Life-creating potential of primitivism (naive, tragic and naive-tragic sense of life)

The subjects of the article are function of primitivism as direction of artistic thought and expression of artistic and social utopias of the 20th century, and its form-creating potential and ability to suggest vital understanding of the world. Materials for the article are folk fine arts and primitivism in fine arts and literature of the 20th and 21st centuries. The article differentiates terms "primitive" (archaic symbolical thinking), "primitive art" (naive art) and "primitivism" (primitive style in professional art-making). The article tracks common principles of poetics of primitivism: graphical simplicity of forms; brightness of colors; "naivety" of realization; vigorous and laughing ostentation of world-perception; fantastical realism as combination of the impossible and the recognizable; not mimetic, but ontological way of thinking. The main topic of the article is the force of the natural, i.e. the magical and mythological aim of primitivism when creating life in conditions of urban civilization. The article explores the position and image of the tragic in the consciousness of masters of primitivism. It also explores the poetics of representation of unsolvable conflicts in history; place of man in nature; life itself in its original power. The article sets parallels between folk primitivism and primitive style in fine arts, Russian poetry and prose at different stages of modern history. The content of comparison is the search of concrete and absolutely significant forms of expressing true knowledge about the world and the human. The article briefly revises evolution of artistic primitivism in literature: utopia of the absolute unity by V. Khlebnikov; narrative urban naivete of M. Zoshchenko; infantile naivete of L. Dobychin; natural philosophy of N. Zabolotsky's utopia; heroic epic utopia of A. Platonov; high naivete of N. Rubtsov and V. Shukshin; sarcastic concretism of I. Kholin; utopia of heroic simplicity of the Mitki, conceptual primitivism of T. Kibirov; folklorism and apocryphal Christianity of M. Stepanova. The primary purpose of primitivism in literature is suggestion of belief in the miraculous as a way of accepting the tragedy of existence.

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