Kudrinskaya carving refers to flat-relief types of carving. Flat-relief carving has several varieties: carving with an oval contour, carving with a pillow contour, and carving with a selected (selective) background. What they have in common is a low conditional relief located in one plane at the level of the decorated surface. Flat-relief carving is, as it were, a transitional view from contour to relief carving.

As for the Kudrinskaya carving, it happens with a cushion background or an elective one. This carving got its name from the village of Kudrino near Moscow, where a wood carving workshop was organized by the talented carver V.P. Vornoskov. Later, similar workshops were opened in the nearest villages with the support of V.P. Vornoskov, but the name remained, partly in memory of the initiator of this carving, which became known throughout the world.

The main decorative role in the Kudrinskaya carving is played by traditional garlands of finger petals, in the form of elongated drops, almost converging with sharp ends into hairy branches. From finger twigs-garlands, with the inclusion of decorative leaves and curls, a continuous, elastic flow is created that determines the entire rhythm and structure of the composition, with the inclusion of stylized flowers, fruits, birds, animals, etc.

The compositional feature of the Kudrinsk carving is the main image (plot composition), surrounded by a fluid elastic flow of a plant pattern, as if enveloping the main image, framing it with a precious frame.

The preparatory drawing for the Kudrinskaya carving is performed in full size. To do this, a piece of paper is first removed from the intended decoration of the surface. A future thread pattern is being developed on it. Next, a drawing is transferred to the prepared wooden surface with a pencil using carbon paper or tracing paper. The pencil drawing on the surface to be decorated should not be bright - in the future it may make it difficult to finish the finished product.

Any flat-relief carving is carried out with semicircular chisels with a blade width of 3-25mm. Depending on the radius of curvature, they are divided into sloping - with a large radius of curvature, medium and steep. Kudrinskaya carving differs from other types of flat-relief carving not only in the decorativeness of stylized elements, but also in the special sharpening of the tool. Chisels, and there should be from 5-7 or more pieces of different diameters and curvature radii, have a nail-like sharpening, because. sharpened rounded side edges of the chisel web are involved in the carving process.

The whole cutting process is conditionally divided into several stages: tattooing, trimming, chamfering and cutting.

At pricking the chisel is held in the fist with the blade vertically down perpendicular to the surface to be decorated. At first, they work with steeper chisels and perform tattoos of the same diameter with one chisel. As a rule, they start with fingers - from their rounded part. The sharp edge of the chisel is placed on the contour line, with pressure it deepens into the tree by 3-4 mm and, by turning the brush, scrolls around the axis. The sharp side edges of the chisel work. The movement continues as long as the blade of the chisel moves along a contour corresponding to the diameter of the chisel, but no more. Immediately with the same chisel, preliminary chamfers are removed from the inside and outside of the contour. To do this, the chisel is placed at an angle of approximately 45 ° and slightly pressed. It turns out a cut in the form of a bracket.

Then the adjacent sides of the droplets are pricked. To do this, take a more gentle chisel. They also take it in a fist, put it on the contour line of the drawing close to the slot left by a steep chisel, and deepen it with light pressure, but do not turn it. The chisel should be deepened by a maximum of 3-4 mm at the wide side of the drop finger. And where individual fingers converge on a common stem, the tattoo comes to the surface. The chisel, as it were, glides, rolls. Almost the entire cutting edge of the chisel is used. Also, with a chisel of this or a slightly larger diameter, external and internal chamfers are removed.

A tattoo can be done immediately over the entire carved surface, but it can also be done sequentially, in sections, completing each of them separately.

The next stage is pruning. At this stage, the pattern is released from the surrounding field, i.e. the background is cut off, the pattern stands out, the actual relief of the pattern is revealed. Trimming can be done either with a cutter knife or a Bogorodsk knife. In difficult moments, semicircular chisels are used, with which the pattern was tattooed.

Stepping back from the edge of the pattern by 4-5 mm, they make a trimming with a knife, cut down the outer chamfers of the fingers. From several semicircular chamfers, one is made - relatively straight, of the same depth and width. All external sharp corners are rounded so that the external chamfer of the pattern on the background is continuous, even in depth and not interrupted. The pattern rises, separates from the background.

Also at this stage, all the flaws of the tattoo are removed. All burrs, remnants and scraps of fibers must be cut and removed from all nooks and crannies around the pattern. It should stand out clearly and cleanly from the deep background.

