOI: 10.18688/aa2212-05-37
M. Prosen
Vladimir Pavlovich Zagorodnjuk and Applied Arts in Belgrade between the Two World Wars
The period of the third and fourth decades of the 20th century was very progressive in the development of Belgrade as the capital of Yugoslavia. The fourfold increase in population, as well as the immigration of a large number of inhabitants from the provinces and abroad, was caused by economic prosperity and specific historical circumstances. This period is marked by the development of all areas of art and was so fruitful that even today, a century later, it has still not been fully researched and presented, demanding a deeper introspection of authorial contributions and stylistic trends, especially in the field of applied art. This article is an attempt to unite for the first time and present the contribution that Vladimir Pavlovich Zagorodnjuk (Владимир Павлович Загороднюк) gave to the development of Serbian and Yugoslav visual culture — as a sculptor, decorator, and set designer who respectfully marked the architectural and theater scene during the mentioned period. All of that done relying on significant contribution of previous researches, based on the study of preserved edifices, archives, the artist's private legacy preserved in his family, as well as parts of his legacy that his daughter Galina Harmann donated to the Theater Museum of Serbia1.
Vladimir Pavlovich Zagorodnjuk was born in Odessa on May 18, 18892. His well-to-do parents Ekaterina and Pavel, a captain of the Russian merchant fleet, provided Vladimir with a solid education. He was educated in Odessa, where he attended the Gymnasium and the Art School, which he finished in 1906, i. e. 19093. From 1910 to 1914, he studied sculpture in Paris at the Ecole Nationale des Beaux Arts in the studio of Antonin Mercié (Marius Jean Antonin Mercié 1845-1916). Mercié was a respected sculptor, the winner of the Grand Prix de Rome, the Gold Medal of the Paris Salon, a member of the French Academy of Arts, and at the time Zagorodnjuk studied in his class, he became the president of Société des artistes français [34]. Following the instructions of his esteemed professor, Vladimir Zagorodnjuk exhibited at the Paris Autumn Salon during his studies in 1912. During his four years in Paris, he had the opportunity to get acquainted with the current artistic aspirations, as well as the possibilities of contemporary decorative art, abundantly represented in everyday life, on the theater stage, in
1 I am very grateful to Ms. Nina Chrustinsky, granddaughter of V. P. Zagorodnjuk, for providing me with the published material and insight into his legacy, that gave me more complete knowledge about his life, work and artistic oevre.
2 He was born on May 18 according to the new, that is May 31 according to the old Julian calendar, as it is mostly stated in the available documents and from the curriculum of V. P. Zagorodnjuk, Legacy of V. P. Zagorodnjuk, Theater Museum of Serbia.
3 According to the curriculum preserved in the legacy of V. P. Zagorodnjuk kept in his family.
public and private space, especially in the interior and architectural design. Upon his return to Russia in 1914, he exhibited with the Association of Russian Artists in Odessa. That year (1914) he married Elena Vasilevna and the couple had a daughter called Galina (10.11.1915).
While serving in the military (1914-1920), he participated in the First World War, as well as in the Civil War in the rank of a lieutenant. With the withdrawal of the Russian army at the end of the Civil War, in the first great wave of emigration in 1920, he arrived to the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes4 with his mother. His wife and daughter, who was small and weak, remained in Russia due to the doctor's recommendation that the child should not travel, and due to the circumstances that followed, the family would remain separated, and the marriage was officially terminated by the decision of Metropolitan Atanasij on October 8, 19375. Vladimir later married Zinaida, with whom he lived in a house with an atelier at 46 Sveti Nikola Street in Belgrade6 [31, pp. 107-108].
