Sergey
Vasilyevich Chekhonin

Graphic artist and crafts and monumental and decoration. art. B. article Valdayka Valdai. Novgorod province. (now art Lykoshyne Bologovskiy R-on Tver. region). He studied in St. Petersburg at the Drawing school of the society for the encouragement of artists (1896-97) and the school of M. K. Tenisheva Ilya Repin (1897-1900). In 1902-07 was engaged in the ceramics Art pottery on the s de of S. I. Mamontov in Moscow. P. K. Vaulin, 1907-14 - workshop "Goldwein and Vaulin" near St. Petersburg; in 1913-17 directed Uch-demonstration workshops for finifenma PR-vu in Rostov, Yaroslavl lips. and Torzhok. H participated in the design of the Metropol hotel in Moscow (1902-07), performed majolica panels for the Church to mark the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty in Moscow and the life guards regiment of Moscow in St. Petersburg (1912-15), 1905-07 published satiric. the figures in the well. "Spectator", "the Mask", etc. In 1917-20-ies - teacher Central Uch-schA sci. drawing Stieglitz in St. Petersburg, in 1918-23 and 1925-27 hood. hands. State. porcelain plant in Leningrad, in 1923-25 - hand hood. part of the "Nowsupport" (the Volkhov farfora-faience. z-d). H - one of the creators of the products from otech. Mat-catching, with the new theme and technique of painting (the so-called agitation porcelain), the author of portraits of Gorky (1921), Alexander Glazunov (1922) and others, the first joint. emblems, stamps, posters; engaged in book and magazine graphics (W. "Flame", Moscow, Izd-VA Lenges and the state publishing house), design shows. H -member over 50 grew. and foreign exhibitions (since 1908), including in Leipzig (1914), Berlin and Florence (1922), new York (1924), Paris (1925, 2 angry. medals), etc. From 1928 he lived in Paris.

The son of a railroad engineer Nikolaev, S. V. Chekhonin with fifteen years began to earn on life and served as clerk, draftsman, cashier at steamboat station. Love for art brought him to St. Petersburg, where he studied at the Drawing school of the OPH (1896-97) and the school of M. K. Tenisheva (1897-1900) and also, thoroughly studied the art of ceramics.

And he began his career as an artist, having to participate in the decoration of many major buildings of the early twentieth century (in particular, the hotel "Metropol" in Moscow).

Insatiable curiosity forced him to master some other decorative crafts - interior design, painting on porcelain, enamel, miniature painting, and all so thoroughly that almost in each of these areas, he managed to leave a noticeable trace.

Not content with the achieved, Chekhonin turned to the chart. He first worked as a cartoonist in satirical magazines of the first Russian revolution, then engaged in design of books, and very successfully in the 1910s he was one of those few artists whose work is determined by the high level of Russian book art (book covers M. the Moravian "Orange peel", 1914; S. Makovsky and N. Radlov "Contemporary Russian art", 1917, etc.). Flawlessly owning the font and ornament, Chekhonin, along with D. I. Mitrokhin and G. I. Narbut, belonged to the "younger generation" of "world of art", raised book graphics to new heights. Virtuoso master, decorativism and aesthete, his bold and sophisticated style has been able to answer the queries of the elite of the Russian society and became popular, even fashionable.

But, paradoxically, Chekhonin could be necessary and the new society, after the outbreak of the social disaster of 1917. His life was now even richer. He engaged in social activities, served as artistic Director of the State porcelain factory in Petrograd-Leningrad (1918 - 23 and 1925-27). However, the main thing for him was still his own work. He considerably changed his style, introducing dynamism and emotion. This new style - the "Soviet Empire" (in the witty definition of critic A. M. Efros) - Chekhonin used in all that was done in book and industrial graphics, emblems, and numerous paintings on porcelain, which was the most interesting page in the history of this art.

He again became fashionable, his works have spawned a lot of imitators, he was followed by many professional artists, and hundreds of Amateur decorators to replicate his findings across the country in countless slogans, the banners, the titles of Newspapers and magazines, etc. With the new cekoniskiu style became firmly associated the revolutionary era - dramatic, but still able to awaken the pathetic feelings.

The era has passed, and Chekhonin left Russia (1928). He lived in France and Germany, was still indefatigable, worked in the theater, almost never painted porcelain, no book graphics, but it has mastered decorative painting of fabrics, even managed to invent an entirely original method of multicolor printing on fabric. He died, apparently not having exhausted its amazing possibilities.