Those places inside the pattern where the diameter of the chisel was not enough to complete the tattoos must be cut with a knife and chamfered.

Then the most painstaking part of the work begins - chamfering. The more chamfers on the thread element, the more convex and attractive it is, the richer the pattern as a whole looks

At this stage, each element of the pattern is carefully processed with a knife: sharp edges are cut off, the outlines are rounded, not only the details of the pattern, but also the background.

It is considered a special chic when the chamfer is thinly removed and, as it were, continuous on the entire element of a finger, leaf, curl.

Ultimately, the entire thread should be gently rounded, without sharp edges. All contours should be softly rounded with many chamfered edges. The whole pattern, as it were, sinks, pushes through the surrounding background like a feather bed. Hence the name - cushion background.

The next final stage is cutting. For better readability of the decorative pattern, it is necessary to apply the last “sloppy touch of the artist” - small details of the pattern. This is for Kudrinskaya carving, first of all, a notch on some elements of the thread in the form of a “grid” of cross-cut recesses with contour strokes: on the cores of flowers and other details. As well as veins on the leaves.

The cuts are made with a knife. Sometimes, for decorative purposes, the smallest semicircular chisels are used, for cutting in the form of dimples, brackets, etc.

Finishing operations include: grinding the carved surface, tinting it with a stain and applying a transparent protective coating. According to tradition, Kudrinsk carving, performed mainly on light linden, is tinted in various shades of brown, imitating valuable wood species. Pre-fine sandpaper from the carved surface removes traces of markings, pencil marks and so on. Places worn during work are also cleaned with fine sandpaper. Under the stain coating, the surface should be as clean as possible, otherwise it will not turn out even, and the marking residues will shine through through the transparent finish layer.

According to the tradition of Kudrinsk carving, after the stain has dried, the product is again treated with fine sandpaper. This time, only the carved pattern is sanded, which gives it more expressiveness, the edges of the chamfers will play and the small details of the notches will appear.

Then the entire surface is varnished or waxed. The varnish is applied with a cotton-gauze swab in a thin layer in several stages. Using a swab, the varnish gets only on the protruding surfaces. It turns out a wonderfully beautiful combination of a sparkling pattern with deep matte gaps.

Kudrinskaya carving

The world of hobbies is rich and varied. Many amateur artists willingly devote their leisure time to the beautiful art of woodcarving. Let's talk about the decorative features, materials, tools, techniques for performing one of the most beautiful types of folk carving - Kudrinskaya.

Kudrinskaya carving refers to flat-relief types of carving. Its name surprisingly combines the name of the village of Kudrino near Moscow, where this type of carving originated, and the nature of its appearance. The continuity of the movement of plant shoots, the fluidity of garlands of leaves, flowers, branches evoke a feeling of "curly" patterns. The main decorative role in this type of carving is played by traditional garlands of petals, pointed on one side and rounded on the other. They merge into a continuous, elastic flow that determines the entire rhythm and structure of the composition. Other pictorial elements are included between the garlands - riders, birds, animals, fish, berries, flowers. Images of birds, animals, fish surrounded by flowers and leaves are the most common motifs among the masters of the past. They are found on trays, round caskets, glasses for brushes, ink devices, chests.

In the future, the traditions and motifs of Kudrinsk carving became richer and more diverse. There were plot compositions related to the theme of defending the Fatherland, memorable dates in the life of our country, showing the peaceful work of our Motherland. But no matter what motifs are born under the cutters of the Kudrin masters, they are always surrounded by a fluid stream of plant patterns, as if enveloping the main image, framing it with a precious frame. The softness of the contours, the roundness of the relief forms, the richness of chiaroscuro, the liveliness of the patterns make up the decorative structure of this carving. It is complemented by a spectacular combination of convex ornament sparkling polished with matte gaps of recessed areas.

The origin of Kudrinskaya carving is associated with the name of Vasily Vornoskov, the son of a carpenter from the village of Kudrino, who was one of the students of the carpentry workshop established in Abramtsevo at the end of the 19th century. This art-carpentry school-workshop was founded by leading Russian artists. The workshop was headed by Elena Dmitrievna Polenova. From villages and villages, she collected all the best that was created by folk craftsmen. The children of the local handicraftsmen were trained on these samples. Handicraftsmen from the villages of Kudrino, Akhtyrka, Mutovka, Levkovo and other nearby places united around the workshop. Subsequently, artels were organized from the graduates of the workshop and local handicraftsmen. In 1960, the artels were transformed into the Khotkovo factory of carved art products. Following the best traditions of the past and developing them, the factory produces wooden products (hollowed, planed, machine-turned), covered with Kudrin carving and polished. These are ladles, dishes, decorative plates, biscuits, boxes for needlework, caskets. At present, the factory has an art and industrial school, where the techniques and traditions of Kudrin carving are taught in educational workshops and classrooms.