The readiness and intention of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes to accept refugees more cordially and in larger numbers than was the case in other parts of the Balkans stemmed primarily from the centuries-old ties of the Serbian people with Russia. Apart from a wide range of historical spiritual, military and trade ties, this connection was also reflected in the education of a part of the Serbian intellectual elite [15] in St. Petersburg and Moscow — which was the case with Alexander I, King of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, who as a young prince by order of Tsar Nicholas II during his schooling in the Page Corps was assigned a special apartment in the Winter Palace, decorated in the style of Catherine II [11, p. 18]. The political and dynastic ties of the Karadjordjevich and Romanov family, which began with the godfathership of the Russian emperor to the marriage of the king's parents — Prince (and then King) Peter and Montenegrin Princess Zorka Petrovic Njegosh, later strengthened by the marriage of Alexander's sister Jelena and Prince Ioann Konstantinovich Romanov (Иоанн Константинович Романов), culminated in plans to marry the Serbian crown prince Alexander and the emperor's daughter Olga in 1914 [11, p. 354; 32, p. 67]. Although this marriage did not occur, due to the suffering of the entire imperial family, it did not diminish the warmth of welcome given to Russian refugees a few years later, as evidenced by the concert "For Russian refugees" held at the Officers' House in Belgrade on June 24, 1919 [59, p. 26].
About 40,000 refugees arrived in Yugoslavia during this period [19, p. 45], most of whom remained in Belgrade, while some emigrants continued to other countries in Europe and America, looking for better conditions for their existential and professional progress, than those they could have in the Balkans. At the beginning of the third decade, Belgrade was on the verge of
4 The Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was founded on December 1, 1918 on the territory of the Kingdom of Serbia, and the territories annexed to it: the Kingdom of Montenegro, parts of the former Ottoman Empire and the Austro-Hungarian Empire which today form the Republics of Northern Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Slovenia and the Serbian province of Vojvodina. In 1929, it changed its name to the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.
5 Divorce document issued by the Episcopal Council under the administration of Russian Orthodox municipalities in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1937. It is kept in the family legacy. After Elena Vasiljevna and their daughter Galina emigrated from Russia during the Second World War to Germany and then to the USA in 1957, they maintained contact with Vladimir.
6 During the Nazi bombing of Belgrade in World War II in 1941, AnanijeVerbicki, Vladimir Zedrinski and illustrator George Lobachev and their families were housed in Zagorodnjuk's house.
its prosperity, with the development potential of the capital of the country that won the Great War, and in just two decades it quadrupled its population, reaching from a modest 90,000 to 350,000 in 1940 [38, p. 178]. Russian emigrants found work in all state institutions, where they were treated equally with the domicile staff and often held high positions, regarding their respectable professional experience. They enjoyed the reputation of well-educated people from a milieu with highly developed culture [19]. Coming to a modest environment, they instigated the growth of all areas of science and art, to the extent that in many domains they can be considered the founders and prolific creators. The cultural policy of the state, led by King Alexander I, "an admirer of architecture, art and technology" [45] was responsible for the excellent reception of Russian artists in Yugoslavia.
The government tried to help the immigration of large groups of people, reception centers were organized, as well as entire Russian enclaves throughout the country, of which Belgrade was the most important gathering place, while other smaller centers of emigration gravitated to it — primarily those in Serbia and Old Serbia (North Macedonia) as well as in the annexed territories of the former Southern Hungary inhabited by Serbs, such as the city of Pancevo, in the immediate vicinity of Belgrade, once the Austro-Hungarian military center and trade city [39]. Vladimir Zagorodnjuk was thirty years old when he arrived in Pancevo in 1920 and found his first job as a drawing teacher in a Russian school [35, p. 226; 39, pp. 49, 83].
At the end of the following year 1921, due to the need for educated artists in the circle of the National Theater, at the invitation of Leonid Mikhailovich Brailovsky (Леонид Михайлович Брайловский, 1867-1937), Zagorodnjuk began to work as a painter-set designer for the National Theater in Belgrade [57, p. 6]. Until the First World War, theatre scenography at the National Theater was mainly based on the decor painted on curtains and backdrops [35, p. 73] as well as the decor procured abroad — mostly in Vienna. Brailovski's arrival led to the modernization of the scenography. Brailovski was an established St. Petersburg architect, academician of architecture (1916), and one of the five leading set designers in Russia [36, p. 93]. He was also a professor at the Moscow School of Painting and Architecture (Московское училище живописи, ваяния и зодчества — МУЖВЗ) and the Stroganov School for Technical Drawing (Императорское строгановское центральное художественно-промышленное училище). He exhibited with the artists of the World of Art movement (Мир искусства) and was oriented in his artistic attitude towards modern discourse, inspired by the legacy of Byzantine Empire and Russian national culture [41, p. 315; 55, p. 41]. He left Russia in 1919 during the Revolution and settled in Belgrade, where he lived in the period 1921-1924. During three theater seasons, Brailovski worked as a set designer for the National Theater. He founded and led the painting studio, organized workshops and employed artists, mostly young Russian emigrants [36, p. 93]. The fact that they made up almost half of the ballet and opera ensemble of the 1920s also testifies to how strong the reception of Russian artists in the National Theater was [39, p. 143]. He hired Vladimir Zagorodnjuk to organize a cashier workshop in the theater and make sculptural elements of decor of papiermache [20, p. 307].
