Fantastic realism in all its glory. What does “fantastic realism” mean? Fantastic realism in literature

The truth of life and the truth of theater. The aesthetic principles of E. Vakhtangov and his directorial style have undergone significant evolution over the 10 years of his active creative activity. From the extreme psychological naturalism of his first productions he came to the romantic symbolism of Rosmersholm. And then - to overcoming the “intimate-psychological theater”, to the expressionism of “Eric XIV”, to the “puppet grotesque” of the second edition of “The Miracle of St. Anthony” and to the open theatricality of “Princess Turandot”, called by one critic “critical impressionism”. The most amazing thing in Vakhtangov’s evolution, according to P. Markov, is the organic nature of such aesthetic transitions and the fact that “all the achievements of the “left” theater, accumulated by this time and often rejected by the viewer, were willingly and enthusiastically accepted by the viewer from Vakhtangov.”

Vakhtangov often betrayed some of his ideas and hobbies, but he always purposefully moved towards a higher theatrical synthesis. Even in the extreme nakedness of "Princess Turandot" he remained faithful to the truth that he received from the hands of K.S. Stanislavsky.

Three outstanding Russian theater figures had a decisive influence on him: Stanislavsky, Nemirovich-Danchenko and Sulerzhitsky. And they all understood the theater as a place of public education, as a way of learning and affirming the absolute truth of life.

Vakhtangov admitted more than once that he inherited the consciousness that an actor must become purer, a better person, if he wants to create freely and with inspiration, from L.A. Sulerzhitsky.

The decisive professional influence on Vakhtangov was, of course, Konstantin Sergeevich Stanislavsky. Vakhtangov’s life’s work was teaching the system and forming a number of young talented groups on its creative basis. He perceived the System as Truth, as Faith, which he was called to serve. Having absorbed from Stanislavsky the foundations of his system, the internal acting technique, Vakhtangov learned from Nemirovich-Danchenko to feel the acute theatricality of characters, the clarity and completeness of heightened mise-en-scenes, learned a free approach to dramatic material, and realized that in staging each play it is necessary to look for approaches that are most appropriate the essence of a given work (and not specified by any general theatrical theories from the outside).

The fundamental law of both the Moscow Art Theater and the Vakhtangov Theater has invariably been the law of internal justification, the creation of organic life on stage, the awakening in actors of the living truth of human feeling.

During the first period of his work at the Moscow Art Theater, Vakhtangov acted as an actor and teacher. On the stage of the Moscow Art Theater he played mainly episodic roles - Guitarist in "The Living Corpse", Beggar in "Tsar Fyodor Ioannovich", Officer in "Woe from Wit", Gourmet in "Stavrogin", Courtier in "Hamlet", Sugar in " Blue Bird." More significant stage images were created by him in the First Studio - Tackleton in "The Cricket on the Stove", Frazer in "The Flood", Dantier in "The Death of Hope". Critics unanimously noted the extreme economy of funds, modest expressiveness and laconicism of these acting works, in which the actor was looking for means of theatrical expressiveness, trying to create not an everyday character, but a certain generalized theatrical type.

At the same time, Vakhtangov tried his hand at directing. His first directorial work at the First Studio of the Moscow Art Theater was Hauptmann's "Feast of Peace" (premiere November 15, 1913).

On March 26, 1914, another directorial premiere of Vakhtangov took place - “The Panin Estate” by B. Zaitsev at the Student Drama Studio (future Mansurovskaya).

Both performances were made during the period of Vakhtangov’s maximum passion for the so-called truth of life on stage. The severity of psychological naturalism in these performances was taken to the limit. IN notebooks, which the director conducted at that time, there are many discussions about the tasks of the final expulsion from the theater - the theater, from the play of the actor, about the oblivion of stage makeup and costume. Fearing common craft cliches, Vakhtangov almost completely denied any external skill and believed that external techniques (which he called “devices”) should arise in the actor by themselves, as a result of the correctness of his inner life on stage, from the very truth of his feelings.

