Nonconformism of the first phase in Ukrainian decorative art of the 1930s-1950s (on the example of Mykhailo Boychuk’s school)
Among the questions of defiance to the official doctrine in the Soviet Ukrainian culture in general and its decorative art in particular, the contemporary Ukrainian and world art science is paid much attention to, especially in terms of research of the defiance recourses. Recently the professional art science and cultural publications have revealed many facts about artists’ defiance to the authorities. The majority of such defiance occurrences fall on the period of the 1960s-1980s. The attempted research focuses on the first stage of the artists’ defiance, namely on the creative activity of Mykhailo Boychuk, whose output was eliminated for the defiance to the official artistic policy. The research in question reveals the facts about the attempts of the nationally conscious artists to restore the justice in the 1940s - 1950s. The new culturological paradigm gives the opportunity to reconsider the approaches to artistic phenomena of the recent past, especially under conditions of absence of opposition “official / underground art”, there’s a more objective opportunity to analyse nonconformism as a cultural phenomenon in its regional aspects on the basis of culturological ideas of the ХХth - ХХІst centuries. Contemporary Ukrainian society is gradually returning to the moral-ethical values forgotten in the times of totalitarian regime. One of the leading places in the hierarchy of such values belongs to freedom. Owing to the artistic nonconformism of the 1960s-1980s the traditions of free thinking and individualism were preserved in Ukrainian culture and became the basis for its renewal today. Nonconformist art, which under conditions of total ruling of social realism, strove for the new understanding of beauty, avoided the extremities of formalistic nihilism and totalitarian aesthetics. Its aesthetic pursuit resulted in the appearance of new artistic forms and in new approaches to the realization of artistic conception. In culturology the notion “nonconformism” implies “dissidence, rebellion, opposition to the conventional ideological or moral state doctrine.” Early demonstrations of nonconformism were fixed in the late 1930s. No doubts M. Boychuk and his adherents are meant in this context. The follow-up display of dissidence, which gained different forms, falls on the time length of the late 1950s-1980s. The first and the latter occurrences of the fight with the system prove that nonconformism wasn’t an integral consistent movement. Rather, those were emotional reactions of the conscious artists to the total ideological system aimed at oppression of free individual creativity. At the same time the orderly soviet ideological system had some inevitable gaps in total control and censorship. These gaps were used by the nonconformists of the second wave, when dissidents didn’t put their lives at stake. Yet, individual cases of destroying the rebellion, unfortunately, occurred. Another feature of opposition consists in the fact that nonconformism wasn’t and couldn’t be a centralized phenomenon. Unlike centralized conformists organizations the followers of nonconformism advocated the principles of subjectivism, individualism and irrationalism. These personified ideals catalyze the deeper essence of nonconformism which consists not only in opposition, but also in actions and concrete deeds, in movement. There were lots of myths round the control of the Soviet authorities over the development of national cultures within the boundaries of the former USSR. At present more and more evidence is revealed about the real attitude of the Soviet totalitarian government to the questions of the development of Ukrainian culture and art. One of the most characteristic examples in this sense is the tragic life of Mykhailo Boychuk and his unique school, which absorbed the best national traditions, but didn’t remain isolated; on the contrary it has global significance. After destroying practically all artistic groups in early 1930s and establishing the Union of Ukrainian Soviet Artists, the opposition to the official artists’ doctrine practically stopped. The offered principles of the Soviet realism weren’t adopted only by the artists of Mykhailo Boychuk. The attempted research proves that the first Ukrainian nonconformists were the followers of Mykhailo Boychuk. The objective of the research declares such viewpoint and interpretation of the problem. This material is represented in the doctorate thesis “Decorative art of the Soviet Ukraine in the 1940s-1960s” which the author is currently working at, at the Modern Art Research Institute of the National Academy of Arts of Ukraine.