At the beginning of 1922, Brailovski was given the task of designing and performing a decor for the wedding of King Alexander I Karadjordjevic and the Romanian princess Maria Hohenzollern Sigmaringen in the Cathedral church in Belgrade. As a part of the Brailovski's team of Russian painters, Zagorodnjuk organized a workshop in the nearby yard across the Art
Academy — today the Faculty of Applied Arts, with forty workers who made elements of the church decor in an express period, placed in the Cathedral at the end of May [2]. The entire decor was made of wood and the main motifs were sculpted by Vladimir Zagorodnjuk in a mass of papiermaché and clay. The focus of the decor was a luxurious baroque canopy with a dome resting on two twisted pillars, decorated with gilded garlands, monograms of the newlyweds A and M. The canopy was illuminated, decorated with ermine, carved state coat of arms, and a large gilded crown. However, before the ceremony took place on June 8, 1922, the canopy was removed by order of the King [3; 4]. However, this participation of the newly arrived V. Zagorodnjuk in the decor of the royal wedding opened the way for his later cooperation with the Royal Court.
As an independent set designer and costume designer, he presented himself to the Belgrade audience for the first time with the opera The Flying Dutchman by Richard Wagner, which premiered at the National Theater on November 6, 1923, and provoked affirmative criticism [37]. Quickly accepted for his talent and good education, Zagorodnjuk was elected to the national team to exhibit with other selected Yugoslav artists at the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in 1925 in Paris [13, p. 23; 42]. For the scenography of the play "The Death of Jugovic's Mother" (1ll. 62), which he exhibited in the Grand Palais, he was awarded the Gold Medal of the Diploma de Medaille d'Or7 [20, p. 308]. For the success in representing his new homeland in 1926, he received high Serbian decoration of the Order of Saint Sava8. He simplified his original scenography solution in terms of surfaces and colors, striving for the symbolism of the mood achieved through the dialogue of light and shadow, enabling a great gesture and momentum for this epic tragedy, imbued with mysticism and witty solutions where necessary, surprising the audience with its elegant style and beauty of decor. Olga Milan-ovic recognizes the purity of the surfaces and the reduction of colors, which put the staircase in the foreground as a locus of action, as the influence of the expressionist scenographies of Leopold Jesser and Gordon Craig [35, pp. 227-228]. Art critics first of all, the daily Politika, Pravda, and Vreme followed and critically commented on all the premieres of the National Theater, leaving us a trace of the scenographies of Vladimir Zagorodnjuk and the impression they left on the public cultural life of the Yugoslav capital.
After the departure of Leonid and Rima Brailovski from Belgrade to Rome in 1924 [36, p. 94; 41, p. 320], Vladimir Zagorodnjuk additionally established his position in the National theater. Collaborating with directors Teofan Pavlovski, Mihailo Isailovic, Aleksandar Verescagin, Branko Gavela, Jurij Rakitin, Momcilo Milosevic, Erich Hetzel, etc., during seventeen years — until 1940, he staged 19 plays and 12 operas. Scenographies: The Flying Dutchman — Wagner (1923), The Death of Jugovic's Mother — Vojnovic (1924), Antigone — Sophocles, Aida — Verdi, Julius Caesar — Shakespeare (1925), Lohengrin — Wagner, Hunchback of Notre Dame — Birch Pfeiffer, La belle aventure — Caillavet (1926), Masked Ball — Verdi, Louise — Charpentier and Henry IV — Pirandello, Robert and Mariana — Gerardley (1927), Cyrano de Bergerac — Rostan, Ghosts — Ibsen, Escape — Goldsworthy, Peripheries — Langer (1928), The Trial of Mary Dagan— Wheeler, Prince of Zeta — Konjovic (1929), Samson and Delilah — Saint-Saens,
Diploma is kept in V. P. Zagorodnjuk's legacy in The Theatre museum in Belgrade.