Operating procedure

Kudrinskaya carving is performed in several steps related to the features of the pattern. Like every type of carving, it begins with a drawing. The drawing is chosen depending on the product to be decorated, and on the set of chisels of one size or another (in the early stages, when there are few tools). The diameters of the chisels and the outlines of the carving patterns are directly related.

A set of tools for woodcarving.

Round file prepared for filing a groove.

Chisel for Kudrinskaya carving.

Making a semicircular chisel from a file:
round, semicircular, square, triangular.

Sharpening the working end of the chisel:
a) wrong, b) right.

For the first works, it is better to use the samples given in the literature on carving. In the future, using the experience gained, you can try to compose independent compositions. On the prepared wooden surface, the drawing is transferred using a carbon paper. Only when squeezing a drawing onto a tree, you need to use not a pencil, but a bone stick, so as not to clog the contour, not to spoil it with a random line (a bone stick can be replaced with a wooden one made of durable rock, or a ballpoint pen in which the paste has run out). The cutting itself is conditionally divided into several stages: piercing, background processing and element modeling.

The sequence of the Kudrin thread (from top to bottom):
- made a tattoo;
- the first stage of cutting the background;
- the edge between the recess and the background was cut;
- littered with elements of the pattern.

When pricking, the chisel is held in a fist with the blade vertically down. First, the steepest, curls of the thread are pricked, then more gentle. The sharp edge of the chisel is placed on the contour line, with pressure it deepens into the tree by 3-4 mm and, by turning the brush, scrolls around the axis. The movement continues as long as the blade of the chisel moves along a contour corresponding to the diameter of the chisel. Then they take a more gentle chisel and, pointing it close to the slot left by the first chisel, make a tattoo further. The cut line should smoothly, without kinks and gaps, move from an arc of one diameter to an arc of another. Transitions are made smoothly, like mates in drawing. The most gentle parts of the pattern are cut with a cutter knife. All cut lines with respect to the plane must be vertical. The depth of the tattoo is not the same everywhere: in tightly twisted curls it is the deepest, and where individual petals converge on a common plant stem, the tattoo comes to the surface. A tattoo can be done immediately over the entire carved surface, but it can also be done sequentially, in sections, completing each of them completely.

The main element of the Kudrinsky pattern.
The arrows show the direction of movement of the chisel blade during tattooing. The dots mark the transition points of the radii. The dashed line marks the borders of the first clipping of the background.

The next stage is the release of the pattern from the surrounding field, that is, cutting off the background around each pinned element. This operation can be performed either with a cutter knife or with semicircular chisels of a larger diameter than those used to tattoo the pattern. From the edge of the pattern they recede towards the background by 2-3 mm and at an angle of about 45 ° with pressure they go deep into the tree along circular contours around the patterns. The edge between the recess and the background is removed with additional, flatter cuts with a cutter knife. The pattern becomes as if gently rising from the background. All burrs, all remnants, fiber breaks must be cut and removed from all nooks and crannies around the pattern. It should stand out clearly and cleanly from the deep background.

Then the study of each of the elements of the pattern begins: sharp edges are cut off, the outlines are rounded. Ultimately, the entire thread should be gently rounded, without sharp edges. All contours should be as if gently melting. Elaboration, removal of excess material from the elements of the pattern is carried out with semicircular chisels (turned with a groove down) and a cutter knife. Among these softly rounded petals, leaves, curls, Kudrin's masters introduce for contrast some elements clearly indented with deepened contour strokes - cross-drawn hearts of flowers and other details. Such a notch is the final stage of finishing.

In the Kudrinskaya carving, the background can be left as a softly rounded “cushion”, which is on the same level with the upper points of the pattern. But you can make sure that the thread is raised above the background. In this case, the background is selected around the pattern to the depth of the tattoo. It turns out Kudrinskaya carving with a selected background. To give the work a special expressiveness, beauty, the background is minted, giving it a matte dotted texture. The easiest way to do this is with a large nail sharpened into a cone and polished. For caulking large planes, it is recommended to make special tools - punches with a notch on the warhead. The notch should be deep and sharp enough to leave clear, evenly deep marks on the wood.