Being a zealous student of Stanislavsky, Vakhtangov called for achieving the highest naturalness and naturalness of the actors’ feelings during a stage performance. However, having staged the most consistent performance of “spiritual naturalism”, in which the principle of “peeping through a crack” was brought to its logical conclusion, Vakhtangov soon began to talk more and more often about the need to search for new theatrical forms, that everyday theater must die, that the play is only a pretext for the idea that it is necessary to once and for all remove the possibility of spying from the viewer, to end the gap between the internal and external technique of the actor, to discover “new forms of expressing the truth of life in the truth of the theater.”

Such views of Vakhtangov, which he gradually tested in a variety of theatrical practice, somewhat contradicted the beliefs and aspirations of his great teachers. However, his criticism of the Moscow Art Theater did not at all mean a complete rejection of the creative foundations of the Art Theater. Vakhtangov did not change the range of vital material that Stanislavsky also used. The position and attitude towards this material has changed. Vakhtangov, like Stanislavsky, had “nothing far-fetched, nothing that could not be justified, that could not be explained,” asserted Mikhail Chekhov, who knew both directors well and highly appreciated them.

Vakhtangov brought everyday truth to the level of mystery, believing that the so-called life truth on stage should be presented theatrically, with the maximum degree of impact. This is impossible until the actor understands the nature of theatricality and perfectly masters his external technique, rhythm, and plasticity.

Vakhtangov began his own way to theatricality, coming not from the fashion for theatricality, not from the influences of Meyerhold, Tairov or Komissarzhevsky, but from his own understanding of the essence of the truth of theater. Vakhtangov led his path to genuine theatricality through the stylization of “Eric XIV” to the extreme game forms"Turandot". The famous theater critic Pavel Markov aptly called this process of development of Vakhtangov’s aesthetics the process of “sharpening the technique.”

Already Vakhtangov’s second production at the First Studio of the Moscow Art Theater, “The Deluge” (premiere on December 14, 1915), was significantly different from “Feast of Peace.” No hysterics, no extremely naked feelings. As critics noted: “What’s new in The Flood is that the viewer always feels theatrical.”

Vakhtangov's third performance at the Studio - "Rosmersholm" by G. Ibsen (premiere on April 26, 1918) was also marked by the features of a compromise between the truth of life and the conventional truth of the theater. The director’s goal in this production was not the previous expulsion of the actor from the theater, but, on the contrary, declared the search for the ultimate self-expression of the actor’s personality on stage. The director did not strive for the illusion of life, but tried to convey on stage the very train of thought of Ibsen’s characters, to embody “pure” thought on stage. In Rosmersholm, for the first time, with the help of symbolic means, the gap between the actor and the character he plays, typical of Vakhtangov’s work, was clearly outlined. The director no longer demanded from the actor the ability to become “a member of the Scholz family” (as in “Feast of Peace”). It was enough for the actor to believe, to be seduced by the thought of being in the conditions of his hero’s existence, to understand the logic of the steps described by the author. And at the same time remain yourself.

Starting with “Eric XIV” by A. Strindberg (premiere on January 29, 1921), Vakhtangov’s directorial style became more and more defined, his tendency to “sharpen his technique”, to combine the incompatible - deep psychologism with puppet expressiveness, the grotesque with lyricism, was maximally manifested. Vakhtangov's constructions were increasingly based on conflict, on the opposition of two disparate principles, two worlds - the world of good and the world of evil. In "Eric XIY" all of Vakhtangov's previous passions for the truth of feelings were combined with a new search for a generalizing theatricality capable of expressing on stage the "art of experiencing" with maximum completeness. First of all, it was the principle of stage conflict, bringing two realities, two “truths” onto the stage: everyday, life truth and generalized, abstract, symbolic truth. The actor on stage began not only to “experience”, but also to act theatrically, conventionally. In “Eric XIV,” the relationship between the actor and the character he plays changed significantly in comparison with “The Feast of Peace.” An external detail, an element of makeup, a gait (the shuffling steps of the Birman Queen) sometimes determined the essence (grain) of the role. For the first time in Vakhtangov the principle of statuesqueness and fixedness of characters appeared in such definiteness. Vakhtangov introduced the concept of points, so important for the emerging system of “fantastic realism”.