Document is kept in V. P. Zagorodnjuk's legacy in The Theatre museum in Belgrade.
Fig. 1. V. P. Zagorodnjuk. Drama Henry IV, 1927. The Theatre museum of Serbia, Belgrade ©Theatre museum of Serbia
Turandot — Puccini (1930), At the End of the Road — Sheriff, Hamlet — Shakespeare and Carmen — Bizet (1930), Thais — Masne (1931), Faust — Goethe (1932), Learned Women — Moliere (1933), Athaliah — Raskin, Eternal Babylon — Dimitrijevic (1934), Don Quixote — Masnet, Merry Women of Windsor — Shakespeare, Gianni Skiki — Puccini, Air Shop — Je-vtic, Tannhauser — Wagner (1935), Nikola Subic Zrinjski — Zajc (costume designer 1939), Falstaff—Verdi (costume designer), and Gioconda — Ponchielli (1940) [35].
Approaching each subsequent topic sensitively and studiously, experiencing the plot of the drama and the director's idea, thanks to his excellent knowledge of literature and artistic instinct, he easily solved stage problems. Zagorodnjuk introduces illusionism, lush sensibility, light and formal effects or colorism, striving to provide the director and participants with adequate space for creative manipulation on stage. He performed the largest number of productions until 1931, when he reduced the production to two scenographies in a season [35, p. 235] (Fig. 1). In his theatrical work, Zagorodnjuk often acted as a costume designer, believing that the scenography and costume should be the work of one author, but with the development of domestic Serbian costume design, his work was mostly limited to scenography [34, p. 239]. His positive and broad attitude in terms of searching for motives and inspirations affected the dynamics and heterogeneity of the Yugoslav art scene, whose theatre life was marked and enriched by the work of important Russian directors, set designers, costume designers, opera singers, and ballet artists. Among them, in addition to the already mentioned Brailovski, we should point out the director Yuri Lvovich Rakitin and the set designer and costume designer Vladimir Ivanovich Zedrinski, with whom Zagorodnjuk often collaborated, as well as his fellow costume designers and set designers Ananija Aleksejevich Verbicki and Pavel Petrovich Froman [19, pp. 430-431; 26, pp. 34-46, 101-190]. The Yugoslav art scene between the two
Fig. 2. V. P. Zagorodnjuk. Opera Tais, 1931, The Theatre museum of Serbia, Belgrade © Theatre museum of Serbia
world wars was imbued with convulsive attempts to affirm the avant-garde and a strong ground of traditionalism that opposed modern experiments. Like Brailovski, Zagorodnjuk was in favor of the modern expression, but the negative criticism of Brailovski's modern scenographies determined Zagorodnjuk's more moderate attitude, receptive to viewers and critics. Therefore, he was perceived a stage erudite, a scenographer prone to classicism, which was noticed also in his sculptural work [28; 44], Zagorodnjuk was especially appreciated as an opera set designer where the richness of his imagination and the picturesqueness of color could be maximally expressed (Fig. 2, Ills. 63, 64).
Along with his scenographic work, Vladimir Zagorodnjuk was noticed as a prolific sculptor. Between the two world wars, in his studio on 46 Sveti Nikola Street, reliefs and facade sculptures of numerous buildings in the capital were created, as well as of public buildings erected in other large centers of the kingdom. This period of his work was marked by flourishing production of facade sculpture in Belgrade [54; 43, p. 59-71], expressed on both private and public buildings of the capital [33]. Vladimir Zagorodnjuk's sculptural work followed the stylistic fluctuations of the Serbian architecture, which in the period of late 1920s and in 1930s was in favor of modern but decorative Art Deco [18; 49; 50], as well as traditional academicism [25] National style [22], reserved towards avant-garde architecture [30] and purified modernism [10]. The presence of sculpture and the synthesis that the sculpted decor achieved with the design of the facade and interior significantly influenced the definition of styles in the Serbian architecture [52] (Fig. 3).
