The city of Yoshkar-Ola, the capital of the Mari El Republic, has often invited artists to the All-Russian Plein Air. In 2016, a plein air session was held based on the theme “Mari El — the land of ancestors: traditions and modernity”. Artists from all over Russia got acquainted with the peculiarities of the Mari culture and the traditional Mari religion, took part in the Agavayrem festival in the village of Nemda-Obalysh. Agavayrem is an ancient agricultural holiday dedicated to the deities of fertility, earth and forces of nature. It completes the spring cycle of the festive rites of the Mari people. After that, the artists stayed in the Novotoryalsky district and created works inspired by ethnic materials. One of the artists who took part in this plein air was the Nizhny Novgorod artist Mikhail Polyakov. A painting of his was included in the permanent exhibition of the National Art Gallery.
Mikhail Polyakov was born in the Gorky region, graduated from the Graphic Faculty of the Vladimir State Pedagogical Institute and the Department of Interior Design of the Nizhny Novgorod State University of Architecture and Civil Engineering. A member of the Artists’ Union of Russia and participant of significant exhibitions in Russia, Mikhail Polyakov actively promotes Russian and Nizhny Novgorod art abroad. His works have been presented at exhibitions in Poland and Germany, and are kept in private collections in the USA, Australia, China, the Czech Republic, England, and the Netherlands.
Polyakov learned the secrets of the so-called Vladimir school of painting with its vivid decorative colors, thick textures and constant optimism. The artist was fascinated with the Russian avant-garde and its search for structures of objects and space, and from this fascination arose his own original manner of working with objects and spaces characterized by decorative and expressive elements. Mikhail Polyakov enthusiastically experiments with materials and textures, travels around Russia and Europe in search of new images and meanings. But his main way of processing impressions of the surrounding world is still manifested though his painting.
The painting “Prayer for the Mari People” depicts the supreme priest in the Mari traditional religion, Alexander Ivanovich Tanygin, holding a prayer in the sacred grove during the Agavayrem holiday. He led the community until 2017.
Mikhail Polyakov was born in the Gorky region, graduated from the Graphic Faculty of the Vladimir State Pedagogical Institute and the Department of Interior Design of the Nizhny Novgorod State University of Architecture and Civil Engineering. A member of the Artists’ Union of Russia and participant of significant exhibitions in Russia, Mikhail Polyakov actively promotes Russian and Nizhny Novgorod art abroad. His works have been presented at exhibitions in Poland and Germany, and are kept in private collections in the USA, Australia, China, the Czech Republic, England, and the Netherlands.
Polyakov learned the secrets of the so-called Vladimir school of painting with its vivid decorative colors, thick textures and constant optimism. The artist was fascinated with the Russian avant-garde and its search for structures of objects and space, and from this fascination arose his own original manner of working with objects and spaces characterized by decorative and expressive elements. Mikhail Polyakov enthusiastically experiments with materials and textures, travels around Russia and Europe in search of new images and meanings. But his main way of processing impressions of the surrounding world is still manifested though his painting.
The painting “Prayer for the Mari People” depicts the supreme priest in the Mari traditional religion, Alexander Ivanovich Tanygin, holding a prayer in the sacred grove during the Agavayrem holiday. He led the community until 2017.
