The study of modernism has been largely focused on Western cultural centres such as Paris, Vienna, London, and New York. Extravagantly illustrated with over 300 photos and reproductions, Modernism in Kyiv demonstrates that the Ukrainian capital was a major centre of performing and visual arts as well as literary and cultural activity. While arguing that Kyiv's modernist impulse is most prominently displayed in the experimental work of Les Kurbas, one of the masters of the early Soviet stage, the contributors also examine the history of the city and the artistic production of diverse groups including Ukrainians, Russians, Jews, and Poles.
Until now a silent presence in Western accounts of the cultural topography of modernism, multicultural Kyiv is here restored to its historical, intellectual, and artistic complexity. Excerpts taken from the works of artists, writers, and critics as well as the numerous illustrations help give life to the exciting creativity of this period. The first book-length examination of this subject, Modernism in Kyiv is a breakthrough accomplishment that will become a standard volume in the field.
Table of Contents:
Contents
Acknowledgments
Permissions
List of Illustrations
A Note on Transliteration
Introduction: Reconnecting Modernisms 3
IRENA R. MAKARYK
PART ONE KYIV: 'SPECIAL AND BEWILDERING'
Les Kurbas Foreword to Victor Auburtin, Art Is Dying (excerpt)
1 Modernism in Kyiv: Jubilant Experimentation
IRENA R. MAKARYK
Serhy Yefremov 'How beautiful Kyiv is' (diary excerpt)
2 'A Theatrical Mecca': The Stages of Kyiv in 1907
MAYHILL C. FOWLER
Pavlo Tychyna 'Dawn'
3 'Special and Bewildering': A Portrait of Late-Imperial
and Early Soviet Kyiv
MICHAEL F. HAMM
Legend of Sweet Michael and the Golden Gates
4 Three Novels, Three Cities
TARAS KOZNARSKY
Tsar Nicholas II and Lev Trotsky On Film
5 Film in Kyiv, 1910-19160
OLEH SYDOR-HYBELYNDA
PART 2 KYIV THE EPICENTRE
Les Kurbas On Rhythm (diary excerpt)
6 In the Epicentre of Abstraction: Kyiv during the Time of Kurbas
DMYTRO HORBACHOV
Volodymyr Koriak 'To the Isles Electric!' (excerpt)
7 The Yiddish Kultur-Lige
GENNADY ESTRAIKH
Pavlo Tychyna 'You Tell Me'
8 Politics and the Ukrainian Avant-garde
MYROSLAV SHKANDRIJ
Les Kurbas On Art (Diary excerpt)
9 Kyiv's Multicultural Theatrical Life, 1917-19260
HANNA VESELOVSKA
PART 3 'FIRE AND MOTION'
Pavlo Tychyna 'In the Orchestra of the Cosmos' (excerpt)
10 Towards a New Vision of Theatre: Les Kurbas's Work
at the Young Theatre in Kyiv
VIRLANA TKACZ
Taras Shevchenko 'The Sky's Unwashed'
Serge Lifar On Movement (excerpt)
11 The Choreographic Avant-garde in Kyiv, 1916-1921:
Bronislava Nijinska and Her École de Mouvement
MARIA RATANOVA
Pavlo Tychyna 'The Highest Power'
12 Kyiv, the 1920s, and Modernism in Music
DAGMARA TURCHYN-DUVIRAK
Pavlo Tychyna 'Lull' (excerpt)
13 Music in the Theatre of Les Kurbas
YANA LEONENKO
PART 4 THE INVISIBLE MADE VISIBLE
Bronislava Nijinska On the Theatre (notebook excerpt)
14 Les Kurbas's Early Work at the Berezil: From Bodies in Motion
to Performing the Invisible
VIRLANA TKACZ
Vladimir Lenin 'Why worship the new?'
15 Abstraction and Ukrainian Futurist
Literature
OLEH S. ILNYTZKYJ
Kliment Redko 'Arm in arm' (autobiography excerpt)
16 The Graphics Arts: From Page Design to Theatre
MYROSLAVA MUDRAK
Pavlo Tychyna 'Rhythm'
17 Dissecting Time/Space: The Scottish Play and the New
Technology of Film
IRENA R. MAKARYK
Natalka Bilotserkivets 'We'll not die in Paris'
18 On the World Stage: The Berezil in Paris and New York
IRENA R. MAKARYK
PART 5 ELEGIES: REFLECTIONS ON THE FUTURE PAST
Serhiy Zhadan 'The End of Ukrainian Syllabotonic Verse'
19 Vsevolod Meyerhold and Les Kurbas
BÉATRICE PICON-VALLIN WITH VERONIKA GOPKO-
PEREVERZEVA
Pericles 'Funeral Oration over the Athenian Dead' (excerpt)
20 Les Kurbas and the Spiritual Foundations of the Ukrainian
Avant-garde
NELLI KORNIENKO
Les Kurbas 'Premonition'
Appendices
1 Production List
2 Kyiv, Historical Timeline
Contributors
Index
About the Author :
Irena R. Makaryk is an award-winning author and a distinguished university professor of English at the University of Ottawa.
Virlana Tkacz is the artistic director of the Yara Arts Group in New York.
Review :
'[Modernism in Kyiv] is a ground-breaking examination and study of the historical, intellectual, and artistic complexity of Kyiv in the years of modernism.' - Oksana Zakydalsky, The Ukrainian Weekly 'Impressive, richly illustrated volume...This book is successful in creating a strong impression of early twentieth century Kyiv as a bustling and sophisticated major cultural centre... A careful reading of this book will prove an eye opening experience both for specialists and general readers.' - Marko Robrt Stech (Canadian Slavonic Papers: vol52:3-4:2010) ‘This book is a fun read that captures the exuberance of the time, place, and the people that it describes. It is highly recommended to anyone interested in Modernism, in Ukrainian art and literature, to anyone with a desire to live, to experience, to try something new. ’ - Natalie Kononenko (Slavic & East European Review; vol 55:02:2011) ‘We should be grateful to Makaryk and Tkacz for selecting, editing, and publishing such a rich concordance to the study of international Modernism.’
- John E. Bowlt (Slavonica) ‘Modernism in Kyiv, a massive, richly illustrated collection of essays, provides a spectacular introduction to the artistic life of this city.’
- Robert Crane (Theatre Journal) "Irena Makaryk and Virlana Tkacz’s volume on the dynamic cultural life of Kyiv in the age of modernism represents a momentous achievement in English-language scholarship on Ukrainian culture. The volume recovers the neglected but rich modernist culture of Ukraine for the English-speaking reader, but its significance is, by virtue of the scope and framing of the project, also wider than this: in its attention to transnational cultural dynamics and (neo)colonial frameworks and attitudes, the volume represents a corrective to the metropolitan orientation of scholarship on modernist culture."
- Uilleam Blacker, University College London (Harvard Ukrainian Studies)
