Most art historians date back the origin
of the Khokhloma painting style to the 17th century. At that
period the northernmost lands of the Nizhni Novgorod province
were just starting to recover after the desolation brought
by the Mongol invaders. New settlers moved into the ravaged
area beyond the Volga. New estates were parceled out there
to the feudal nobility, and the monasteries in Moscow and
Nizhni Novgorod. New settlers built villages, hermits found
refuge in the dense forests where the fanatical followers
of the rebellious Old Believer groups hid from the relentless
persecution by the official Russian Orthodox Church.
 Many
of the new settlers were skilled in various handicrafts. It
is traditionally believed that the Khokhloma handicraft was
originated by the Old Believers. In the 1880s the historian
V.P. Bezobrazov studied the industries of the Old Believer
communities in the Semenov district and concluded that the
Khokhloma handicraft originated from the wooden spoon manufacturing
skills that had been brought over from the village of Purekh
near the town of Balakhna on the Volga that had been settled
by Old Believer in an earlier period. A Khokhloma expert V.M.
Vishnevskaya suggested that the Volga craftsmen could have
learned how to emulate gilding on the wooden articles from
one of the fugitive Moscow icon painters known from the Old
Believer legends. There exists documentary evidence, however,
that the Nizhni Novgorod artisans employed a technique for
painting the wooden utensils which was similar to the Khokhloma
technique as early as 1640-1650s, that is, well before Old
Believer faith became widespread.
The evidence is found in the letters of the
nobleman B.I. Morozov to the clerk managing his Nizhni Novgorod
estates asking for delivering to Moscow hand-painted wooden
utensils. A passage from the letter of 1659 says, "Ask
the serfs in all my Nizhni Novgorod and Arzamas estates to
deliver a hundred painted tin-work dishes, large and medium,
as it was done before, as well as twenty large painted cups,
and twenty medium cups, and twenty smaller cups..." As
one can judge from the 17th century accounts on the handicrafts
the "tin-work" painting was used for imitating the
gilded background effect in icon painting and for mock gilding
of leather and wooden articles. The gilding effect was produced
by coating a surface with tin powder or foil and painting
it over with linseed oil that had a yellowing golden tint
rendered by pigments dissolved in it. The skillful craftsmen
in the Volga villages Lyskovo and Murashkino on Morozov's
lands employed the technique to "guild" the ornamental
icon cases, sacred wooden vases, candlesticks, and other church
articles. The same craftsmen manufactured the wooden utensils
mentioned in the above letter of the nobleman. They kept on
improving the painting and varnishing processes as the linseed
coating had to be treated at higher temperatures to make it
stronger and more durable in use. These improvements could
have been borrowed from the local craft traditions prevalent
in the vicinity of the town of Kozmodemyansk near Morozov's
estates.
Back in early 17th century craftsmen coated
wooden dishes with clay and boiled linseed oil and applied
red-hot iron sheets to them so that the linseed coating was
hardened, became glossy, and acquired a dark amber color.
These dishes, cups and wooden drink pots were used for serving
food at holiday feasts. The wooden article! manufactured by
serfs for the use at the Moscow house o: an important statesman
had to look valuable; accordingly they were modeled on the
rich painted plates decoratec with real golden fabricated
by the jewelers for the luxuri ous homes of the Russian nobility.
The Volga craftsmei cunningly employed their traditional techniques
fo obtaining the effect in decorating the wooden article they
manufactured for their feudal lords. One may assume that the
Trans-Volga craftsme: learned the "tin-work" process
of wooden dish painting a early as the middle of the 17th
century.
The Tsar of Russia, Aleksei Mikhailovich, gave
the estates along the rive Kerzhenets and the Semenovskoe
village (now it is th town of Semenov, the center of the Khokhloma
crafts) 1 his former tutor, Lord Morozov. The new owner move
the craftsmen from the right bank areas of the Volga where
they did not have land to till to his new estate and allowed
them to cut down the woods for several years without paying
annual dues or quitrent to him. In 1670 the villages Lyskovo
and Murashkino on the former Morozov's estate were devastated
by the government troops as "rebels' hangouts" during
the bloody uprising of the serfs led by Stepan Razin. The
craftsmen who escaped from the villages on the right bank
of the Volga brought their skills to the Trans-Volga settlements.
