Khokhloma — a Nizhny Novgorod name that stands for three distinct things at once: a folk craft of gilded painted woodwork, the trading selo in Koverninsky District that gave the craft its name, and a museum-and-tourism center in Semyonov.[1] The craft took shape in the seventeenth century in the Trans-Volga villages near Nizhny Novgorod and remains one of the most recognizable Russian handicrafts.[1][2]
The Craft
Khokhloma painting emerged in the seventeenth century in villages of Nizhny Novgorod Governorate; at first, painted tableware was produced at monasteries for the royal court, and by the nineteenth century it was sold throughout Russia and exported to Persia, India, the United States, and Australia.[1] The craft takes its name not from its place of production but from its place of sale: peasants brought their wares to the large trading selo of Khokhloma to sell at market.[1][2]
The process involves several stages: tableware turned from linden wood is coated with a red-brown ground, impregnated with boiled linseed oil, and rubbed with metallic powder — formerly tin, now aluminum — then painted, varnished two or three times, and fired in a kiln at 120–130 degrees Celsius.[1][2] The lacquer film transforms the silvery surface into golden, and the firing makes the tableware resistant to hot food — yet no actual gold is present in the finished piece.[2]
Two painting techniques are distinguished. In the raised technique, the design is applied over the gilded background in red, green, and black; in the background technique, the outline of the ornament is drawn first, then the background is filled in with paint, leaving the pattern golden.[2] A detailed examination of the technique, historical examples, and masters can be found at Khokhloma technique.
The Selo
Khokhloma is a historic selo in Koverninsky District, twenty kilometers southeast of the district center, on the Uzola River. It had no workshops of its own to speak of: it was a trading settlement, and it gained worldwide renown as the place where goods from the surrounding villages were sold. For more, see Khokhloma Village.
Semyonov
Painted tableware in this area is mentioned as early as 1659, and by 1764 the production of wooden tableware had been recognized as the principal occupation of the local population.[3] Khokhloma pieces were displayed at the All-Russian Exhibition in Moscow in 1853; in 1882 Empress Maria Fyodorovna awarded master craftsman Mikhail Krasilnikov a gold watch, and in 1889 the craft received the Grand Prix at the World Exhibition in Paris.[3]
In 1913 an instructional school for lathe-turned tableware crafts opened in Semyonov, and in 1916 a School of Artistic Woodworking was established under the direction of G. P. Matveyev. The school became the cooperative "Kustar-Khudozhnik" (1924), then the artel "Eksport" (1931); in 1934 a museum of handicraft artistic goods was opened, in 1960 the artel was reorganized into the "Khokhloma Painting" factory, and in 1964 a creative laboratory was established alongside it.[3] In 2014 Semyonov was granted the status of capital of the Golden Khokhloma.[3]
The museum and tourism center "Golden Khokhloma" was established in Semyonov in July 2008 to preserve and promote folk artistic crafts — MTC Golden Khokhloma.
Sources
- nkhp.ru — Association "Folk Artistic Crafts of Russia" — Khokhloma painting: origins, technique, craft centers (archive)
- livingheritage.ru — Living Heritage — Khokhloma painting: a cultural brand of Nizhny Novgorod Region (archive)
- goldenhohloma.com — "Khokhloma Painting," Semyonov — Company history: dates from 1659 to the granting of Semyonov's status as capital of the Golden Khokhloma (archive)