The principle of conflict, the opposition of two dissimilar worlds, two “truths” was then used by Vakhtangov in the productions of “The Miracle of St. Anthony” (second edition) and “Wedding” (second edition) in the Third Studio.

Calculation, self-control, the strictest and most demanding stage self-control - these are the new qualities that Vakhtangov invited the actors to cultivate in themselves while working on the second edition of The Miracle of St. Anthony. The principle of theatrical sculpture did not interfere with the organic nature of the actor’s presence in the role. According to Vakhtangov’s student A.I. Remizova, the fact that the actors suddenly “frozen” in “The Miracle of St. Anthony” was felt by them as truth. This was true, but true for this performance.

The search for external, almost grotesque character was continued in the second edition of the Third Studio's play "The Wedding" (September 1921), which was performed on the same evening as "The Miracle of St. Anthony." Vakhtangov proceeded here not from an abstract search for beautiful theatricality, but from his understanding of Chekhov. In Chekhov's stories: funny, funny, and then suddenly sad. This kind of tragicomic duality was close to Vakhtangov. In "The Wedding" all the characters were like dancing dolls, puppets.

In all these productions, ways of creating a special, theatrical truth of the theater were outlined, new type relationship between the actor and the image he creates.

Fantastic realism- artistic movement in Austrian art of the second half of the 20th century, known as “ Vienna school fantastic realism" and had a pronounced mystical-religious character, turning to timeless and eternal themes, exploration of hidden corners human soul and focused on the traditions of the German Renaissance (representatives: E. Fuchs, R. Hausner). Together with Arik Brauer, Wolfgang Hutter, Rudolf Hausner and Anton Lemden, Ernst Fuchs founded a school, or rather created a new style"Fantastic realism." Its rapid development occurred in the early 60s of the 20th century. Five of her the brightest representatives Fuchs, Brouwer, Lemden, Hausner and Hutter became the main group of the entire future movement, soon Klarwein, Escher, Jofra appeared, each bringing their own manner and method of work from their national schools. Paetz, Helnwein, Heckelman and Wahl, Odd Nerdrum also formed part of the general movement. Giger worked in Switzerland. Ernst Fuchs taught at Reichenau Castle, where such bright and famous artists as Hana Kai, Olga Spiegel, Philipp Rubinov-Jacobson, Wolfgang Widmoser, Michael Fuchs, Roberto Venosa, Dieter Schwetrberger, known as De Es, appeared today. Exhibitions with the participation of Isaac Abrams, Ingo Swan and Alex Gray were held in the USA. At the end of the sixties, the Fantastic Realism movement became international and formed, as it were, a kind of parallel art world, although many artists changed their style, moving to other societies, others appeared, coming from completely different movements. The galleries of James Cowan “Morpheus” appeared in Beverly Hills, which presented Beksinski, who so impressed the younger generation, Henry Boxer in London, Karl Karlhuber in Vienna and others. Fuchs participates in the first exhibition of the Vienna Art Club in Turin (Italy). The creativity of the representatives of the “school”, which absorbed national traditions Gothic, modern, expressionism, operating with images of myth and the subconscious, initially did not find recognition among the Austrian public, who at that moment were captivated by abstract art... Fantastic realism - artistic trends related magical realism, including more surreal, supernatural motifs. Close to surrealism, but unlike the latter, he adheres more strictly to the principles of the traditional easel image “in the spirit of the old masters”; can rather be considered a late version of symbolism. Among the typical examples are the works of V. Tubke or the masters of the “Viennese school of fantastic realism” (R. Hausner, E. Fuchs, etc.).

The current generation is clearly represented by the activities of such artists as Tristan Shen, Andrew Gonzales, Oleg Korolev, Sergei Aparin, Peter Gryk, Laurie Lipton, Jacek Yerka, Maura Holden, Lucas Kandle, Herman Smorenburg, Stephen Kenny and many others.