Finishing operations

These include grinding the carved surface, tinting it with dyes and applying a protective transparent coating. According to tradition, Kudrinsk carving, the material for which is mainly light linden, is tinted in dark brown, varnished, and then the convex places of the patterns and the background are polished. It turns out a wonderfully beautiful sparkling pattern with deep matte gaps of an in-depth background. Depending on the artistic intention, however, the natural color of the wood can also be preserved. To protect the product from dust and moisture, it is covered with a liquid diluted varnish, which is rubbed into the wood with a stiff bristle brush. In this case, the varnish coating does not give shine and retains the color of the wood. Kudrinsky patterns look equally great on chiseled, slotted and planed surfaces, complement and enrich the shape of products.

© "Encyclopedia of Technologies and Methods" Patlakh V.V. 1993-2007

Photo by Alex&K

In the second half of the last century, a carpentry workshop was organized in the Abramtsevo estate near Moscow, in which furniture, caskets, pencil cases and other artistic wooden products, decorated with trihedral-notched and flat-relief carvings, were made according to folk patterns. Carvers from neighboring villages worked in the workshop. A talented craftsman from the village of Kudrine, V.P. Vornoskov, who studied the traditional techniques of Russian flat-relief carving of the 17th-18th centuries, managed to create a new original type of carving, which later became known as Vornoskovsky, Abramtsevo-Kudrinsky or, briefly, Kudrinsky. The carver decorated wooden items with a bizarre floral pattern of smoothly curving stems studded with leaves. The ornate pattern was skillfully intertwined with the image of fish, birds, animals, cones of coniferous trees, flowers and fruits of various plants.

Kudrinskaya flat-relief carving can be with a pillow and selected, selected or selected background. In the first variety, the background has the same height as the elements of the pattern. Each section of the background, located between the elements of the pattern, is turned into a "cushion" with arbitrary outlines. In a carving with a selected background, as the name implies, the background is selected, that is, it is cut off in all areas to the same depth; in this case, the elements of the patterns are raised above the background. Carving with a selected background is more laborious than with a pillow.

The main material used for flat-relief carving is linden. Soft and light linden wood, which has a homogeneous structure, cracks a little, slightly warps and, most importantly, is well cut. Instead of linden, aspen, alder and willow can be used, which have similar properties. Especially good is alder, which has a brownish-red color. It is used for carving and harder hardwood - birch, pear and apple. Solid wood makes it possible to perform very fine carvings with fine, elegant cuts. But cutting hardwood is much more difficult than softwood. And it takes more time: you have to sharpen and straighten tools more often, which become blunt when processing hardwood rather quickly. It is estimated that to carve with a cushion background on a 40x25 cm linden board, the carver needs about 10 hours, birch - 12, apple or oak - 15.

Products in which flat-relief carving is supposed to be used as a decor are made from hardwood in a carpentry workshop according to a pre-designed sketch. At first, you can use purchased wooden products, such as a cutting board, shelf, pencil case, etc. They are usually made from linden, aspen or birch. A good material for carving is seasoned linden wood from worn-out drawing boards.

Flat-relief Kudrinskaya carving is carried out with a cutter knife, flat and semicircular chisels, which are bought, ordered or made themselves from tool steel. Good tools can be made from commercially available standard flat chisels. The industry produces flat and semicircular (grooved) chisels with a blade width of 4 to 50 mm. The following numbers of chisels are set by the standard, which correspond to the width of the canvas: 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 16, 20, 25, 32, 40 and 50. Usually chisels are mounted on wooden or plastic handles. Flat chisels need only be sharpened and are ready to use. From flat chisels with a blade width of 8 and 20 mm, make two cutters (jamb knives). The angle between the bevel cut and the longitudinal axis of the cutter should be 45-60°. From chisels having a web width of 4, 6, 8, 10, 12 and 16 mm, you need to make semicircular chisels. Anneal the end of the chisel blade on a gas burner or blowtorch and cool slowly. Then clamp the chisel blade in a vise and saw off the wedge-shaped cutting part with a hacksaw. With a suitable round file, cut a groove along the canvas and file the canvas from the back with a flat file, giving it a cylindrical shape. In the same way, a chisel-corner 147 (geismus) is filed, only the gutter is turned with a trihedral file. When selecting a deep background, it is more convenient to use cranberries instead of semicircular chisels. Clukarzy are the same flat and semicircular chisels, but with a knee-shaped bend. They are made from chisels with wooden handles. Cloths of chisels are knocked off the handles, red-hot in a muffle furnace and give them the desired bend on the anvil, hardened and, after cooling, put on the handles. All cutting tools are first sharpened on electric emery, and then on a fine-grained whetstone and whetstone. The final finishing is performed on a felt wheel or manually on a leather belt with GOI paste. In the process of carving, tools are constantly undermined on a whetstone and ruled with GOI paste.

