Stepan Grigoryevich Pissachow

Stepan Grigoryevich Pissachow around 1920

Stepan Grigorjewitsch Pissachow ( Russian Степан Григорьевич Писахов , scientific transliteration Stepan Grigor'evič Pisachov ; * October 13th ^July / October 25th  1879 ^greg. In Arkhangelsk ; † May 3rd, 1960 ibid. , Writer ) was a Russian painter , ethnographer and writer Traveller. Pissachow's artistic works deal primarily with the landscapes of Northern Russia. Today he is considered one of the most important Russian fairy tale writers .

Adolescent years

Stepan Grigoryevich Pissachow was born on October 25, 1879 in Arkhangelsk. His father, Grigori Michailowitsch Pissachow, was of Jewish descent and settled in Arkhangelsk, penniless, from the Moglijow governorate . There he ran a small jewelry store and worked in the same as a blacksmith . He was baptized and married Irina Ivanovna Miliukova . Pissachow was born the third of five children. In addition to an older brother ( Pawel ) and a one year older sister ( Taisja ), he had two younger sisters ( Serafima and Evpraksinja ).

Pissachow was not able to attend high school. Instead, he went to a city school and didn't graduate until 1899 at the age of 20. He then left his parents' home and traveled through Russia for several years. In the first time he settled on the Solovetsky Islands and worked in a forestry company. Later he tried in vain to be accepted into an art school in Kazan . From 1903, contrary to his father's wishes, he attended the art school Baron AL Stieglitz for a year and a half ( Санкт-Петербургская государственная художественно-промем атика . During this time, Pissachow received little financial support from his parents and had to leave school in 1905 because of his participation in the student unrest.

Travel and first works

Image “On the Dwina. The Night ” by Pissachow

After leaving art school, Pissachow visited Novgorod and then spent some time in northern Russia (including in Malyje Karmakuly ( Малые Кармакулы ) on the west coast of the Novaya Zemlya ). Pissachow painted a lot during this time and the impressions of northern Russia, to which he later returned many times, were to be of great importance for his later work. Pissachow decided to leave Russia and traveled to Palestine in the fall of 1905 penniless . He also visited other countries in the Mediterranean region such as Turkey , Egypt , Syria and Greece . Pissachow subsequently traveled through Europe and finally settled briefly in Paris to continue his training there. In 1907 some of his works were first exhibited in Rome .

After a three-year trip, Pissachow returned to Russia and attended the private art schools of LJ Dmitrijew and Jakow S. Golblata in Saint Petersburg. During this time and in the years that followed, Pissachow took part in a number of Arctic excursions and trips. Pissachow was particularly fascinated by the regions of northern Russia. He traveled to Novaya Zemlya, the areas around the Pinega , the Kara Sea , Pechora and the Mesen, among other places . Above all , he traveled several times to the Ki island near Onega ; many of his pictures were created on them. He published his observations and experiences on these trips for the first time later in 1916.

In 1910 Pissachow exhibited his works for the first time at an exhibition in his hometown of Arkhangelsk. At the exhibition entitled Russian North ( Русский Север ) 234 pictures by Pissachow were shown, which had the four regions of Severodvinsk , Murmansk , Novaya Zemlya and the White Sea as the subject. In the same year Pissachow took part in one of the most important art exhibitions of the time, in honor of the 200th anniversary of Tsarskoye Selo (today the city of Pushkin ). At this exhibition 60 works by Pissachow were exhibited in three pavilions.

At the end of 1911 Pissachow took part in an exhibition in Saint Petersburg, in which he received the Great Silver Medal as an award. In letters, Pissachow later mentioned several times that it was at this time that he met the painter Ilya Repin , which Pissachow's work Sosna, pobediwschaja buri ( Сосна, победившая бури ) particularly liked.

