ARTISTS OF SUBCARPATHIAN RUTHENIA IN THE CZECHOSLOVAK PRESS, 1921 – 1937

The paper examines the problem of the formation and functioning of the «Society of Visual Artists of Subcarpathian Ruthenia», which officially existed in 1931 – 1938, but its roots date back to the early 1920s. The idea is substantiated that the Society, created on the model of the Prague «Manes», became the first institutional attempt by local artists to build an organisational structure that united representatives of different artistic trends, schools and aesthetic orientations. The activities of the founders and leading figures of the Society – Adalbert Erdélyi, Josyp Bokshay, Ladislav Kaigl and others, as well as less known participants, such as Istvan Kutlan or Nikolai Ostashkin, are traced. The article raises the issue of the institutionalisation of art in the multicultural environment of Subcarpathian Ruthenia, where the avant-garde practices of Czech artists coexisted in one association with the academic, impressionistic and realistic searches of local artists. Considerable attention is paid to the analysis of exhibition activities, in particular to collective exhibitions in Košice (1921, 1934), where artists from Subcarpathia presented their works on the same exhibition site as well-known Czech, Viennese and Munich authors. The article reveals that the press reaction was generally favourable: critics noted the quality of the works and gave the leading role to Erdelyi and Bokshay as the «pillars» of Transcarpathian art. At the same time, the absence of a single «school» was emphasised, since the artists of the region came from different artistic traditions. Based on the study of the daily press, new facts about little-known artists and circumstances related to the formation of the local art scene have been established. The paper introduces new and little-studied materials related to the interwar art of Transcarpathia into scientific circulation. The authors conclude that the Soviet interpretation of this phenomenon as a «painting school» is incorrect, since the sources of the 1920s–1930s demonstrate rather a lack of stylistic integrity and emphasise the heterogeneity of artistic approaches. Thus, the article is devoted to a comprehensive study of the processes of institutionalisation of the art of Subcarpathian Ruthenia, which reveals the dynamics of the cultural life of the region and allows us to rethink traditional ideas about the «Transcarpathian school of painting».