Paintings by Rachev E. Illustrations for Russian fairy tales. Summary of the lesson “Russian folk tales in the work of illustrator E. M. Rachev

RACHEV EVGENY MIKHAILOVICH

Dates of life: January 26 (February 8) 1906 – July 2, 1997
Illustrator, graphic artist, People's Artist of the Russian Federation, Honored Artist of the Russian Federation.

Evgeniy Mikhailovich was born in Tomsk and spent his childhood in the village with his grandmother. In 1920, he traveled alone to Novorossiysk to visit his mother, worked in the port, studied at a nautical vocational school, then at a locomotive polytechnic school. Since childhood, Evgeniy Mikhailovich was fond of drawing and writing poetry. The desire for creativity led him to the Kuban Art and Pedagogical College in Krasnodar, from which he graduated with honors in 1928. After graduation, Rachev studied for some time at the Kiev Art Institute, and in 1930 he began collaborating with various Kyiv children's publishing houses as an illustrator. He joined a group of young avant-garde graphic artists who united around the Kyiv publishing house “Culture”, among whom were L. Hamburger, B. Ermolenko, B. Kryukov, I. Kisel, M. Boychuk; and in 1936, the drawings of Rachev, who increasingly gave preference to Russian fairy tales and fables in his work, were seen in “Detgiz” and the artist was invited to Moscow.
In 1960, Rachev became the chief artist of the children's publishing house "Malysh", and worked in this position for almost twenty years.
Evgeny Rachev devoted more than sixty years of his creative life to children's books; Many books have been published with his illustrations, including “The Pantry of the Sun” by M. Prishvin, “My Animals” by Lev Durov, “Alenushka’s Tales” by D. Mamin-Sibiryak, “Satirical Tales” by M. Saltykov-Shchedrin, Krylov’s fables, works by V. M. Garshina, I. Ya. Franko, L. N. Tolstoy, S. Mikhalkov, V. V. Bianki and a huge number of folk tales - Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Hungarian, Romanian, Tajik...

The main characters of his illustrations are animals, and animals with character traits inherent in people. Rachev studied the habits of animals in order to later show them in books. In fairy tales, animals speak and act like people, and Rachev dresses them in Russian folk costumes, making them look like people. That’s why you can immediately see what kind of character the furry and feathered fairy-tale heroes have.

Here is the bear from the fairy tale “Tops and Roots” - he is naive and trusting, and the crafty little man with whom the bear is talking is not at all afraid of him.

Here is the fox talking to the mice in the Eskimo fairy tale “The Brave Mouse.” It is clear that the fox is cunning; she seems to be smiling, squinting her eyes and preparing to grab the mice. But one of them turned out to be more cunning - she told the fox that she could hear the hunters approaching to scare the red cheat.

And here is a fox and a cat, dressed up in ancient costumes: the fox is a hawthorn, the cat is a governor. They walk proudly - after all, they deceived all the forest inhabitants by telling them that the cat was sent to the forest as the leader over all the animals.

The most popular Ukrainian folk tale is “The Mitten,” first published in 1951. It has been translated many times into other languages ​​of the world. “Mitten,” with illustrations by Rachev in Japanese, is one of the three longest-selling children's books in Japan.

Rachev himself spoke about his work like this: “For me, it is especially interesting to convey in a drawing the character of an animal - good-natured or cruel, harmless or predatory. Studying the appearance of an animal and its character, you suddenly notice that one of the animals or birds is surprisingly similar to this or that person, and a person is like an animal or bird. And if I met a bear dressed in clothes in the forest, I probably would not be surprised, but would say respectfully to the owner of the forest: “Hello, Grandfather Bear!” And if you look at my drawings and rejoice at the amusing fairy tale, it means that it turned out like a fairy tale. If, looking at my birds and animals, you understand that the fairy tale is somehow cunning and hints at people, then I have succeeded, as in the fairy tales that I illustrate.”

Read, look at books with drawings by Evgeny Rachev!

Evgeniy Mikhailovich Rachev- Honored Artist of the RSFSR, Soviet animal artist, known for his work in the field of book graphics.

Born in the city of Tomsk. He lost his father early. His mother was a doctor, and his stepfather a civil engineer.

He spent his childhood in the village with his grandmother, near Tomsk, in the Siberian village of Yudino. When Eugene was twelve years old, the October Revolution took place in the country and the Civil War began. In 1920, fleeing hunger, he was forced to travel alone from Siberia to Novorossiysk, to his mother. During that difficult time of hunger, he studied at a nautical vocational school, worked in the port as a loader and winch operator, then transferred to the locomotive polytechnic school. But he became increasingly attracted to art: he wrote poetry and painted.

In 1928, he graduated with honors from the Kuban Art and Pedagogical College in Krasnodar, then briefly studied at the Kiev Art Institute and in 1930 began collaborating with various children's publishing houses as an illustrator. He chose Russian folk tales, Russian prose and fables as his specialization.