The newcomers started operating as wood turners expanding
the output of wooden utensils but they just did not have the
means to manufacture the "gilded" wooden utensils
as the imported tin was too expensive. Only wealthy customers
could pay for the tin supplies when placing bulk orders. In
the Trans-Volga area such wealthy customers were the monasteries
which needed ornamental dishes and cups for performing sacred
rites, using during holiday feasts, and giving out as gifts
and mementos to pilgrims. Sergiev Monastery near Moscow, the
most influential Christian center in Russia, bought wooden
articles from craftsmen of Khokhloma and about 80 other villages
along the rivers Uzola and Kerzhenets. In mid-17th century
important visitors to the monastery were given "diverse
dishes and cups of fair wood, carved and gilded". The
monastery had among its inmates craftsmen skilled in wood
turning, wood painting, and gilding who completed painting
the plain wooden utensils brought over from all the monastery
estates. The monastery probably also supplied costly materials
to the outside craftsmen and gave them best decorated articles
for copying. Many wood turners lived at the estates along
the rivers Kerzhenets and Vetluga that belonged to the Makarievskii
and Zheltovodskii Monasteries and they undoubtedly manufactured
some eminently decorative articles.
A 1699 document found in a monastery archive
mentions purchases of tin and safflower for preparing the
tin powder (tinning mixture) needed for "gilding"
wood painting. The prosperous Old Believer communities in
the Trans-Volga area could engage wholesale customers for
painted wooden plates and dishes in late 17th century.
It was only in 1720s after the end of the
Great Northern War that tin imports into Russia grew, the
metal became cheaper and more accessible to the ordinary craftsmen.
The trade in varnished painted wooden utensils expanded significantly
in that period. It was the period of rapid flourishing of
the decorative arts in Russia. The churches built at the turn
of the 17th and 18th centuries are decorated with abundant
white-stone carvings and multicolored tiles on the outside
and massive icon cases of exquisitely carved gilded wood and
magnificent frescoes inside. The painters specializing in
floral patterns exhibited spectacularly free brushwork skills
executing decorative and figurative murals in churches, and
decorating the holy altar gates, the church doorways, and
sacred vessels. The craftsmen from Kostroma decorated the
Troitskii Cathedral of the Makariev Monastery in this style.
The monasteries and churches in the Trans-Volga
area collected and stored significant art treasures, such
as icons and manuscripts in ornamented silver cases, sacred
vessels with engraved and embossed ornaments, precious fabrics,
ceremonial robes for the clergy embroidered with gold, silver,
pearls and the ritual shrouds and covers. The Old Believers
made a special contribution to the local arts traditions.
The Old Believer communities carefully preserved the treasured
possessions they had brought from all corners of Russia, including
icons, richly ornamented manuscripts, jewelry, and gold embroideries.
The communities had their own icon painters, embroiders in
gold, book decorators, calligraphers, miniaturists, and engravers.
A historian of Nizni Novgorod folk art D.V. Prokopiev suggested
that the painting skills had been most widespread in the villages
with the Old Believer religious communities and they had made
the primary contribution to the birth of the folk arts and
handicrafts.
It is not accidental that the Khokhloma painting
motifs remind one of the lush grassy ornaments executed in
cinnabar in the ancient manuscripts or the painted frames
of the icons representing scenes from saints' lives with their
golden curled leaves weaving against the scarlet or black
background. The Khokhloma style generally exhibits a combination
of the red, gold, and black typical of the decorative painting
of that region in late 17th century and first half of the
18th century. The three colors had a profound symbolism for
decorating the sacred church vessels and the dishes and cups
used in the monasteries and nunneries, as well as in icon
ornaments. The red color represented the beauty, the gold
color symbolized the spiritual heavenly light, while the black
color signified the gracious grief cleansing the human soul.