Zagorodnjuk is the author of Three Atlases — the sculptures bearing a corner bay window on the first floor of the building erected in the style of late eclectic academism at the corner of 58 Kneza Milosa and Milosa Pocerca streets (1926) [54, p. 76]. Four high relief female fig-
ures with drapery are placed along the balcony of the fourth floor. Zagorodnjuk performed his works in artificial stone, a material that he mostly used in his work. Collaborating with the architect Viktor Viktorovic Lukomski, he sculpted the decoration of the building on the corner of 11 Vuka Karadzica and Carica Mil-ica streets (1927) [23, p. 125; 56, p. 46]. In the classical style of Beaux-Arts, he made life-size sculptures of the goddesses Flora and Diana, and two smaller allegorical figures between the windows of the first and second floors on both facades, completing the sophisticated, elegant, modernly interpreted neoclassical ensemble of Lukomski.
Zagorodnjuk performed some of the numerous sculptural works that decorated the Royal Palace in Dedinje in the period 192519349, in which construction Lukomski stood out [23, pp. 117-121; 14, pp. 180-181; 56, pp. 41-42]. Although Zagorodnjuk's specific role in that has not been identified, basing on style, expression, and material, the sculpted decor of the court cinema could, with reasonable hesitation, be attributed to him. During that time he cooperated in the creation of sculptural decorations on the royal mausoleum in Oplenac [60, p. 59]. Following the modern decorative tendencies of Art Déco, he performed the sculptural decoration of the State Hotel on Avala designed by Lukomski (1928-31) [51, p. 626]. Zagorodnjuk performed two monumental sphinxes at the foot of a cascading staircase leading to the entrance surmounted by a relief of a centaur playing the pan flute, introducing us to the world of forest deities expressed on the capitals of the pillars that support the hotel porches.
Continuing to collaborate with Lukomski, he created one of the most important sculptural ensembles presented on facade and interior of the Patriarchate of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Belgrade (1933-35) [51, p. 626]. He designed the monumental coat of arms of the Patriarchate above the entrance — with two angels holding the miter of the high priest (Fig. 4), shaped the capitals of the double pillars of the entrance with a double-headed eagle modeled upon the relief from the Hilandar monastery and the verses of Revelation written in stylized letters. "Be
Fig. 3. Vladimir Pavlovic Zagorodnjuk in his studio, ca. 1930, photo, curtesy of Family
9 Among the carefully preserved press clips from the contemporary daily newspapers that accompany his work, V. P. Zagorodnjuk also preserved those concerning the decoration of the Royal Palace. The theme and style of carved decoration on the facade, but above all in the interior, support this assumption, but previous research has not yet confirmed or identified his specific share. A large number of Russian artists, led by Nikolai Krasnov, Sergei Smirnoff and Viktor Lukomski, took part in decorating the court. Zagorodnjuk himself states the data in his curriculum written four decades later — preserved in the family legacy.
Fig. 4. V. P. Zagorodnjuk. Coat of arms of The Patriarchate of The Serbian Orthodox Church, 1933-35, photo by Milan Prosen
thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life" and the text of the Psalm 93: 5: "Holiness adorns Your house, O Lord, for ever" [1, pp. 35, 39]. He made medallions on the facade with depictions of the symbols of the Evangelists, a good shepherd, and a lamb with a blossoming cross; angels' heads on the dome roof wreath and sculpturally shaped griffin-shaped lamp holders inspired by medieval Serbian art. Zagorodnjuk designed capitals of the hall pillars at the top of the ceremonial staircase, whose balustrade is adorned with bronze reliefs of kneeling angels in prayer, whose gentle faces are stylized in the spirit of Art Deco. In the patriarchal chapel, he shaped the capitals of the pillars, evoking the capitals of St. Sophia in Constantinople. At this time, he carved the symbols of the evangelists on the capitals of the pillars of the Church of St. Mark in Belgrade (architects Branko and Petar Krstic, 1933) [54, p. 154].
