20. Day, April 5, 2018

Our hero has decorated his papacha with a red "wing", as can clearly be seen in Ilja Repin's painting ...:



We can only speculate about exactly what this "wing" looked like, because unfortunately it is not possible to walk around the boy and look at him from behind.

But we have clues ...:

These "wings" were at that time (and are it again!) very different in size and had different shapes; This was decided by the owner of the cap - only "gorgeous" it had to look!

There were short "wings" that hung just above the cap edge ...





... medium-long "wings" ...



...and very long ones...:



There were even those that hung down to the waist ...:




The color was at the decision of the owner of the cap - considering the abundance of the old images, reds of all shapes seem to have been preferred.

This can also be seen in the - very well researched! - Ukrainian movie "Taras Bulba" ...:




As you can see on the next picture, there are "wings" that are cut around at the bottom (gray papacha on the left) and those that are triangular - bag-shaped - (black cap on the right!) ...:




And something else is noticeable:

At many of these wings was - and is! - sewn on a small tassel below, it usually appears golden ...:








Since we can only speculate about the back (and the "wing") of Artjom as I said, I have first taken the artistic freedom, and donated the boy such a tassel from "Milliput".

Then I painted the wing - of course in red, as in Repin's template!

That happened with these colors ...:




And now Artjom looks a bit like Santa Claus - but it fits the template!

Unfortunately, I have just finished, the whole thing gleams a bit ..:










Here again the self-kneaded tassel, whose priming and painting is on the agenda for tomorrow ...:




Cheers

That's looking good Martin.........I can appreciate your dedication to detail and accuracy.

Wayne

Quite possible, Nap!

But knowing that their strict Christian faith forbade them to have girl friends and the law of the Zaporozhian Cossacks required them to live unmarried ...



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21. Day, April 6, 2018

My today's painting day starts with the now hardened tassel!

I primed it with a brush - and then I picked out those colors ...:




First step: A very thin coating of gold.
Second step: A careful wash with a very watery black and gold broth.


Third step: dry painting with golden decor lacquer (something similar to printer ink) ....



And if I look at an original again ...



Then I can - I think! - be completely satisfied with my tassel ...:






Next program point is the painting of the hero's breast of our Cossack!

Ilya Repin gave the breast a very light shade ...:



A - compared to the face - clearly brightened sound is certainly right!

Cossacks have not been lying on the beach all day in the sun and not always walked around with shirts that were almost open to the belly button!

Consequently, the breast gets less sunlight than, for example, the face - and one should see that!

But: quite as extreme as it painted Repin, I do not do it! That would be too caricature for me!

So I took the colors that were already used on the neck and face ...



... but the red part almost completely and the Dunelkbraun-share about half taken out.

There are also three things to consider:

Due to the slight head rotation of "Artjom", the muscular play on the neck is asymmetrical.

And the shirt of the Cossack is not open in the middle of the chest, but more lateral, which is why the chest must be painted even asymmetrically.

And besides, even an older man who does a lot of physical activity has clearly defined muscle parts! Finally, it also has to be emphasized.

But let's phtos talk! This is, how "Artjom" looks now..:








I like it very much.

And you...?


Cheers

I do not think so Kev. That would be too much deviation from the painting ...

Cheers

22. Day, April 7, 2018

Before I made myself in the most beautiful sunshine and 22 degrees on my garden today, painting was announced - this morning it was still too cold for me.

Actually, I wanted to make the little silver cross, which carries our hero around the neck, but postponed that!

This detail is a nice "break filler" if I can not go on elsewhere because the oil paints are drying.

Instead I started with the shirt from "Artjom".

The painting clearly shows that the Cossack wears a white collarless shirt with embellishments on the neckline:




It is an embroidered Ukrainian peasant shirt called "Vyshyvanka" (Ukrainian: Вишиванка, Russian: Вышиванка).

This is what these shirts look like, and the embroidery can vary in form, color and style ...:






In the 17th century, when chemical bleaching and dyeing was not invented, a "Vyshywanka" made of sheep's wool looked a bit different - much darker.



The wool was washed and bleached (in the sun), but it retained this typical and indefinable color.

Who as a Cossack Reenactor keeps what on himself, wears a Vyshywanka made according to the old recipes - without chemistry and "whitening"...:




At that time, too, the embroidery was by far not as colorful as it is today: a rusty red in a much paler version dominated ...:




On the embroidery, which are really a science in itself and have cost me almost the last nerve in the research, I'll talk in detail when I paint them!

At the latest the day after tomorrow, when the oil color is so dry that I can then paint the pattern with acrylic ...


