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© 2011, Vladimir Turkov
Concept and design -
Vladimir Turkov
Translation by Lavrentii Gribov
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Coming upon illustrations in a book especially in childhood
one usually does not care much about the artist's name
(in most cases this is the prerogative of the publishers).
We hope that a small retrospective of the
life
and
works
of Evgenii Rachev,
a splendid Russian artist, will contribute to making his name more popular.
Famous Russian writer Ivan Krylov
when asked about the reason for using allegory in his fables said that his animals were his mouthpiece.
The same can be said of Rachev's illustrations to folk tales and fables.
He wrote: "If you look at my pictures and enjoy the fairy log hut it means I struck the right note.
If my birds and animals help you to fathom that the story is actually about people it means
that I reached the same effect as the folk tales did".
Looking at the illustrations presented here you will probably recall
familiar books,
drawings and images and want to show them to your children.
And on page Folktales you can even leaf through some of the
books
illustrated by Rachev.
Lidya Ivanovna Racheva (maiden name L. Gribova) wife of Evgenii M. Rachev, participated in the creation of a considerable number of his books. Quite often she collected material for his future books, made sketches of ornaments and folk consumes at museums, translated and retold fairy-tales of different peoples. She also compiled collections of fairy-tales and even produced book lay-outs to ensure exact correspondence between text and future illustrations. Moreover, she provided prefaces and commentaries to the books illustrated by Rachev explaining their hidden meaning. All this helped greatly both in the production of books and in the strengthening of family ties. Not without reason it is said that strong love-matches are created not in heaven but at work.
The number of printed copies of books with Rachev's illustrations amounted to more than 80 million copies! And this books were at 77 languages of the peoples of Russia and the world!
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