; later it became established in Russian theater studies as a definition of Vakhtangov’s creative method.

Since 1948, there has been the “Vienna School of Fantastic Realism” in painting, which had a pronounced mystical and religious character, addressing timeless and eternal themes, exploring the hidden corners of the human soul and focusing on the traditions of the German Renaissance (representatives: Ernst Fuchs, Rudolf Hausner).

Founding of the "Vienna School of Fantastic Realism"

Together with Arik Brauer, Wolfgang Hutter, Rudolf Hausner and Anton Lemden, Ernst Fuchs founded the school, or rather created a new style, “Fantastic Realism”. Its rapid development occurred in the early 60s of the 20th century. Its five brightest representatives Fuchs, Brouwer, Lemden, Hausner and Hutter became the main group of the entire future movement, soon Klarwein, Escher, Jofra appeared, each bringing their own manner and method of work from their national schools. Paetz, Helnwein, Heckelman and Wahl, Odd Nerdrum also formed part of the general movement. Giger worked in Switzerland.

Nowadays, the concept of “fantastic realism” is actively promoted by Vyach. Sun. Ivanov and Viktor Ulin, although in in this case it is more of a retrospective manifesto.

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Publisher: After looking at these wonderful works, filled with powerful energy and the harsh romance of fantastic visions, you will have a clearer idea of ​​what fantastic realism is. Of course he surrealism, but supernatural motives, surreal plots, densely mixed with sensuality, lead it into an independent movement. The work of this author, one of the five founders of the school of fantastic realism, will not leave you indifferent.

Ernst Fuchs (German 1930, - 2015) is an Austrian artist who worked in the style of fantastic realism.

Born into the family of an Orthodox Jew, Maximilian Fuchs. His father did not want to become a rabbi and because of this he abandoned his studies and married Leopoldina, a Christian from Styria.

In March 1938, the Anschluss of Austria took place, and little Ernst Fuchs, being half Jewish, was sent to concentration camp. Leopoldine Fuchs was deprived of parental rights; and in order to save her son from the death camp, she filed for a formal divorce from her husband.

In 1942, Ernst was baptized into the Roman Catholic faith.

WITH early youth Ernst shows a desire and ability to learn art. He received his first lessons in drawing, painting and sculpture from Alois Schiemann, professor Fröhlich and sculptor Emmy Steinbeck.

In 1945 he entered the Vienna Academy fine arts, studies with Professor Albert Paris von Gütersloh.

In 1948, in collaboration with Rudolf Hausner, Anton Lemden, Wolfgang Hutter and Arik Brouwer, Ernst Fuchs founded the Vienna School of Fantastic Realism. But only from the beginning of the 60s of the 20th century, the Vienna School of Fantastic Realism manifested itself as a real movement in art.

Since 1949, Ernst Fuchs has lived in Paris for twelve years, where, after a long period of odd jobs, and sometimes real poverty, he gains worldwide recognition. There he also met S. Dali, A. Breton, J. Cocteau, J. P. Sartre.

Returning to his homeland, Vienna, Fuchs not only painted, but also worked in theater and cinema, was engaged in architectural and sculptural projects, and wrote poetry and philosophical essays.

Founded by him in the late 1940s. The “Vienna School of Fantastic Realism” was a mixture of styles and techniques that personified the boundless imagination of the master.

He successfully imitated the old masters, was engaged in sculpture and furniture design, painted cars, worked with mythological and religious themes, nudes, used psychedelic techniques, and painted portraits.

His brush also includes a portrait of the genius Soviet ballerina Maya Plisetskaya.

In the 1970s he purchased and renovated luxury mansion on the outskirts of Vienna in the Hütteldorf district.

In 1988, after the artist moved to France, the Ernst Fuchs Museum, Otto Wagner’s villa, opened here, which became a landmark of the Austrian capital.

According to the will, Fuchs is buried near the villa in the local cemetery.