World War I and Russian Revolution

During the First World War , Pissachow was drafted into the army in 1915. He served in Finland and Kronstadt , among others . During the February Revolution he worked in the Kronstadt Council and gave lectures for soldiers and sailors at the May demonstrations. After demobilization and his return to Arkhangelsk in 1918, Pissachow turned to literature in addition to his artistic work. Pissachow's maternal great-uncle, Leonti, was a professional storyteller and already had a great influence on his later work in Pissachow's youth. Pissachow was also mainly concerned with traditional fairy tales and stories from northern Russia. He had already written his first story Notsch w biblioteke ( Ночь в библиотеке ) at the age of 14, and Ijeronim Jassinsk, the writer and editor of the newspapers Beseda ( Беседа ) and Novoje slowo ( Новое слово ), advised him even before the revolution Writing down stories. Pissachow had initially limited himself to presenting the stories he had created in front of an audience. In the same year of his return to Arkhangelsk, he published his stories Samoyedskaja skaska ( Самоедская сказка ) and Son w Novgorode ( Сон вдевгоро ) in the newspaper Severnoje utro ( Северное утро ), the publisher ML Leonow for the first time .

Beginnings as a writer

The Governorate Executive Committee ( губернский исполнительный комитет ), commissioned Pissachow in 1920 to look after the Archangel Museums. In the same year he made drawings of the battlefields of the northern intervention on the instructions of the Moscow Revolutionary Museum, as well as drawings of the monuments of the Mesen and Pinega regions for the Russian Museum. In the autumn of that year he took part in an excursion to the Bolshezemelskaya Tundra ( Большеземельская тундра ). Between 1920 and 1921 Pissachow prepared a total of five exhibitions. In 1923, Pissachow headed the collection of materials for the ethnographic exhibition of the north at the First All-Soviet Trade Exhibition of Agriculture and Crafts .

Pissachow's fairy tales were brought out in 1924 in the Na Severnoi Dvine collection ( На Северной Двине ). In 1927, many North Russian fairy tales were published in the Almanac Sovetskaya Strana with comments from Pissachow. In the same year Pissachows took factory memorial to the victims of the intervention on the island Yokanga River ( Памятник жертвам интервенции на о. Иоканьга ) a central place on the allsowjetischen exhibition Ten years in October ( 10 лет Октября ), on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the October Revolution a. As a reward for this exhibition, Pissachow was allowed to exhibit his works at his own art exhibition in Moscow a year later. Two of his paintings were acquired by the All-Russia Central Executive Committee at this exhibition and hung in Kalinin's study .

In 1935 Pissachow began to publish his fairy tales under the title Munchhausen from the village of Uima ( Мюнхаузен из деревни Уйма ) in the popular newspaper 30 Tage ( 30 дней ), the Russian Writers ' Union . Within three years, more than 30 Pissachow's fairy tales appeared in the newspaper. Since the late 1920s, Pissachow's real main income was teaching in schools. In total, Pissachow gave drawing lessons in three schools. In 1938 and 1940, Pissachow's fairy tales were published in two volumes in Arkhangelsk. The books contained 86 Pissachow's fairy tales and were later reprinted many times in a different form. Although Pissachow was a painter, he did not make the illustrations for his books himself, but had the books illustrated by other talented artists, such as his former student Jura M. Danilow. In 1939, Pissachow joined the Union of Writers of the USSR . Already at this time Pissachow was hoping for his works to be published by a Moscow publishing house. In the early 1940s, the State Publishing House of the RSFSR ( Государственное издательство РСФСР ) worked on publishing Pissachov's stories. With the outbreak of the Great Patriotic War , however, the publisher's priorities shifted, so that Pissachow's works did not appear.

Late years

Even shortly after the war, Pissachow, who did not receive a pension, continued to teach in schools. It was not until 1957 that his fairy tales were first published by the Soviet Writer Publishing House ( Советский писатель ) in Moscow. Shortly before his death, this also brought Pissachow national fame. Pissachow died on May 3, 1960 at the age of 80 in Arkhangelsk. He was buried in the cemetery of the Holy Iliinsky Cathedral ( Свято-Илиинский кафедральный собор ). Most of Pissachow's works were only published after his death; including many travel reports, diaries and notes.