Meanwhile, my wife and I our nostrils flattened on the screen to find out which colors are contained in the indefinable non-white, non-beige, non-gray, non-ocher, and non-light brown.



Marion, always trendy "state of the art", said that this color is boutiqueness "off-white" ...

I, on the other hand, fashionably absolutely unclothed (for me there is only one portable color, namely black!), I have put on "trial and error"!

So I tried it with these colors ...:



"Artjoms" Vyshywanka now looks like this - I think I ended up pretty close to the original ...:





Before I finished the painting, I deliberately avoided looking in my old documents, because I have already painted such a shirt - albeit without embroidery - five years ago:

2013, when I painted my "Young" bust, which was changed into a real Ivan Sirko. At that time with Acrylics, because of the blessings of the oil paints I did not have a clue at the time!

Now the comparison shows:

I came to quite similar results in 2013 ...:



Can not be so wrong ...!


Cheers

Ööööhmmm - I'm afraid, rather not ...

Better, I do not even ask.





Cheers

23. and 24. Day, April 8. and 9., 2018


Although the Cossacks on Ilja Repin's painting are more than life-size ...



... the painter has made it very difficult for someone who - like me - researched his traces:

He - like so much else - only hinted at the embroidery on the Vyshyvanka of "Artyom" ...:

So the researcher must dive very deep into the matter until he gets reasonably firm ground under his feet.

There have always been a number of different ways to embroider such a shirt ...:

None of these embroidery is random or pure decoration, so to speak! They all have their very specific meaning!

With certain ornaments you can even "write" the name of the wearer!

Here is a brief overview of the then (and today) most famous names:

At the top left we have "Ivan", then "Igor" and the whole thing ends at the bottom right with "Maksim" and "Marija" ...:

In addition, certain patterns stand for specific regions, according to which they are also called (and were called)!

As an example, here is the "Crimea" called, which can be seen in the overview above right bottom!


Here is another overview showing the different patterns in a map with the corresponding regions ...:

If we take a closer look at "Artjom's" shirt, we see spots and dots in red and dark green.

I interpret these spots and dots as "berries", "acorns" and "leaves"/"flowers"...:

So we have undoubtedly a pattern with floral elements in front of us!

Floral patterns occurred in the eastern part of present-day Ukraine - quite congruent with the "Donbass" area, which is currently fighting for secession from Ukraine and integration into the Russian Federation.

And they came to the southeast and south!
**to be continued next post**

There in the southeast the Zaporozhian Cossacks lived on the large Dnieper island of Chortyza ...:





The island was impregnable with the military means of the 17th century!

There were no roads and footbridges that allowed larger masses of troops to move, and they could not be brought up on the Dnieper, because Chortyza was reliably protected from attack by water by seven rapids, cataracts:



Incidentally, the Zaporozhians also owed their name to these cataracts ("Porogami" in Russian): "Sa Porogami" means "Behind the rapids" ...

There on Chortyza was the main settlement site of the Zaporozhian Cossacks, called "Sitch" or "Setch", which means "power".






At risk, they found refuge in a wooden fortress whose walls were peppered with cannons ...:







Their settlement area was not only limited to the island of Chortyza, but extended across the offshore interior of today's Ukrainian region of Zaporizhia, but also included the present-day eastern Ukrainian regions of Kirovograd, Dnipropetrovsk and Donetsk ...:



There lived in the middle of the 16th century in about 50 villages ("Stanizas") so by 60,000 residents! All men, for a hapless life was Cossack law.

A very handsome powerful army, therefore, the first wanted to be subjected!

This succeeded only to the favorite of Tsarina Ekatarina II (Catherine the Great), Prince Grigory Potyomkin (Potemkin) in the 18th century.

The Sitch was destroyed - and anyone who was not killed by the Cossacks or fleeing to the Ottoman Empire, Persia or Siberia was forcibly deported to the Taman Peninsula in the Kuban area of the newly conquered Caucasus apron.

So the Zaporozhians are the ancestors of today's Kuban Cossacks!

Meanwhile, the island of Chortyza has been reconstructed according to archaeological findings and is inhabited as a "living museum village" for tourists by Cossack performers ...:







However, the famous seven cataracts have not existed since the large Dnieper dam with a hydroelectric power plant was built in the 1970s, which can be seen in some of the pictures above in the background.


**to be continued next post**

But I wanted to actually report on the painting of the shirt!

After much back and forth, I chose this pattern ...:



Not easy!