For the first time, Vakhtangov begins to approach issues in a theatrical “fantasy” form in a small production of a fairy tale by the poet P.G. Antokolsky called “The Infanta Doll”. This production was entrusted by Vakhtangov to his student Yu.A. Zavadsky, as a lesson in directing. Zavadsky was supposed to create a performance based on the instructions of Yevgeny Bagrationovich. Vakhtangov immediately establishes a principle that will subsequently find application in developing the form of a number of his productions. Vakhtangov proposed staging the play as puppet show. Each actor had, first of all, to play the puppet actor, so that then this puppet actor would play this role: infantas, queens, etc. Vakhtangov told Zavadsky: “You need to imagine a doll-director and feel how she would direct: then you will go right.” By developing and defining formal tasks, establishing special theatrical techniques and a special manner acting, that is, a special manner of stage behavior, significantly different from the behavior of a living person in real life, Vakhtangov does not betray the basic principles of Stanislavsky’s teachings. Trying to create on stage some special, fictitious, created by the imagination theater world dolls, he requires from the performers living acting feelings, which, having filled this form, would make it alive, would give it the persuasiveness of real life. But there are no living dolls in nature, and how can the performer know how the doll is experiencing? Living dolls do not exist in nature, but they exist in the imagination. And what is in the artist’s creative imagination can and should be embodied on stage. Creative imagination entirely based on experience. It is nothing more than the ability to combine individual elements of experience, sometimes in such combinations in which these elements do not occur in reality. For example, a mermaid. The elements that make up this fantastic image are taken from life. The combination created by the artist's imagination may be unreal, but the material from which the artist combines fantastic images supplies him with real life, provides him with experience. This is why fantastic art should not be contrasted with realistic art. If creative activity The artist’s vision is aimed at understanding real reality; his art will turn out to be realistic, no matter in what fantastic images he expresses the result of his knowledge. Folk art, fairy tales, have always been deeply realistic. Fantastic image An animated doll consists of elements that can be observed in reality: on the one hand, in real dolls, and on the other hand, in doll-like living people. Consequently, to experience like a doll ultimately means: to experience as people experience, their behavior and essence reminiscent of dolls. Any combination external features inevitably also corresponds to a combination of certain internal psychological states, which also, each separately, are certainly given in the experience of reality. Fantasy, theatricality, natural and necessary convention theatrical performance- all this is by no means in conflict with the requirements of realistic art. This was only the beginning of that direction in Vakhtangov’s work, which a few years later, after much experimentation on theatrical form, would result in something grandiosely theatrical.

Often at rehearsals for Turandot, trying to formulate his creative credo, he uttered two words: “fantastic realism.” Naturally, this definition of Vakhtangov is to a certain extent conditional. Meanwhile, almost all researchers writing about Vakhtangov give this formula a meaning alien to Vakhtangov’s work, defining the word “fantastic” as fantasy abstracted from life.

Vakhtangov’s last conversation, which seemed to complete him creative life, there was a conversation with Kotlubay and Zahava about the actor’s creative imagination. And Vakhtangov’s last entry, concluding his diaries, was an entry defining and deciphering Vakhtangov’s meaning and understanding of the term: “fantastic realism.” This is how Evgeniy Bogrationovich formulated it: “Correctly found theatrical means give the author genuine life on stage. You can learn by means, you need to create a form, you need to fantasize. That's why I call it fantastic realism. Fantastic or theatrical realism exists, it should now be in every art.” From here it is quite obvious that Vakhtangov is talking about the artist’s fantasy, about his creative imagination, and not about far-fetched fiction that leads the artist away from the truth of life.

The realist is not always obliged to reflect the truth of life he has learned “in the forms of life itself.” He has the right to dream up this form. This is exactly what Vakhtangov wanted to assert when he called his realism “fantastic.” Theater artist- the director exercises this right in forms peculiar to the theater, that is, in specifically theatrical forms (and not in “forms of life itself”). This is what Vakhtangov meant when he called his realism “theatrical.”