Effects and aftermath

Pissachow Museum

During his lifetime Pissachow gained notoriety not only because of his services as a writer, painter and storyteller. His peculiar but always friendly demeanor in public - Pissachow was naturally very short, wore a long white beard, an old hat and well-worn clothes, often talked to people on his walks and told them stories - brought him great popularity and made it a living sight in Arkhangelsk.

Pissachow Museum

Just a few years after his death, Pissachow's house at Pomorskaya 27 was demolished at the end of the 1960s and a nine-story building was built in its place. In 2007, the Pissachow Museum in Arkhangelsk was opened not far from the former home. It consists of eight exhibition rooms, which are spread over two floors. Each of these halls is dedicated to different parts of Pissachow's life. The museum contains many personal items, documents and more than 150 pictures from Pissachow's possession.

Pissachow Monument

Pissachow monument in Arkhangelsk

In 2008 a bronze statue in honor of Pissachows was erected in the center of Arkhangelsk, at the intersection of the two main pedestrian zones Pomorskaya and Chumbarowa-Luchinsky . The statue titled “ Good afternoon, good people! “( Здравствуйте, люди добрые! ) Was created by Sergei Sjuchin and depicts Pissachow in original size (145 cm). The statue shows Pissachow with an outstretched hand, a walking stick, a net with fish and a seagull on his head, which symbolize Arkhangelsk as a port city should.

Works (selection)

• На Северной Двине: Сборник / Арханг. о-во краеведения : Не любо - не слушай , Arkhangelsk 1924, pp. 74–80.
• Сказки , Arkhangelsk, 1938.
• Сказки , Arkhangelsk, 1940.
• Сказки , Arkhangelsk, 1949.
• Сказки , Moscow, 1957.
• Сказки / Предисл. Ш. Галимова - Arkhangelsk, 1977.
• "Сказы и сказки": Издательство "Современник" , Moscow 1985.
• Сказки. Очерки. Письма [Сост., Авт. вступ. ст. и коммент. И.Б. Пономарева] , Arkhangelsk, 1985.
• “Месяц с небесного чердака” , Leningrad 1991, ISBN 5-08-000299-9 .
• "Ледяна колокольня" , Moscow 1992, ISBN 5-268-01429-3 .
• Не любо - не слушай: сказки , Kaliningrad, 2004. ISBN 5-7406-0786-8 .

literature

• Pomorskaja ėnciklopedija: Tom 1 Istorija Archangel'skogo Severa . Pomorskij gosudarstvennyj universitet, Arkhangelsk 2001, ISBN 5-88086-147-3 , p. 306.

Web links

Commons : Stepan Grigoryevich Pissachow  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Literature by and about Stepan Grigorjewitsch Pissachow in the catalog of the German National Library
• Kurzbiographie (English)
• Detailed biography of Pissachow (Russian)
• Photos and paintings of Pissachow (Russian)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} http://www.russia-ic.com/people/culture_art/312/ Stepan Pisakhov on Russia-InfoCenter.
2. ↑ http://www.rusiskusstvo.ru/journal/2-2006/a1336  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Поэтическая душа Русского Севера i, Journal «Русское искусство».  
3. ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original dated December 16, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Pissachow on bibliogid.ru. 
4. ↑ http://www.pravda.ru/districts/northwest/arhangelsk/233674-1/ Article about the opening of the museum in Pravda.
5. ↑ http://www.museum.ru/N34090 Pissachow Museum.
6. ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from February 15, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Article about the Pissachow monument. 
7. ↑ http://www.pravdasevera.ru/?id=1051772502 Prawda Sewera from September 26, 2008.