The second life of the Volyn ornament

The Samchyky ornament is not very well known among Ukrainians. The Petrykivka ornament is more cognitive, central-Ukrainian by origin, prevalent throughout the entire period of the USSR’s existence. Though it differs from the ethnic motives in Great Volyn’s painting (the territory of present Volyn, Rivne, and western Zhytomyr, northern Khmelnytsky, Ternopil and Lviv regions) both in ornament and coloring.

Nowadays the revived Samchyky ornament is unique, as the art of decorative painting in the lands of Great Volyn had been partly lost. During the pre-Soviet period, such patterns were used to embellish building walls, stoves, chests etc. The Volyn decorative ornament was mostly spread in the icon painting of Podillia and southern Volyn. In 19-20th centuries the entire background of the icons, especially those created in village workshops, was filled with flowers. With the advent of communism the icon painting in villages stopped, though the paintings remained on walls and chests. In the 1960s several men from the village of Samchyky have decided to revive the Volyn ornament in easel painting. Speaking about Samchyky works, it should be remarked that despite the similarity of ornaments, because of the prevalent floral motives, each of them has its unique style and color spectrum.

The works of Oleksandr Pazhymsky, the oldest painter from Samchyky, apart from ornamental flowers, combine plots from Ukrainian history, yet each image is stylized and brought closer to the Volyn ornament.

Viktor Rakovsky, another artist whose works are represented at the exhibition, decided to bring his works closer to the Trypillian ornament. His father Hennadii is also a painter but, as he is one of the best ethnographers of south Volyn, his works show a scrupulous scientific attitude to peasant clothing, depicted among a great number of flowers.

The subjects of the paintings are diverse, but all are united by a rich world of symbolism, which may be observed in every piece. The exhibit would have been incomplete if the organizers had restricted themselves to the south-eastern region of Volyn. Therefore they invited an artist from Lutsk, Halyna Chernysh. Although Mrs. Chernysh received her training in painting in Myrhorod, where she mainly studied the Petrykivka painting, after moving to western Volyn 20 years ago, she reconstructed the Petrykivka basis of decorative painting through her own perception of ethnic identity of western Volyn. Due to this, her works obtain both the color and the ornament style, which is uncharacteristic for Petrykivka, but close to the region near Lutsk.