The religious symbolism of colors was lost in the Khokhloma
art but the precise and solemn scheme of colors inherent in
the festive design of the "gilded" dishes grew to
be traditionally used for decorating all wooden Khokhloma
articles and made them especially favored by the customers.
There were other sources of inspiration that shaped the painting
style of the Khokhloma craftsmen, such as the precious ornamental
fabrics and prints, embossed ornaments on the silver sacred
vessels, and the decorative cases of manuscripts and icons.
Having learned the artistic skills and styles developed by
the Volga artisans in other decorative art contexts, the Khokhloma
craftsmen adapted them for the purpose of mass production
of folk art articles for the expanding market. They sold batches
of up to a thousand articles as early as the 18th century.
 After
the land law of 1764 had been promulgated the government took
away the lands beyond the Volga from the monasteries and conducted
a survey of the villages there. The survey report noted that
the residents of villages along the rivers Uzola, Kerzhenets
and Vetluga manufactured "diverse wooden utensils, cups,
and spoons" which were sent to various towns and transported
down the Volga. The survey noted that "manufacturing
uncommonly agreeable wooden dishes and cups" was "the
main industry of the inhabitants" of the Semenov district
The villages Nikolskoe on the Volga and Khokhloma are referred
to as the main centers of trade in wooden utensils in the
documents related to the Volga estates of the immensely rich
aristocrat P.B. Sheremetev.The town of Semenov (known as the
village of Seme-novskoe until the year 1779) was another main
center of the Khokhloma trade. The Semenov town hailiff Blummer
answered to an inquiry from the central government about the
occupations of the town dwellers that they were not employed
in farming but manufactured "diverse fine varnished wooden
utensils" and that the annual turnover of trade in the
articles produced in the town and brought from outside for
selling was 550 thousands of large, medium, and small dishes,
100 thousands of cups, 800 thousands of the spoons made of
the aspen wood, maple wood, and birch wood, and 300 thousands
of small plates of aspen wood.
A vivid description of the Khokhloma
wooden utensils was given by the Russian court physician G.
Reman who came to the Makariev Fair in 1805. In the picturesque
chaos of the numerous fair stalls and booths along the Volga
bank he saw a long row of wagons and carts packed with extraordinary
wooden utensils. They were the lime wood cups and dishes used
by Russian countrymen for serving meals. Some of them were
"almost four feet across" and were intended for
a large family or a company of workmen. Up to forty cups of
increasingly larger sizes with covers were inserted into one
another. Reman noted that these cups were "exquisite
specimens of the craft of wood turning" and admired their
strength as the light weight dry wood of the huge cups did
not show any cracks despite the extreme heat of the sun-scorched
sand where they stood. He wrote, "Almost all luxurious
utensils intended for brightening the countrymen's houses
were prettily decorated with the yellow or dark varnish and
ornamented on the outer sides with the gilded or silver borders.
They are mostly manufactured in the villages of the Semenov
district and brought to the fair by boatloads." The contemporary
documentary evidence agrees with the appearance of the Khokhloma
articles made in late 18th and early 19th centuries found
in the oldest museum collections. The State Ethnography Museum
in Saint-Petersburg exhibits an immense thick-walled cup bearing
a silver image of the two-headed eagle and a smaller cup decorated
with small golden ornaments similar to those embossed on book
covers. This collection and the collection of the State History
Museum in Moscow include large and heavy dishes and cups,
and beer pots and mugs. The vessels intended for festive use
have gilded edges and are decorated with golden and silver
vertical stripes made of tiny stars, spots, or fan-shaped
bush-like ornaments. Some of the articles are painted over
with branches bearing fantastic large silver or golden flowers
glittering against a dark-red or black background. Similar
patterns can be seen on the printed fabrics and brocade fabrics
that were the favorite materials for the contemporary women's
dresses in the Russian country-side at the time.
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