In 1934, he collaborated with the architect Dimitrije M. Leko, decorating the building of the Home of War Invalids King Alexander on Sava Square and its annex on 44 Balkanska Street with identical circular reliefs, the allegorical representations of Warriors, Industry, and Agriculture, made of artificial stone [54, p. 12]. These circular reliefs Kg 5. v.RZagorodnjuk.Mfra.,rV) 1934-i935, photo, (Fig. 5), which we find in smaller dimensions on curtesy of Family
the facade of the Patriarchate, became very popular at the beginning of the fourth decade in the reception of Art Deco in Serbian architecture [18, p. 80], after they were placed in the form of a horizontal belt in the final part of the facade of The Palace of the Adriatic-Danube Bank in 1924 [58, p. 74], modeled by the Slovenian sculptor Lojze Dolinar. At the same time, while working on the decoration of the Home for War Invalids, Vladimir Zagoronjuk made a frieze of relief medallions in the counter hall of the Mortgage Bank in Belgrade (architect Dimitrije M. Leko, 1935)10. He also designed a stair railing with sculpted bronze plates — like those in the Patriarchate, depicting on them male and female nudes as allegories of fertility, industry and abundance. Such an allegorical ensemble corresponded to the object of financial purpose, today the National Museum in Belgrade. Although Zagorodnjuk's sculptural work adorns the interior of the building, his works are not in the collection of the National Museum, and therefore not mentioned in the catalog of Yugoslav sculpture [12]. He will repeat the mentioned form of circular relief on the bronze relief Dance which was placed above the entrance to the Cinema Belgrade, which was designed by the architect Grigorije Ivanovic Samojlov in 1938 [46, pp. 188; 47; 51, p. 630].
His relief Hercules with the Lion which was exhibited at the First Salon of Architecture in 1929, and praised by critics [7], was placed in the interior of the building of the General Staff of the Army of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia [26, pp. 346-347]. Zagorodnjuk won the sculpture competition of the Mortgage Bank in 1930 [8], performing in seventy hours11 the awarded relief. He was afterwards employed by The Mortgage Bank to decorate many of the exposi-tures — firstly the decor of the building of the bank in Sarajevo (architect Milan Zlokovic, 1928-31) where he made relief panels on the façade and a continuous bas-relief frieze in the counter hall depicting allegorical figures of Wealth, Agriculture, Engineering, and Construction preformed in soft lines, fluent and dynamic. In front of the entrance, he made two monumental bronze sculptures of Atlas carrying luminous balls above their heads. In the hall of the Mortgage Bank in Zemun, he made a relief with a reposing act — the Allegory of Fertility, and on the facade of the Mortgage Bank in Banja Luka (architect MiodragVasic, 1935), he made eleven relief panels on theme of labor, industry, agriculture, mining, and construction, of which due to the catastrophic devastating earthquake of 1969, only one is preserved today, as well as two monumental sculptures in bronze with a representation of a man and a woman in folk costume [50, pp. 423-425].
For the building of the bank's branch in Valjevo (architect Vasily Fyodorovich von Baumgarten, 1939) Zagorodnjuk made reliefs on the façade of the bank depicting allegorical figures of fertility, prosperity along with labour, and in the entrance hall, he represented two local heroes from The First Liberational war: Ilija Bircanin and Aleksa Nenadovic [48; 51, p. 327]. He is the author of the relief on the residential building at 78 Molerova Street in Belgrade, where he presented the allegorical figures Fertility, Enlightenment, and The Source (architect Miodrag Vasic, 1938) [54, p. 110; 50, p. 362].
Although he was not engaged in the erection of public monuments, he cooperated with architect Roman Nikolaevic Verhovski and sculptor Zivojin Lukic on the construction of the
Evidenced by photo documentation kept in family legacy.
According to the memory of V. P. Zagorodniuk, family legacy.
Monument to the Defenders of Belgrade 1914-1918, which was erected in 1931 by the Association of Reserve Officers and Warriors at the New Cemetery in Belgrade [24, p. 35]. He also performed several portrait busts at this cemetery: a member of the opera Svetozar Pisarevic, 1926, the senator and president of the National Assembly Stanojlo Vukcevic, 1934, and the bust of the editor of the magazine "Kosmos" Svetolik Lazarevic [60, p. 59] tombstone of painter Stjepan Fyodorovich Kolesnikov [26, p. 93].
He actively participated in exhibition activities and in May, 1928: he exhibited his sculptures and scenographic sketches along with 25 other artists at the First Exhibition of the Society of Russian Artists held at the Serbian Officers Club [5; 6; 53]. With the artistic group Krug, he exhibited in 1929 and 1930, and his works were occasionally shown at the Salons of Architecture [21] and the Art Pavilion of Cvijeta Zuzoric. Later he exhibited at The First exhibition of theatrical painting (1938), as well as at the salon of Russian artists (August 1942 and July 1943) [27]. During the Nazi occupation he retired from service to continue his work in the period 19451950 when he staged about 20 plays all over Yugoslavia, the last of which was Gounod's opera Faust performed in National Theatre in 1950 [21, p. 312].