Work on the carving begins with a sketch, which is developed taking into account the shape, size and purpose of the decorated wooden product. The sketch is made on a sheet of paper in full size. The composition of the ornament is made up of elements characteristic of this type of carving, all its details are carefully processed. The drawing from the sketch is transferred to tracing paper, and then, using carbon paper, to wood. The drawing can be translated with a sharpened pencil. But with repeated strokes, the contours of the drawing are clogged and lose their clarity. Therefore, instead of a pencil, carvers often use a bone stick with a thin polished end. You can also use an awl, the end of which is blunted and carefully polished so that it slides freely over the paper without scratching it.

The first stage of carving consists of two main techniques: notching and trimming. Notching is performed mainly with a cutter, but in some parts of the contour semicircular chisels with a steepness corresponding to the lines of the pattern can be used. The blade of the chisel or the nose of the cutter deepens into the wood by about 1.5-2 mm. The cutter is moved towards itself, slightly tilting its blade to the surface of the workpiece. At the same time, make sure that the depth of the incision remains constant. It is impossible to make a clean and neat cut on wood if you do not take into account its structure. Where the cutter will cut through the grain of the wood almost at right angles, chipping is most likely to occur. When carving, the product must be constantly rotated, choosing for each section of the contour such a direction of movement of the cutter in which the wood fibers would be cut by them at a slight angle. Where it is impossible to avoid cross-section of the fibers, trimming is performed in two or three passes of the cutter. In those parts of the pattern where its contours coincide with the curvature of the existing semicircular chisels, the incision is made with chisels. The use of semicircular chisels greatly speeds up the work. A carving made in this way looks sharper than a carving made with a cutter.

Following the notching of the contour, trimming follows. When cutting, the cutter is led in the same direction as when cutting, only with the blade tilted to the other side (toward the background), observing the same rules for cutting wood. After performing the next trimming, chips are separated from the wooden board in the form of trihedral prisms.

Carver's tools made from standard carpentry chisels: 1 - flat chisels; 2 - cutter (knife - jamb); 3 - cranberries with a straight blade;
4 - the sequence of manufacturing a semicircular chisel; 5 - cranberries with a semicircular blade, an angled chisel, a punch.

At the next stage, they proceed to the so-called rolling, that is, the rounding of the ribs protruding along the contour from the side of the ornament and from the side of the background. The details of the ornament oval more steeply, while a very narrow chamfer is removed on the edge. Rolling is done with a cutter and a flat chisel. The carving is completed by applying small cuts, contour or nail-like, to certain areas of the pattern, in a conditional manner conveying veins on the leaves, plumage of birds, etc. The background is left untouched.

If carving is performed with a selective background, the background is first selected with semicircular chisels, and then leveled with flat ones. But the most convenient for these purposes are cranberries with semicircular and flat working parts.

The sequence of execution of one of the elements of the "herringbone" thread: 1 - notching along the contour; 2 - pruning;
3 - rolled up (carving with a cushion background): 4 - selection of the background (carving with a selected background).

