''Wycinanki'' () in

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...

or ''Vytynanky'' (Витина́нки) in

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inva ...

or ''Vycinanki'' (Выцінанкі) in

Belarus Belarus,, , ; alternatively and formerly known as Byelorussia (from Russian ). officially the Republic of Belarus,; rus, Республика Беларусь, Respublika Belarus. is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by ...

, is a Slavic version of the art form of

papercutting Papercutting or paper cutting is the art of paper designs. Art has evolved all over the world to adapt to different cultural styles. One traditional distinction most styles share is that the designs are cut from a single sheet of paper as opp ...

, popular in Belarus, Poland, and Ukraine.

Belarus

Vycinanka is also known as vyrazanka or vystryhanka. Viačaslaŭ Dubinka was key in reviving in Belarus the folk art of paper cutting images with scissors.http://kurjer.info/2010/05/12/vyachasla%D1%9E-dubinka-%E2%80%9Cvycinanka-lichylasya-durykami-a-ne-mastactvam%E2%80%9D Repeatedly the winner of international competitions, he left behind thousands of images with this technique. His works have adorned calendars, business cards, notepads, postcards and other items.

Poland

Polish wycinanki became a popular folk craft in the mid-1800s. Wycinanki originated with

shepherd A shepherd or sheepherder is a person who tends, herds, feeds, or guards flocks of sheep. ''Shepherd'' derives from Old English ''sceaphierde (''sceap'' 'sheep' + ''hierde'' ' herder'). ''Shepherding is one of the world's oldest occupations, ...

s cutting designs out of

tree bark Bark is the outermost layers of stems and roots of woody plants. Plants with bark include trees, woody vines, and shrubs. Bark refers to all the tissues outside the vascular cambium and is a nontechnical term. It overlays the wood and consist ...

and leather.Wycinanky, Madelyn Joyce
/ref> Colorful wycinanki were pasted on furniture or roof beams as decoration, hung in windows, and given as gifts. Wycinanki vary by region. For example, wycinanki created in the Kurpie region are typically all one color, while wycinanki from the

Łowicz Łowicz is a town in central Poland with 27,896 inhabitants (2020). It is situated in the Łódź Voivodeship (since 1999); previously, it was in Skierniewice Voivodeship (1975–1998). Together with a nearby station of Bednary, Łowicz is a m ...

region are multicolored. Techniques include cutting, clipping, punching, tearing, and carving of paper, as well as ''nalepianki'' in which multiple layers are glued together. Subject matter includes

peacock Peafowl is a common name for three bird species in the genera '' Pavo'' and '' Afropavo'' within the tribe Pavonini of the family Phasianidae, the pheasants and their allies. Male peafowl are referred to as peacocks, and female peafowl are r ...

rooster The chicken (''Gallus gallus domesticus'') is a domesticated junglefowl species, with attributes of wild species such as the grey and the Ceylon junglefowl that are originally from Southeastern Asia. Rooster or cock is a term for an adult m ...

s, and other birds; circular or star-shaped

medallion A medal or medallion is a small portable artistic object, a thin disc, normally of metal, carrying a design, usually on both sides. They typically have a commemorative purpose of some kind, and many are presented as awards. They may be int ...

s (''gwiazdy''); flowers; and annual holidays such as Easter and Christmas. In some towns and villages competitions evolved to create the most beautiful wycinanki. Traditionally done for relaxation in rural Poland, the techniques were passed down through generations, with new themes and ideas developing as the papercuttings became more detailed and intricate. The

Polish Pavilion The Polish pavilion houses Poland's national representation during the Venice Biennale arts festivals. Background Organization and building The pavilion was originally designated for Venetian decorative arts as part of Brenno Del Giud ...

at the

2010 World Expo Expo 2010, officially the Expo 2010 Shanghai China, was held on both banks of the Huangpu River in Shanghai, China, from 1 May to 31 October 2010. It was a major World Expo registered by the Bureau International des Expositions (BIE), in the t ...

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Chinese, Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four Direct-administered municipalities of China, direct-administered municipalities of the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the ...

is based on a wycinanki design.

Ukraine

Historical evidence suggests that vytynanky began to be made in Ukraine at the end of the fifteenth to early sixteenth

century A century is a period of 100 years. Centuries are numbered ordinally in English and many other languages. The word ''century'' comes from the Latin ''centum'', meaning ''one hundred''. ''Century'' is sometimes abbreviated as c. A centennial or ...

, but it took quite some time before they became an integral part of the decorative arts practiced at the grass roots level. During the nineteenth century decorative paper cutouts spread all across the Ukrainian

countryside In general, a rural area or a countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities. Typical rural areas have a low population density and small settlements. Agricultural areas and areas with forestry typically are desc ...

. The word itself, vytynanky, gained currency in the early twentieth century, but there were many other, regional words that were used too — stryhuntsi, khrestyky or kvity to mention but a few. The vytynanky shapes were of many kinds and represented stylized figures of

people A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of prope ...

animals Animals are multicellular, eukaryotic organisms in the biological kingdom Animalia. With few exceptions, animals consume organic material, breathe oxygen, are able to move, can reproduce sexually, and go through an ontogenetic stage in ...

and

plants Plants are predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. Historically, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi; however, all current definitions of Plantae exclude ...

Ethnographer Ethnography (from Greek ''ethnos'' "folk, people, nation" and ''grapho'' "I write") is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures. Ethnography explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject o ...

s and art historians began to study the art of vytynanky, and artists began to seek inspiration for their art in vytynanky. Articles and essays were published, vytynanky began to be collected. Vytynanky were displayed at exhibitions of the Ukrainian decorative and applied arts alongside traditional

pottery Pottery is the process and the products of forming vessels and other objects with clay and other ceramic materials, which are fired at high temperatures to give them a hard and durable form. Major types include earthenware, stoneware and ...

embroidery Embroidery is the craft of decorating fabric or other materials using a needle to apply thread or yarn. Embroidery may also incorporate other materials such as pearls, beads, quills, and sequins. In modern days, embroidery is usually seen ...

, rugs and other items. Vytynanky that were made for the occasions of religious feasts and holidays were more decorative than the ones used for everyday decoration.

Christmas Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A feast central to the Christian liturgical year ...

and

Easter Easter,Traditional names for the feast in English are "Easter Day", as in the '' Book of Common Prayer''; "Easter Sunday", used by James Ussher''The Whole Works of the Most Rev. James Ussher, Volume 4'') and Samuel Pepys''The Diary of Samue ...

called for vytynanky in the shapes of angels, churches or even whole evangelical scenes to be pasted prominently on the walls. Marriages saw vytynanky in the shapes of doves, flowers, or the ones that formed “ trees of life.”Vytynanka — an art of decorative paper cutting
/ref>

Notes

External links

{{Decorative arts Paper art Ukrainian art Polish art Artistic techniques