ST.PETERSBURG THE SHORTEST WAY TO THE ARCTIC

Unknown Authors… First Publication…

Elena Vasilieva,
Senior researcher of the State Russian Arctic Museum

      The Institute of the Peoples of the North was founded in the years 1929-30 in Leningrad on the initiative of Professor Vladimir Bogoraz-Tan. Its students were young natives from the North and the Far East who were, by tradition, fishermen, reindeer breeders, and hunters. Often they did not even have a primary education. Nevertheless, a creative atmosphere was present in the Institute from the very first days.
      A group of student artists was formed in the Institute under the guidance of talented teachers. What was created set the base for a new style in art - called 'Northern Primitive'. The already then famous art critic Nikolay Punin, placed the art work of the 'Northerners' together with "monuments of world art that had played such a decisive role in the rebirth of the formal fundamentals of Renaissance traditions". Studying the drawings of these northern students he found them to be of great value to modern artistic culture.
      As early as 1929 the works of the Institute of the Peoples of the North were already being exhibited in the Russian Museum. Soon after they were displayed in Moscow, followed by Paris, at the World Exhibition of Art and Technology.
      For many years the collections of drawings, paintings and sculptures of the students of the Institute of the Peoples of the North has been kept in storage at the State Russian Arctic Museum. The NEW EAST TODAY magazine is publishing for the first time a few works from this unique collection. They date back to the 1920s and the early 1930s. Their authors are unknown.