In 1936, Rachev’s drawings were seen in “Detgiz” and invited to Moscow. The young artist moved to the capital and began to work actively, but soon the Great Patriotic War began, and he went to the front, he was assigned to design a front-line newspaper. After the war, Evgeniy Mikhailovich continued to work at Detgiz, in addition, he collaborated with many other publishing houses. And, starting in 1960, he became the main artist at the Malysh publishing house and remained so for about twenty years.

Rachev devoted his entire creative life, more than sixty years, to working with books, and created hundreds of beautiful drawings. At the same time, the artist always remembered his little viewer and tried to make his drawings understandable to the child.

Many books were published with Rachev’s illustrations, including: Vladimir Obruchev “Plutonia”; Prishvin M. M. “Pantry of the Sun” and “Golden Meadow”; Durov V.L. “My animals”; Mamin-Sibiryak D. M. “Alyonushkin’s Tales”; Saltykov-Shchedrin M. E. “Satirical tales.” In 1958–1959, especially for the exhibition “Soviet Russia,” Rachev prepared a whole series of drawings for the fables of I. A. Krylov. He created wonderful drawings for the works of V. M. Garshin, I. Ya. Franko, L. N. Tolstoy, S. Mikhalkov, V.V. Bianki and, of course, to folk tales: Ukrainian, Russian, Belarusian, Hungarian, Romanian, Tajik, as well as fairy tales of the peoples of the North.

In 1973 E.M. Rachev became the Laureate of the State Prize of the RSFSR for illustrations of the books: “Terem-Teremok”, I.A. Krylov “Fables”, S. Mikhalkov “Fables”.

In 1986, for illustrations for the book of Ukrainian folk tales “Spikelet” by E.M. Rachev received an Honorary Diploma from the International Council for Children's and Youth Literature of UNESCO - IBBY. Once every two years, IBBY awards the International Hans Christian Andersen Prize to children's authors - writers and artists, as well as Honorary Diplomas to the best recently published children's and youth books.

In 1996, many years of work by E.M. Racheva was awarded the audience award - “Golden Key”.

Evgeniy Mikhailovich worked on a significant part of his books together with his wife Lidia Ivanovna Racheva(1923 - 2011), who often collected material for his future books, made sketches of ornaments and folk costumes in museums, translated and retold fairy tales of different peoples, was a compiler of collections of fairy tales and even calculated book layouts so that there was an exact match between the test and future illustrations. For example, when the idea arose to make illustrations for Krylov’s fables, she collected material in the archives that made it possible to tie the plots of the fables to real events, which made it possible to create unique drawings that exactly corresponded to the text of the fables and the events to which they were addressed. This book of fables was very different from all other books with Krylov’s fables; the fables were provided with comments written by Lydia Ivanovna, which conveyed to the readers the meaning embedded in them by Ivan Krylov. There were other books in which you can see that among the creators was L. Gribova - that is, Lidia Ivanovna Racheva.

Evgeniy Mikhailovich Rachev lived a long life, it included many events - both personal and those that his contemporaries experienced; he was born in one country - the tsarist one, and died in a third - “democratic”, living all the time in the same one. He was buried at the Kalitnikovskoye cemetery in Moscow in 1997, and those artists with whom he worked at the Malysh publishing house came to see him off.

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Biography

Evgeniy Mikhailovich Rachev(1906-1997) - artist, book illustrator.

Born in Tomsk, he spent his childhood in the village with his grandmother. In 1920, he traveled alone to Novorossiysk to visit his mother, worked in the port, studied at a nautical vocational school, then at a locomotive polytechnic school. Since childhood, he was fond of drawing and wrote poetry; his desire for creativity led him to the Kuban Art and Pedagogical College in Krasnodar, from which he graduated with honors in 1928. After graduation, he studied for some time at the Kiev Art Institute, and in 1930 he began collaborating with various Kyiv children's publishing houses as an illustrator. He joined a group of young avant-garde graphic artists who united around the Kyiv publishing house “Culture”, among whom were L. Hamburger, B. Ermolenko, B. Kryukov, I. Kisel, M. Boychuk; and in 1936, the drawings of Rachev, who increasingly gave preference to Russian fairy tales and fables in his work, were seen in “Detgiz” and the artist was invited to Moscow.

In 1960, Rachev became the chief artist of the children's publishing house "Malysh", and worked in this position for almost twenty years.

Evgeny Rachev devoted more than sixty years of his creative life to children's books; Many books have been published with his illustrations, including “The Pantry of the Sun” by M. Prishvin, “My Animals” by Lev Durov, “Alenushka’s Tales” by D. Mamin-Sibiryak, “Satirical Tales” by M. Saltykov-Shchedrin, Krylov’s fables, works by V. M. Garshin, I. Ya. Franko, L. N. Tolstoy, S. Mikhalkov, V. V. Bianki and a huge number of folk tales - Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Hungarian, Romanian, Tajik...

The younger the viewer for whom you work, and, therefore, the less his life experience, the more responsible the artist’s role.