The shirt area is very narrow on both sides, so only parts can be showed- and wrinkles and "light and shadow", which distort the pattern, must also be taken along.

I have used these colors here, where is the black embroidery made with dark green, because pure black is too violent and gray was too boring for me ...:




Well, yesterday two and a half hours and today again just under two hours I spent with the "embroidery".


Half an hour ago I coped with that - and now ask for your opinions!








Thank you!

Thanks Kev, but lets say: I have tried it!

Absolutely fascinating!!!!Your research is simply amazing and your painting follows suit.

Oda.

Thank you, mates!

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25. Day, April 10, 2018

Today we start with the kaftan "Artjom" wears.

Again, first a sharp look at a detail enlargement of the Repin painting ...:

At first glance, the kaftan just looks red! But it is not!

We recognize clearly - again only hinted - colorful pattern ...:




Ten years ago, when I was still at the beginning of my "Cossack Passion" and painted my 90mm figure of this Cossack, I helped myself .like this..:




But that's not enough for me today!
It would be nice to know what kind of garment "Artjom" is on the way in order to reproduce it as exactly as possible.
So last summer the gods had once again researched.
I do not know about you, but I recognize floral elements in the only hinted pattern!
A (south-) Ukrainian garment is not so!

At that time, the Zaporozhian Cossacks obtained their income and equipment first and foremost from two sources:
First, they hired themselves as mercenaries - and were highly regarded by their respective clients because of their fighting power, their audacity and their outstanding ability as a lone fighter!
We have already read that her famous ataman Ivan Sirko, with a hundred-centime on the side of the French, was part of the storming of the fortress of La Rochelle in the possession of Cardinal Richelieu in France!

Their other economic "foothold" were income from war and raids!
And the Zaporozhians were all around surrounded by enemies worth looting!
To the north and northeast lay the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which at that time ruled almost the whole of Ukraine and part of Russia.
In the East, Russia, which was at that time (we speak of the time far ahead of Tsar Petr. I.), was primarily occupied with itself - and by no means really rich either!
However, rich prey lured in the south (at the Crimea) and in the southeast in the Ottoman Empire!




And from the biography of Stepan ("Stenka") Rasin we know that the Cossacks even undertook raids to Persia!

So I have - which took VERY long, systematically scoured one country after another for suitable templates.

I finally found something in the Ottoman Empire!

Caftans with floral elements were typical Ottoman at the time - here are some templates ...:








And I even found a picture showing a Cossack wearing a kafan - it's the one with the rifle on his shoulder ...:




When I got there, I systematically "grazed" the sites of relevant museums, such as the museum in the old Tartar Crimean capital of Bakhchis, or the Topkapi Museum in Istambul.

Result:

Our Cossack wears such a caftan ...:








And here is the matching historical fabric pattern to ...:




The pattern has ONLY one disadvantage: I do not like it so much, I find it too cluttered!

We have the patterned shirt, then the patterned kaftan, finally another pattern on the folded collar of the caftan, namely the inside - I'm afraid that will end up just too "colorful" for me!

Repin has bypassed these cliffs by only hinting at all the patterns.

So I was looking for an alternative that would be less cluttered and therefore more elegant.

And I came across this museum piece ...:




Now I even have two alternatives - and still struggle with me, which will be.


Which one would you take ...?


However, now only the basic color - red - come onto the Caftan!

It consists of "carmine red", "Pompejanischrot" - and "Indian Yellow"!

I tried out this "Indian Yellow" for the first time today - it's one of the colors Julia bought when she had to give up painting with oil paints.

This "Indian Yellow" is somewhere in the middle between bright red and yellow orange, but does not "pop" like the traditional orange.
On the other hand, this color gives the red a clear push away from that bright "Santa Claus red" that I do not like at all!

Anyway, the "Indian Yellow" has paved the way for my red to lighten it with "Naples Yellow" and darken it with "Burnt Umbra" ...:




Just stupid to take pictures now!

The radiant sun shoots in full to the windows and the red shines even more terrible!

But I hope you can still recognize something ...:




And here is another picture that shows the red of the cap "wing" and the red of the caftan together. Happily, nothing "bites"!




So much for today.

I will paint the remaining kaftan games (sleeves, collars) next, then the color will have enough time to dry when I am at the "Duke of Bavaria" in Ingolstadt next wekend...


Cheers

Better each time....

Wow

26. Day, April 11, 2018


Collars and cuffs of our hero are now even ground-painted with oils!









The caftan has now time to dry until next week, when I'll be back from the "Duke of Bavaria".

So I win even a few days more time to decide, which pattern I will fumble on it.


Cheers