On 12.11.1949, the Government of Federal Peoples Republic of Yugoslavia decorated him the Medal for Labor Merits of the 3-rd degree for his long-lasting work in the field of theatrical art, performed in Belgrade and in many other centers in Yugoslavia. Reputable and esteemed, Zagorodnjuk left the National Theater in October 1950. With Vladimir Zagorodnjuk's departure the People's theatre in Belgrade has been missing an outstanding member-conscientious artist, and worker12. For family reasons he left for Australia, where he continued his artistic work to a lesser extent: in 1960, he painted the iconostasis of the Church of the Virgin of Kazan Convent in Kentlyne, as well as the iconostasis of the Church of All Saints in Sydney (Церковь Всех Святых, в земле Российской просиявших). In his work biography, he states that after 1950 he dealt with iconography, church projects, wood carving, etc., in the Russian Orthodox Diocese and the Serbian church at Strathfield, Croydon, Fairfield, Black-town, Tosmania-Hobart, Ren-wick, etc. In 1951, he exhibited at The Royal Art Society and at Black Praise in Sydney in 195213. He died in Sydney on August 25, 1976.
The knowledge of the diversity of the range of works of applied arts is weaker than the attention that fine art has had almost historically. It largely depends on the level of the research of particular artistic opuses and personal biographies of artists. Our cognition of those who created in the interwar period, such as V. P. Zagorodnjuk, is often interwoven with obstacles caused by the unavailability or absence of documentary sources.14 Artists usually do not leave records about performed decorative works, nor is their name mentioned in the technical documentation of architectural objects that are adorned by them. Sometimes the preserved signature of an author, memories of the contemporaries, and the daily press covering the erection of significant buildings are the most common sources for further study. The mention of Zagorodnjuk's scenographies is present without exception in the articles that accompanied the
12 Document signed by Milan Bogdanovic, director of The National Theatre in Belgrade on 11.10.1950. Legacy of V. P. Zagorodnjuk, Theatre museum, Belgrade.
13 Curriculum vitae of Vladimir Pavlovich Zagorodnjuk, family legacy.
14 In the Nazi bombing of Belgrade on April 6, 1941, the funds of the theater, scenography and costume, many archives and the National Library of Serbia were irretrievably destroyed.
theater premieres, annual reports, and theater publications. The study of his creative opus is significantly facilitated by him and his family's awareness of the need to preserve memories, the transfer of scenographic sketches to the Theater Museum of Serbia (in May, 1975, at the request of Vladimir Zagorodnjuk), and the author's insight into preserved photo documentation that helped identify many sculptural achievements in the field of architecture. Certainly, this article does not represent the final sum of the author's works or the final judgment about them, but rather tends to encourage the further study of Vladimir Pavlovich Zagorodnjuk's creative work as part of the visual culture of that period and its scope in the field of applied arts.