Since the Kudrinsk carving has a low relief, with an insignificant play of light and shadow, its expressiveness and beauty largely depend on the decorative finish with which the work is completed. There are special requirements for finishing operations. These include painting, varnishing and polishing wood. Before finishing, the product is carefully cleaned with sandpaper. First, medium-grained paper is used, and then fine-grained paper. Wood dust and abrasive residues after grinding are swept from the thread with a dry brush or a wide bristle brush. But even with the most accurate and clean processing, the smallest villi, barely visible to the eye, still remain on the surface of the wood. To remove the pile, the wood is moistened with clean warm water using a sponge or rag swab. After about 10-12 hours, the dried product is ground with fine-grained sandpaper. Only the protruding elements of the relief are polished until a soft sheen appears on their surface, while the recessed areas should remain matte. After grinding proceed to dyeing. Hardwood wood after painting acquires a noble dark brown color with reddish and yellowish tints. For coloring carved products, humic dye is most often used, obtained at the factory from peat 150 and brown coal and known as walnut stain. Powder dye must be diluted in hot water and filtered through gauze. The tonality and color shades of the coloring solution are selected empirically. The tone is changed by adding powder or by adding water. Alcohol stains are sold ready-to-use, but if necessary, they are lightened by diluting with water. You can color the dye solution, giving it the desired shade, with aniline dyes used for dyeing fabrics. With a stain solution, to which red aniline paint is added, birch and alder wood is painted under mahogany. Before proceeding directly to the coloring of the carved product, carry out a control coloring on small boards from the same type of wood. After the dye has dried, you will be able to get an accurate idea of ​​how the background will look like, and by covering a part of the painted board with varnish, you will see what the product itself and the protruding elements of the relief will be like. Having picked up the desired color and tone of the dye, proceed to coloring. To make the stain lay on the surface more evenly, it is recommended to moisten the product with clean water at room temperature about five minutes before staining. The stain should be applied with a brush or bristle brush. First, apply the dye along the fibers, and then blend across the fibers. Wipe the product immediately with a soft, dry and clean cloth. The rag should soak up the excess dye that tends to accumulate in the grooves of the thread and remove any stray stains.

The lid of the box at different stages of manufacture: 1 - preparatory drawing; 2 - carving with a pillow background;
3 - carving with a selected background; 4 - dyeing and finishing.

When the stain is dry, lightly sand the carved piece with fine-grained sandpaper, removing stray stains and remaining lint. Then brush the dust off the threads with a brush. The product prepared in this way must be varnished and then polished. To do this, use shellac or oil varnish. The film of oil varnish differs in durability and intensive gloss. To a working state, the varnish is diluted with turpentine or white spirit and applied to the wood with a rag swab. The varnish must be applied in a thin layer on all parts of the carved product, except for the recesses of the thread, in circular motions without strong pressure. Do not allow the appearance of sagging and smudges. After the next application, each layer of varnish must be dried for at least a day. The first coat of varnish usually has an unsightly appearance, as it partially soaks into the wood. Only after applying three or four thin layers, the varnish film becomes strong and uniform. Sand it gently with fine-grained (preferably somewhat worn) sandpaper. You need to sand until the varnish becomes matte. If shiny spots still remain on its surface, it means that when drying, the varnish in these areas settled and the sandpaper did not touch them. In such cases, the threads must be cleaned with a brush and again covered with a thin layer of varnish. After the varnish has dried, sanding must be repeated.

The final stage of finishing is polishing. By polishing, or polishing, with the help of polish, the lacquer surface is smoothed and gives it a mirror shine. A rag swab is impregnated with polish and two or three drops of vegetable oil (for example, sunflower) are added. The oil improves the glide of the tampon over the lacquer surface. Polish should be applied evenly with circular movements of the swab. After two or three days, the varnish coating is polished again. If the gloss is not intense enough, after three days the polishing is repeated. As a result, the polished sections of the thread acquire a shine and rich color, while the background depressions remain matte. This contrasting juxtaposition of color and texture makes the carving expressive and picturesque. To enhance this expressiveness, a dotted notch is sometimes applied to the background with a punch or an awl.

If it is necessary that the product has a slight matte sheen, it is finished not with varnish, but with wax mastic. Two parts by weight of wax or paraffin are melted in a water bath and one part of turpentine is added. The cooled wax mass resembles a liquid slurry in consistency. Putting a little of this slurry on gauze folded in several layers, gather the edges of the gauze together and tie it with twine. You will get a tampon, inside of which, as in a bag, there will be a turpentine-wax mass protruding from it when lightly pressed. The wax mass is applied with a swab to the protruding parts of the carved product, leading it first across and then along the wood fibers.

After the wax mass has dried, the product is rubbed with a brush (an old clothes brush can be adapted for this purpose). From friction, the wax will melt and spread more evenly over the surface of the wood. After some time, as soon as the melted wax hardens, the waxed surfaces are rubbed with a dry cloth until a light gloss appears.

