70. Bulgarian girl in traditional costume [around 1890]

Ivan Mrkvichka is a Bulgarian artist of Czech origin, a prominent representative of the painting school that marked the period of Post-Renaissance Bulgaria. He is one of the names, along with Anton Mitov and Yaroslav Veshin, who managed to revive and preserve the Bulgarian culture and identity, and pave the way of the new Bulgarian painting school, whose traditions we still rely on today. Ivan Mrkvichka arrived in Bulgaria, in the city of Plovdiv, in 1881. He graduated from the Prague Academy of Fine Arts, and subsequently from the Munich Academy of Arts. Like many artists from this period, Mrkvichka devoted his time to searching for and capturing the authenticity, splendor and beauty of the Bulgarian folk way of life and culture. This makes him one of the best and most recognizable artists in the genre of domestic painting. In Mrkvichka's paintings, the attention to details in the costumes, characteristic of different regions, as well as the color and magnificence in scenes of everyday life or rituals stand out. Mrkvichka is precise, academic, but at the same time poetic in his approach to portraying types and recreating the general character and mood of the subject that is revealed in his paintings. The work "Bulgarian woman in national costume" is one of the examples. The portrait is almost iconographically restrained, on a brown background, and the focus falls solely on the figure of the girl. It stops us with a look that captures attention with its decisiveness and curiosity. The beautiful and delicate features of the girl are complemented by the grace and richness of her costume and ornaments. The pendars braided in her hair, as well as the several flower branches, suggest that the young girl is most likely a lazarka, as some of the folk traditions are related with a similar kind of braiding that has an apotropaic function. The wealth of embroideries embroidered on the sleeves of the shirt and on the edges of the black bodice most likely belong to the clothing traditions of Western Bulgaria. A similar work by the artist, named "Lazarka" (1892), can be found in the collection of the National Art Gallery in Sofia. This gives us the opportunity to place the portrait "Bulgarian woman in national costume" in the same, early period in the work of Ivan Mrkvichka. (S.Ya.)

Dimensions

width 17 cm, height 26 cm

Description

oil on canvas laid on cardboard, signed centrally down, in pencil, "ИВМ"; titled upper right, in red, "Гълабинка"

Research information

The artwork is classified as cultural value, according to the certificate of identification.

Dating

around 1890

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