References
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Title. Vladimir Pavlovich Zagorodnjuk and Applied Arts in Belgrade between the Two World Wars
Author. Prosen, Milan — Ph. D., docent, head of department. University of Art, Faculty of Applied Arts, Kralja Petra 4, 11000 Beograd, Serbia. milanprosen@gmail.com ORCID: 0000-0002-6402-7849
Abstract. Vladimir Pavlovich Zagorodnjuk (Odessa, 1889 — Sydney, 1976) is one of many Russian artists who arrived in Yugoslavia in the early 1920s, in the first wave of emigration, and contributed to the visual culture of Belgrade in the period between the two world wars. This period is marked by the development in all areas of art and was so fruitful that even today, a century later, it has still not been fully researched and presented, demanding a deeper introspection of authorial contributions and stylistic trends, especially in the field of applied art. With the experience he gained while studying at the Ecole Nationale des Beaux Arts in Paris, he began his work in Belgrade in 1921 as a painter-scenographer of the National Theater. In the period 1923-1940, as an independent set designer for the National Theater, he staged 19 plays and 12 operas and about 20 plays in the period 1945-1950. Along with his scenographic work, in the period 1927-1939, he was noticed as a prolific sculptor, and created reliefs and facade sculptures of numerous public and private buildings in the capital and in other large centers of the kingdom. He cooperated with eminent architects of the period, often in favor of the Art Deco style, and contributed to its reception in Yugoslavia. He exhibited with the Society of Russian Artists (1928), with the group Krug (1929, 1930), at the Salon of Architecture (1931), at The first exhibition of theatrical painting (1938), as well as at the Salon of Russian Artists (1942 and 1943). He was awarded with Diploma de Medaille d'Or at The Exhibition of Industrial Decorative Modern Art 1925 in Paris, high State Decoration of Saint Sava in 1926 and The Medal for Labor Merits of III in 1949. In 1950, he immigrated to Australia, where he continued his artistic work to a lesser extent until his death in 1976 in Sydney. His three prolific decades of work in Belgrade left a considerable contribution, highly praised by contemporaries, but not entirely researched and evaluated by present historiography. Regarding previous researches, preserved edifices and documentation of the artist's private legacy preserved in his family, as well as parts of his legacy donated to the Theater Museum of Serbia, this article tends to present the artistic oeuvre of V. P. Zagorodnjuk and to initiate its further consideration.
Keywords: Russian emigrants, applied arts, decorative sculpture, scenography, National Theatre in Belgrade, Vladimir Zagorodnjuk, Serbian architecture, Yugoslav architecture, Belgrade, Art Deco
Название статьи. Владимир Павлович Загороднюк и прикладное искусство в Белграде между двумя мировыми войнами
Сведения об авторе. Просен, Милан — Ph. D, доцент, заведующий кафедрой. Университет искусств, Краля Петра 4, Белград, Сербия, 11000. milanprosen@gmail.com ORCID: 0000-0002-6402-7849
Аннотация. Владимир Павлович Загороднюк (Одесса, 1889 — Сидней, 1976) — один из многих русских художников, прибывших в Югославию в начале 1920-х гг. в первой волне эмиграции и внесших свой вклад в художественную культуру Белграда в период между двумя мировыми войнами. Этот период отмечен развитием всех областей искусства и был столь плодотворным, что даже сегодня, столетие спустя, он всё ещё не полностью исследован и представлен, требуя более глубокого анализа авторских вкладов и стилистических тенденций, особенно в области прикладного искусства. Благодаря опыту, который Загороднюк приобрёл во время учёбы в Национальной школе изящных искусств в Париже, он начал свою работу в Белграде в 1921 г. в качестве художника-сценографа Национального театра. В 19231940 гг. в качестве независимого сценографа Национального театра он поставил 19 пьес и 12 опер, а в 1945-1950 гг. —около 20 спектаклей. Наряду со сценографической работой, в 1927-1939 гг. он проявил себя как плодовитый скульптор, создававший рельефы и фасадную скульптуру многочисленных общественных и частных зданий в столице и других крупных центрах королевства. Он сотрудничал с выдающимися архитекторами того периода, часто в стиле ар-деко, и способствовал его восприятию в Югославии. Он выставлялся с Обществом русских художников (1928), с группой Круг (1929, 1930), в Салоне архитектуры (1931), на Первой выставке театральной живописи (1938), а также в Салоне русских художников (1942 и 1943). В. Загороднюк был награждён Дипломом Золотой медали на Выставке промышленного декоративного современного искусства в Париже (1925), орденом Святого Саввы (1926) и медалью За трудовые заслуги III степени (1949). В 1950 г. он эмигрировал в Австралию, где в меньшей степени продолжал художественную деятельность вплоть до своей смерти в 1976 г. в Сиднее. Его три плодотворных десятилетия работы в Белграде оставили значительный вклад, высоко ценимый современниками, но не полностью изученный и оценённый современной историографией. Опираясь на предшествующие исследования, сохранившиеся свидетельства и документацию о частном наследии художника, хранящемся в его семье, а также на часть его наследия, переданного в дар Театральному
музею Сербии, эта статья стремится представить художественное творчество В. П. Загороднюка и инициировать его дальнейшее изучение.
Ключевые слова: русская эмиграция, прикладное искусство, декоративная скульптура, сценография, Национальный театр в Белграде, Владимир Загороднюк, сербская архитектура, югославская архитектура, Белград, Ар деко