After all, if we agree with the requirement that the artist create exclusively “in the forms of life itself,” then there can be no talk of a variety of forms and genres within the limits of realism. Then Vakhtangov’s thesis: “each play has its own, special form of stage embodiment” (in other words: how many performances, so many forms!) should disappear by itself. And this thesis contains the whole essence of “Vakhtangov’s” theater arts.

Speaking about the participation of fantasy in creative process, we mean such a state of the artist when he, captivated by the subject of his art, at first imagines it only in the most general outlines, perhaps even in individual particulars, but gradually embraces this subject, the image as a whole, in its entirety. details, in all the richness of its content. Creative imagination helps him find an external vestment that corresponds to this image, helps him bring together the details and particulars accumulated by fantasy into a holistic form - complete, complete and the only possible expression of the idea of ​​​​the work, lovingly conceived by the artist. Vakhtangov's rehearsals were a clear example of this. Extraordinary passion for work, brilliant imagination, huge revelations suddenly revealed to all participants in the performance. creative possibilities; unexpectedly bold adaptations that were born right there, instantly; the ability to ruthlessly abandon what has already been found with difficulty, lived in, and immediately begin new searches in order to convey the essence of the work more clearly and clearly; and, most importantly, what is especially valuable in a director, the extraordinary ability to evoke the same creative state in actors - this is what is characteristic of the favorable mood of Vakhtangov’s creative imagination.

Meanwhile, it was precisely these epithets - “fantastic”, “theatrical” - that served as the basis for misunderstandings in theater literature, which speaks of Vakhtangov’s break with Stanislavsky, his transition to the formalist camp, etc.

No, Vakhtangov did not fight against realism, but against that very naturalism, which, posing as realism, boasted of its truthfulness, objectivism and fidelity to nature, afraid to admit the poverty of its thought, the poverty of fantasy and the weakness of imagination.

Vakhtangov, calling his realism “fantastic” or “theatrical,” in fact, fought for the right to express his subjective attitude to what was depicted, for the right to evaluate phenomena, people and their actions from the perspective of his worldview, to pass his “sentence” on them, as N.G. Chernyshevsky also demanded this.

None of the bizarre creations of Vakhtangov’s wayward directorial fantasy could have been born as alive, organic, convincing as they turned out to be, if Vakhtangov, when creating them, had not relied on that unshakable, timeless, imperishable that constitutes the soul, grain, essence of Stanislavsky’s system , but would strive in his performances for the poetry of the authentic stage experience of the actors, the full “life of the human spirit.” Some theorists for some reason always associate with the concept of “Vakhtangovsky” in art only those principles and features that determined the originality of the stage form of “Princess Turandot”. Speaking about “Vakhtangov”, they always remember “irony”, “playing theatre”, the external elegance of a theatrical performance, etc. And “The Flood”? What about the Miracle of St. Anthony? And "Gadibuk"? And “Wedding”? And Vakhtangov’s behest is to “listen to life” and look for his own for each play. special form theatrical embodiment?

"Vakhtangovskoye" is the brightest, most modern form manifestations of that great truth, which K. S. Stanislavsky affirmed with such force in theatrical art. It primarily lives in best works theater, which bears the name of Vakhtangov.

No matter what forms and techniques Vakhtangov invented, no matter what new paths he paved, he never took the vicious path of naked experimentation. Everything he did, he did, without leaving for a minute the only solid foundation of realistic art - the truth of authentic life. He found new paths, new forms, new techniques and methods, and all this turned out to be valuable and necessary, because it grew on the healthy soil of the demands that life put forward.

Creating the sunny theatricality of “Princess Turandot”, minting grotesque figures of the bourgeois and philistines in “The Miracle of St. Anthony” and in “The Wedding”, extracting from the depths of his creative imagination the ugly chimeras of “Gadibuk”, Vakhtangov invariably created on the material of genuine life, in the name of this life , from her and for her sake. Therefore, no matter what techniques he used - impressionistic or expressionistic, natural or conventional, everyday or grotesque - the techniques always remained only techniques, they never acquired self-sufficient significance, and Vakhtangov’s art, thus, was always deeply in its essence realistic.