Figurine “First Letter”

Technique: Porcelain, polychrome painting.
Size: Height 23 cm.

Figurine “First Letter”, USSR, 1960s, author I. Kolomiets, Polonne Factory of Artistic Ceramics (PZKhK), porcelain, polychrome overglaze painting, incised gilding. Overglaze maker's mark on the plinth of the sculpture. Height 23 cm. Good condition. Inna Antonovna Kolomiets (Ukr. Inna Antonivna Kolomiiets, 8 March 1921–2005) – sculptor of the Ukrainian SSR, Merited Artist of the Ukrainian SSR (1973), member of the National Union of Artists of Ukraine (1973). Beginning in the 50s, Kolomiets had a notable influence on the development of sculptural Socialist Realism. The work of Inna Kolomiets is an example of original Ukrainian national art of the 20th century. A characteristic feature of the sculptor was her work in various kinds of sculpture – monumental, monumental-decorative, easel, as well as ceramic architecture. Participant in the Great Patriotic War. Awarded the Certificate of Honour of the Presidium of the Verkhovna Rada of the Ukrainian SSR. Inna Kolomiets was born on 8 March 1921 in Aleysk, Altai Krai, into the family of Anton Kolomiets, head of the Kyiv factory. She was a participant in the Great Patriotic War. In 1951 she graduated from the Kyiv Art University. Her teachers were Merited Art Workers of the Ukrainian SSR: L. Muravin, I. F. Krichevsky, professors M. Gelman, K. Elev, which influenced her worldview and choice of profession. Having graduated from the university in 1951, Kolomiets worked as a teacher at a vocational school. At the same time she took part in all kinds of art exhibitions, both regional and foreign in scale. In 1955 Kolomiets entered postgraduate studies at the Academy of Architecture of the Ukrainian SSR, where she studied architecture and the forms of creative work associated with it. She was an employee of the Research Institute of Architecture until 1965. From 1951 Inna Kolomiets took an active part in the cultural life of the USSR, participating in various art exhibitions. Popularity came to Inna Kolomiets after she created the figurine “First Letter” (1953), which was produced in an edition of a million. “First Letter” / a mother sits with a book, a girl beside her, height 230 mm – this is what Inna Kolomiets called her work. In this sculptural group everything is very simple and at the same time filled with deep meaning – both the daughter in the foreground of the composition and the figure of the mother: she does not simply teach reading, she radiates warmth and love. The smooth lines of the sculpture's silhouette, the laconic visual language, great spontaneity and vitality – these are the characteristic features of the work. Here the artist speaks not only of the happiness of the mother, but also of one of its most important conditions – of peace. Happiness and calm are boundless, because it is quiet on earth. “Antikvar” magazine No. 7-8, 2011 In the summer of 1958 the sculptor showed her works at a personal group exhibition, in which artists of the same generation as her, M. Barinova and G. Morozova, took part together with Kolomiets. She put on view for art lovers small “fairy-tale” compositions executed in majolica, based on motifs of Ukrainian classical poetry and fairy tales: “The Mermaid and the Water Sprite”, “The Little Humpbacked Horse”, “Lukash and Mavka”, “Firebird”, “Stone Flower”, “Dovbnya”, “Girl in the Field”, “Motherhood” and others. In the fifties Soviet sculpture was dominated by tendencies towards descriptiveness, features of a manly and ascetic ideal, and a narrowed understanding of realism as elementary verisimilitude. Against this background, the fairy-tale works of Kolomiets seemed very fresh; in them, even then, she was trying to convey her awareness of the individuality of the person. These works were written about as follows:  They did not fit the notion of decorative sculpture. Their inner world was so spacious and complex, but they resembled ordinary “small-scale sculpture”, easel pieces, even less. Their powerful masses, flowing now swiftly, now smoothly, now suddenly seething up steeply under green, silver, red glaze, their temperamental modelling and unexpected compositional solutions – all this was hers, incompatible with the conventions of the genre. – Sculpture. Catalogue. Union of Artists of the RSFSR. – Kyiv, 1968 . Vladimir Tseltner, in the 1968 solo catalogue, gave the following characterisation of the creative genius of the young but already very influential Inna Kolomiets:[source not indicated for 3990 days] Inna Kolomiets is in love with our time – she, as artists say, “feels the present day”. She is captivated and delighted not only by faces; she gladly introduces objects of today's everyday life into her compositions, asserting that milk cans, electric milking machines and the iron masks of electric welders can become the subject of true sculpture. She explores the plastic form of tarpaulin jackets and quilted jackets, white coats and “kirzach” boots, and discovers their inner beauty. In 1973 Kolomiets joined the National Union of Artists of Ukraine. In the same year she was awarded the title of Merited Artist of the Ukrainian SSR.