I am an animalist - an artist who draws animals. But not those animals that live in the forest, but those that inhabit fables or fairy tales. Fairy-tale animals talk, laugh, cry, the relationships between them are purely human, they live according to human laws

Throughout my life I have retained my love for all living things. To make drawings for fairy tales about animals, of course, you need to know nature well. You need to know well what the animals and birds you are going to draw look like. You can't even draw a sparrow until you look at it properly.

I can draw a long-eared hare, or a toothy wolf, or a raven bird. But after reading the fairy tale, I’m still in no hurry to immediately take up brushes and paints. Because in fairy tales, animals are like different people: good or evil, smart or stupid, mischievous, cheerful, funny.

So it turns out that before you draw, you need to know better about the people who lived in the places where the fairy tales were invented. Then I can clearly imagine my fairy-tale heroes. As if they were my old friends or acquaintances.

For me, it is especially interesting to convey in a drawing the character of an animal - good-natured or cruel, harmless or predatory. Studying the appearance of an animal and its character, you suddenly notice that one of the animals or birds is surprisingly similar to this or that person, and a person is like an animal or bird. And if I met a bear dressed in clothes in the forest, I probably would not be surprised, but would say respectfully to the owner of the forest:

Hello, Grandpa Bear!

And if you look at my drawings and rejoice at the amusing fairy tale, it means that it turned out like a fairy tale.

If, looking at my birds and animals, you understand that the fairy tale is somehow cunning and hints at people, then I have succeeded, as in the fairy tales that I illustrate.

Not only is the peacock beautiful, the sparrow is also very beautiful. But its beauty is discreet, you have to be able to see it. Sometimes there is much more beauty in a small puddle than in a huge lake.

The gallery "Open Club" opened today exhibition of works by Evgeny Mikhailovich Rachev. In my memory, there were no separate exhibitions of this artist, and in general - as noted, this is only the fifth personal exhibition in all, all years.

The exhibition is small, but very integral and, paradoxically, voluminous. The entire creative path of the artist is presented - from the first post-war years to the 90s, both adult and children's books, both b/w graphics and color works. At least a couple of works, but all the main, iconic books of the artist are represented. Perhaps the only thing I was missing was the drawings for “The Mitten,” but it’s “museum-quality.” Everything else is there. Northern, Russian, Ukrainian, Bulgarian fairy tales. Teremok and Masha with the bear, Tailors in the forest, Golden comb, Birds, Krylov's fables and Saltykov-Shchedrin's fairy tales.

I think I won’t reveal a big secret that the largest collection of works is in the artist’s family. It is on the basis of this collection that the exhibition was made. I have seen Rachev’s works at exhibitions (for example, at Darwin), but usually these are mass-produced lithographs. They look a little different - harder, sharper, more spot-like than hand-made graphic works, especially the early ones, where watercolor + charcoal are used. Therefore, this exhibition is unique - you have the opportunity to see exactly these works.

I liked that the works were not filed under passports, but presented as they are - with typographical and editorial notes, very lively and real.

Most of the works are familiar to me personally, so I remember more the works that were new to me: the charming works for Mikhalkov’s “The Arrogant Bunny,” for Tolstoy’s fables, for Obruchev’s “Plutonia.” Well, the main hit (and not only for me) are wooden sculptures. They have not been exhibited since the late 60s.

As was very correctly noted at the opening: Rachev’s style is unique. No, he was not the first to dress animals in human clothes and stand them on their hind legs. But it was Rachev who did it so organically and naturally, while the animals retained their habits, their recognition. These are not people in animal masks, these are wolves, bears, foxes, hares, but at the same time we see characters, facial expressions, emotions. These are fairy-tale animals that walk, talk, get offended, laugh, intrigue, are afraid...

The drawings were well chosen: very lively faces and muzzles

These are the same unpublished (until recently) drawings for Saltykov-Shchedrin.

I took a special photo with the visitor - for scale. These are drawings for Krylov's fables

From early works. These are drawings for Tolstoy's fables.

Still from early.

If I understand correctly: these are the earliest works in the exhibition. Drawings for "Plutonia" by Obruchev

And the main hit (for me). Wooden figurines of animals. Evgeny Mikhailovich picked up pieces of wood, driftwood, roots, and twigs in the forest. After some time they came to life

And the main hit (my personal one). It was impossible to get me away from this mouse with a long tail.

From different angles (I can't resist)

And entirely. With a tail. Long, long

German Alekseevich Mazurin. He told an interesting detail: Rachev soaked the coal in linseed oil, after which, working on the coal with watercolors, the contours did not spread and remained clear.

I highly recommend the exhibition. Even if you are not too big a fan of Rachev’s drawings. The originals have real charisma and are a must see. And the exhibition is unique in its selection and scope. I don’t know if there will be another chance to see everything just like that.

It’s a pity that it’s short in time, but it’s absolutely accessible due to opening hours (until 10 pm!!!), in the center.

Free admission. They sell a small catalogue.