Folk arts and crafts of the Oirats of Mongolia: to the formulation of the problem of study

Народное декоративно-прикладное творчество ойратов Монголии выражает этническую ментальность в системе культуры как своеобразную, во многом уникальную форму осмысления мира. Оно формирует традиционное мироощущение номадов, претворяемое в декоративном оформлении произведений прикладного творчества. Здесь фиксируются общее и этнические особенности народной эстетики, образного мировидения монгольских народов. В анализе орнаментального декора предметной среды важно исходить из знаковой сути культурного наследия номадов, концентрируемого в тамговом комплексе, народном костюме и орнаментике. В художественной форме пластического фольклора, передаваемого из поколения в поколение, сохраняются древние архетипы мышления предков, проецируемые во взаимосвязях духовного и материального бытия номадов. Выявление их дает возможность осмыслить декоративно-прикладное искусство ойратов Монголии в традициях, основополагающих для изучения пластического фольклора калмыков России. Folk arts and crafts of the Oirats of Mongolia expresses the ethnic mentality of culture as a kind, in many ways a unique form of understanding the world. It forms the traditional attitude of the nomads, embodied in the decorative design of works of applied art. Here the general and ethnic features of the folk aesthetics, the figurative worldview of the Mongolian peoples are recorded. In the analysis of the ornamental decor of the subject environment, it is important to proceed from the symbolic essence of the cultural heritage of the nomads, concentrated in the tamga complex, folk costume and ornamentation. In the artistic form of plastic folklore, passed down from generation to generation, the ancient archetypes of the ancestors' thinking are preserved, projected in the interconnections of the spiritual and material life of the nomads. Their identification makes it possible to comprehend the decorative and applied art of the Oirats of Mongolia in the traditions that are fundamental for the study of the plastic folklore of the Kalmyks of Russia.

Eliminating ‘Aesthetics’ from Copyright Law: The Aftermath of Cofemel

The recent Cofemel judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union extended the European Union’s (EU) originality criterion (i.e. the author’s own intellectual creation) to the realm of works of applied art. The Court excluded ‘aesthetically significant visual effect’ as a condition of copyright protection. It was condemned as subjective and incompatible with the EU originality criterion. The decision may signal a shift in several national copyright laws, under which requirements relating to ‘aesthetics’ are laid down as a condition to acquire protection. This article will demonstrate that the ‘aesthetics criterion’, as it emerged historically and has been employed in national copyright laws, is associated with a different meaning than it conveys at first glance. The aesthetics criterion designates the elbow room remaining to the author after functional constraints have been taken into account, and thus represents a form of the functionality doctrine in the domain of copyright law. However, to some extent it also excludes – though not uniformly – commonplace designs from the scope of copyright protection. Against this background, this article suggests that the aesthetics criterion can arguably be reconciled with the EU originality criterion. The aesthetics criterion represents a balance struck between the need for copyright protection in the field of applied arts, on the one hand, and competition, on the other. In order not to upset this careful balance, a robust application of the EU originality criterion is advocated, precluding protection not only to functionality, but also to commonplace creations.

Little Guidance for the Application of Copyright Law to Designs in Cofemel

Cofemel does not provide sector-specific guidance for the application of the originality criterion to works of applied art or industrial designs.

Invisible Women

Maria Vasilievna Iakunchikova designed three works of applied art and craft in a Neo-Russian style for the Russian section of the Paris “Exposition Universelle” of 1900—a wooden dresser, a toy village in carved wood, and a large embroidered panel. Yet, so far as the official record is concerned, Iakunchikova’s participation in the exhibition is occluded. Her name does not appear in the catalogue, for it was the producers, rather than the designers, who were credited for her works. Indeed, her presence might have been entirely unknown, were it not for several reports of the Russian display in the periodical press by her friend Netta Peacock, a British writer living in Paris. The invisibility of the designer in this instance was not a matter of gender, but it had consequences for women artists. In general, women were marginalized in the mainstream of the nineteenth-century Russian art world—whether at the Academy of Arts or in prominent groups such as the Peredvizhniki—and, as a result, enjoyed fewer opportunities at the Exposition. But the Neo-national movement, linked closely with the revival of applied art and the promotion of kustar industries, was one in which women’s art had space to flourish. And, in the so-called village russe at the Exposition, which featured a display of kustar art, by far the larger contribution was made by women, both as promoters and as artists. In this article, I examine Iakunchikova’s contribution to the Exposition within a broader context of female artistic activity, and the significance of the Russian kustar pavilion for a gendered history of nineteenth-century art.

Copyright, Art and Originality: Comparative and Policy Issues

This article reviews the laws of France and of Australia in relation to artistic works copyright for useful articles. Australian law applies a different subsistence test to ‘applied art’ than to fine art, whereas French law makes no such distinction, applying the principle of ‘Unité de l’art’. The decision of the High Court of Australia in IceTV Pty Limited v Nine Network Australia Pty Limited [2009] 239 clr 458, which aligns the standard of originality more closely with that applied in European copyright law, invites reconsideration of the Australian approach in favour of a universal standard for all artistic works. A more contemporary understanding of what constitutes ‘art’ points in the same direction. In the result, there is no longer any need to apply a restrictive ‘artistic quality’ standard to works of applied art in Australia. Such an approach better aligns the tests of artistic copyright subsistence in different jurisdictions.

Decor

The category of decor concerns a highly controversial aspect of the visual arts that has provoked much perplexity among scholars. Works of “applied art” of very different character—such as the column of Trajan, statue decoration of public architecture, Pompeian wall decoration, or Roman coin series—are designed with elaborate image programs but present themselves with a very reduced visibility. A solution to this paradox is offered in the notion of decor: not in the debased modern sense of meaningless decoration, but in the ancient meaning of adequate form. Decor serves the fundamental purpose of conveying visible value to objects of major cultural significance. As such, it has a certain autonomy as a visual order that creates distinction without close inspection.

Understanding the integration of needle and bobbin lace in works of applied art

The research is devoted to the revival of ancient technologies with the combination of needle and bobbin lace in works of applied art. The article reveals the relevance of regional-historical, cultural, artistic and creative approaches to research in the field of embroidery and lace-making. In the course of the research, modern empirical and comparative methods were applied, as well as historical and cultural approaches to the study of the issue. The authors used unique and rare materials of Russian researchers in the field of material cultural heritage preservation. The results of the research can be applied in the course of studying the issue of the historical and cultural heritage of Russian creativity. Keywords: lace, museum, research, historical heritage, ancient technologies, recreation