One of the folk art crafts of woodcarving - Kudrinskaya carving originates from the workshop, which was organized by E.D. Polenova in 1882 in the Abramtsevo estate near Moscow. This workshop brought together local craftsmen from the villages of Kudrino, Akhtyrka, Mutovka, Levkovo and others. Training in the workshop was free and lasted three years. After graduating from the workshop, graduates became homeworkers. Craftsmen made carved wooden products. These were household items and souvenirs (armchairs, cabinets, tables, shelves, chests, frames, dishes, etc.). Carved wood products were sold in a store specially opened on Povarskaya Street in Moscow.

One of the best students was Vasily Petrovich Vornoskov. After completing his studies in the workshop, Vornoskov opened his workshop in the village of Kudrino. The first products were made with light openwork geometric carving, but later Vornoskov created his own style of carving. This style is called Kudrinskaya carving. Its name combines the nature of the appearance of the carving and the name of the village of Kudrino. Carved patterns evoke a “curly” feeling. She became very popular. The products of the Kudrinsky masters began to be sold throughout Russia.

At the beginning of the 20th century, new artels were organized: Khotkovskaya in 1910, Mutovkinskaya in 1918, Kudrinskaya in 1921, Levkovskaya in 1931, Akhtyrskaya in 1932. In 1936 three artels: Kudrinskaya, Mutovkinskaya and Akhtyrskaya merged into one - the Akhtyrskaya artel. Since 1940, having united with Khotkovskaya, they formed the Akhtyrskaya carpentry and art artel. Since 1960, it has been transformed into the Khotkovo Carved Products Factory. Since 1970, the factory has merged with the Khotkovo factory "Folk Art". Since 1993 - the partnership "Folk Art", which is engaged not only in wood carving, but also in bone carving.

Style Features

Abramtsevo-Kudrinskaya woodcarving- flat-relief type of thread. The main feature of the products is a dense ornament of leaves, flowers, branches, which evokes a feeling of “curly” patterns. The main decorative role in this type of carving is played by traditional garlands of petals, pointed on one side and rounded on the other. They merge into a continuous stream that determines the entire rhythm and structure of the composition. Other pictorial elements are included between the garlands - flowers, berries, birds, fish, animals, riders. This type of carving is distinguished from others by the roundness of the relief forms, the softness of the contours, the liveliness of the patterns, and the richness of chiaroscuro. The carving is complemented by a combination of a polished convex ornament with matte recesses. Linden wood is used in products, less often - birch.

Threading order

Kudrinskaya wood carving is performed in several stages. The first step is choosing a pattern. The drawing must correspond to the style features. The choice of pattern depends on the product to be decorated, as well as on the set of chisels that are available. The diameters of the chisels and the outlines of the carving patterns are directly related. For carving, you will need flat and semicircular chisels, cranberry chisels, and a joint knife.

The next stage of work is the production of a sketch of the future product, which will be decorated with Kudrin carvings. The sketch of the ornament must be done in full size on paper. Then the sketch must be transferred from paper to the surface of a wooden blank using carbon paper. When transferring a drawing to a tree, it is better to use a stick, not a pencil, so as not to clog the contour, not to spoil it with a random line (the stick can be bone or made of durable wood; you can use a ballpoint pen that has run out of paste).

Then proceed to the cutting stage. Cutting is conditionally divided into several stages: piercing, background processing and element modeling. When piercing, the chisel is held in the fist with the blade vertically down. First, you need to prick the steepest curls of the thread, and then the more gentle ones. The sharp edge of the chisel is placed on the contour line, with pressure it deepens into the tree by 2-4 mm and, by turning the brush, scrolls around the axis. Then, with a more gentle chisel, make a tattoo further along the slot left by the first chisel. The cut line should be smooth, without kinks and gaps. The most gentle parts of the pattern must be cut with a cutter knife. The edges of the pattern oval more steeply than the edges of the background. After that, you can apply small details to the drawing (veins of leaves, plumage of birds, etc.).

After that, we start processing the background. In Kudrinskaya carving, the background can be left softly rounded “cushion”. In this case, it will be on the same level with the upper points of the pattern. To make the picture look more prominent, you can select the entire background. In this case, the background is selected around the pattern to the depth of the tattoo. You will get a Kudrin carving with the selected background. To do this, it is convenient to use chisels-cranberries. The background can be given a matte dotted texture. This can be done with a large nail sharpened into a cone and polished, as well as with the help of simple punches, chasers. The notch should be deep and sharp enough to leave clear, evenly deep marks on the tree. Background processing will give the work a special expressiveness and beauty.

Finishing operations

In order for the product to serve for a long time, it is covered with liquid diluted varnish, which is rubbed into the wood with a stiff bristle brush. Before applying varnish, the carved surface is ground and tinted. Traditionally, Kudrinskaya carving, the material for which is mainly light linden, is tinted in dark brown. After applying the varnish, the convex places of the patterns and the background are polished. It turns out a wonderfully beautiful sparkling pattern with deep matte gaps of an in-depth background. Depending on the artistic intent, the natural color of the wood can also be preserved. In this case, the varnish coating does not give shine and retains the color of the wood. Kudrinsky patterns look great on wooden surfaces, complement and enrich the shape of products.

Abramtsevo-Kudrinskaya carving is an original phenomenon of folk art of the Moscow region. It originated at the end of the 19th century, in the workshops under the direction of V. P. Vornoskov. Vasily Petrovich and is considered its creator.

, CC BY-SA 3.0

Over the long period of existence of this style of carving, the craftsmen not only preserved, but also improved the methods and technology.

The main thing remained as Vornoskov conceived - the preservation of the beauty of the wooden texture, the plasticity of the pattern, the ornate three-dimensional ornament of which resembles Khokhloma.

Process of creation

Choice of wood

The process of creating a carved item begins with the choice of wood: when making a product with a large carving, the craftsman chooses soft wood, for fine carving - viscous and hard woods.

Guide to Russian Crafts, CC BY-SA 3.0

On the product prepared for carving - a tablet, a box, a spoon - a light pattern is applied with a pencil: the master marks the drawing.

Then the master, as they say, "reads" the ornament with a tool, that is, circles it with the thin end of the cutter, deepening the contour.

At the second stage of carving, he draws with a sharpened cutter along the previously deepened contour lines, smoothly bending around each shape of the ornament - removing the “chamfer”.

Guide to Russian Crafts, CC BY-SA 3.0

From the side of the ornament, the contour is cut and rolled over steeper, from the side of the background - more sloping. Such processing gives the pattern plasticity, emphasizes the volume of the image, gives soft transitions from light to shadow.

Sketching, drawing

Abramtsevo-Kudrinsk masters constantly resort to preparatory drawings and sketches. Work on a preliminary sketch is recognized by artists of various training and generations, it seems to them the necessary stage, inseparable from work with a knife, chisel, chisel.

The very fact of the existence of a preliminary drawing does not at all testify to the creative connectedness, lack of freedom of the carver. It's all about the nature of the drawing, what goals the artist sets for himself when creating it.

If he is a good draftsman, but an inexperienced carver, a carefully executed carving sketch will be a dogma for him, which he will scrupulously follow. It is a different matter if we are talking about a skilled carving master. His drawing will be only a hint, a preliminary estimate, the master does not follow the pencil stroke at all, the movement of his tool is free, organic.

Guide to Russian Crafts, CC BY-SA 3.0

Take, for example, the works of today's Akhtyrka masters, which are still "in work". The drawing and traces of the cutter in them really very often do not match. When moving from an image on paper to working on a three-dimensional form, the master continues to actively create, sometimes deviating from the original idea, often varying it.

Finishing

Much depends on the finish of the product. So, mechanical polishing can ruin, smooth out any thread. Now, especially in small-scale and unique things, craftsmen use only manual polishing. Such a careful attitude to the plasticity of wood could not fail to bring results.

Article author

The article uses materials from the diploma work of the master Olga Vladimirovna Korenevskaya.

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Helpful information

Abramtsevo-Kudrinskaya carving
Inclined carving with cushion background

Types of relief carving

In the creative practice of V. P. Vornoskov and his workshop, various types of relief carving were used to decorate products. This is both a carving with an oval contour, and a carving with a “cushion” background and a “picked” (cropped) background. These special terms did not arise by chance, they denote a set of quite diverse methods of processing the relief and background when creating a relief from wood.

"Pillow"

A characteristic feature of the background in this kind of flat-relief carving is that it is never flat. The type of carving got its name due to the fact that the pattern is steeply ovalized from the side of the contour and somewhat more sloping from the side of the background, which, as a result, becomes similar in shape to a small pillow. Carving is done while standing.

"Selective"

In a carving with a selected background, as the name implies, the background is selected, that is, it is cut off in all areas to the same depth, and the elements of the pattern rise above the background. Carving with a selected background is more laborious than with a pillow.

Often in the terminology of carvers there is an expression “ovalized carving with a matched background.