In the 21st century, an urgent topic is the assessment of the dynamics of cultural development of ethnic groups living in the natural and climatic conditions of the North and the Arctic and bearing conservatism towards their traditional culture, which has become the basis for centuries of survival and adaptive flexibility. In the period of total relativization of postmodern values, the task of making a balanced choice in one’s spiritual heritage and historical practice remains important. The aim of the article is to identify the potential of modernity for ethnic cultures of the North-East of Russia, which experienced incomplete modernization on the wave of bourgeois transformations and Soviet socio-cultural modernization in the 19th—20th centuries, to determine the options for the development of modern culture against the background of the deadlock of postmodernity, which constrained the productive options for the development of “culture of traditions” by the phenomena of global mass culture.

The general scientific methods and the method of symbolic ontologisation of culture, explicating the synthesis of interaction of symbolic constructs of metaphysical and mythological nature, underlying the regularities of ethno-cultural dynamics in the aesthetic sphere and organic modernization transformations in general, have been applied.

It is shown that the metaphysics of modernity determines the dynamic stability of ethnoculture, allowing to realize its undiscovered potential through the principles of modernity, independently reproduce these principles, making the transition of ethnos from the culture of mimesis to the culture of the birth of primordiality. The quality of modernity gives the Sakha a sense of metaphysical continuity with the stages of evolution of European culture, freeing them from mythological predetermination of fate, including by intensive innovative knowledge-intensive economy. The synthetic synergy of “ethno” and “modern” reveals the potential for cultural growth institutionalized by the paradigm of ethnomodernity, which resolves the contradictions of modernity, bringing ethnoculture to the idea of socio-cultural and scientific-technological development, dignity and natural human rights.

Representatives of the Hezhe people (Nanai people) live in Russia and China. This article is about fish in their traditional culture. Fish and everything related to it can be considered a cultural symbol of the Hezhe people. This is due to the peculiarities of the culture of the region located along the Amur, Sungari and Ussuri rivers. Analyses of historical documents and artistic works show the great importance of working with fish skin in the life of the Hezhe. Material production and spiritual life of the Hezhe have been closely connected with fish for many generations. It has been revealed that the high fertility of fish, one of the main sources of food and material for sewing clothes, caused the Hezhe people to revere fish in ancient times. It has been established that the Hezhe people had a rich culture. Fish became one of the most widespread zoomorphic motifs of Hezhe ornamental art. The image of fish on the products was given a high cultural meaning. This image left a vivid trace in both Chinese and Russian culture — from totemism to decorative items. The article presents an analysis of fish as a cultural symbol based on the materials of Chinese and Russian museum collections. The study of fish in the traditional culture of Hezhe will expand the existing knowledge about the nature and specificity of ethno-cultural interaction between China and the peoples of the Amur region for many centuries. An attempt is made to tell about the specifics of Chinese cultural meaning of decorative items based on fish skin. For the first time the authors treat the ornamentation of fish patterns in the traditional culture of Hezhe in a systematized form. This will allow researchers to familiarize themselves with information from Chinese sources to identify typical images of fish in Hezhe for further study of the topic of fish skin processing as art in Russia.

The article is devoted to the cross-cutting consideration of the problem of dialogical interaction between two close phenomena of art related to religious themes: church, liturgical art, which participates in worship, and secular art on religious themes. The stages of their interaction in Russian art of the 20th—21st centuries are considered. The prehistory of this phenomenon dates back to the middle of the 19th century, when the division into religious and church art already existed in fact, but was realised only in the early 20th century in connection with the work of Mikhail Nesterov. Then, over the course of the century, we observe a series of stages of interaction between religious and church art in their convergences and divergences. The era of the Silver Age, with its heightened sense of the religious beginning in art and life, is replaced by times of state atheism, very heterogeneous, including with regard to religious themes. The time of 1920 —early 1930s is characterized by a relatively free artistic search in the sphere of religious themes. At the beginning of the Stalinist period, religious themes in both church and secular aspects were banned, and at the end of the period there was a revival. During the Thaw years, along with the persecution of the church in unofficial culture, a broad interest in religious themes in secular painting emerged and a gradual, albeit localized, rise in contemporary church art began. The late Soviet period is characterized by the gradual establishment and initial legalization of religious and church art. In the 1990s — 2010s, a broad revival and development of church art began, and the religious theme became the focus of attention, including contemporary contemporary art. Once again, as in the early twentieth century, there are conditions and artistic aspirations for a mutually enriching dialogue between church and religious art. The study of various aspects of this interaction in Russian art is an urgent and multifaceted task.

Among the decorative binding papers of the 18th century, brocade papers, so called because of their resemblance to expensive gold woven fabrics, can be recognized as particularly spectacular. The rich relief pattern, the combination of gold and silver lustre with a multi-coloured paper backing was the secret of their popularity in European countries for a whole century.

The technique of paper gilding and embossing originated in the early 18th century in Augsburg. Subsequently, brocade papers were produced in various cities in Germany and mainly spread throughout Europe from there. Although brocade papers were also used by Russian masters, there are no special works about this binding material in the Russian historiography.

The article is devoted to the description of the collection of brocade papers preserved as covers and forzats in Russian civil books of the 18th century in the collection of the Book Museum of the Russian State Library (RSL). The questions of terminology, production technology and systematization of brocade papers are considered. The main types of domestic publications characterized by the use of this material are calendars, published annually at the Academy of Sciences printing house in St. Petersburg, and descriptions of various celebrations, speeches “on occasion”, odes, “instructive words” and “reasonings”, produced by different printing houses and usually small in volume.

The collection provides rich material for a more accurate understanding of the role of the printing house and the aesthetic preferences of the reading public in the external design of books in the period of the birth of bookbinding in Russia. Decorative binding papers are valuable not only for the researcher of old-printed books, librarian, collector or restorer, but also for the cultural historian in a broad sense, as content, stylistically and technologically they reflect general trends in the production of wallpapers, fabrics, furniture and trade packaging. On the basis of the description of the quantitative and qualitative composition of the collection of the RSL Book Museum a methodology of working with brocade papers is proposed, which can be applied to the collections of other fund holders as well.

The aim of this paper is to describe and review 18th century Viennese parade carriages from the point of view of arts and crafts. Carriages are a small architectural form and are “programme works”, examples of the synthesis of arts, harmoniously combining the principles of architecture, sculpture, painting, decorative art, carpentry, as well as the skills of carvers, gilders, bronzers, embroiderers. At the same time, carriages were an integral part of ceremonies and participated in the most important state ceremonies (coronations, weddings, funerals, baptism of heirs). Certain types of carriages, such as carousel chariots and masquerade sleighs, were used for court entertainments, festivals and games. Imperial ceremonial carriages of the 17th—18th centuries served to represent the monarch’s power on a par with the throne and regalia and were created as true works of art, using expensive materials and sophisticated decoration techniques.

The research is based on the study of natural material — original carriages from the collection of the Wagenburg Museum (Schoenbrunn Palace, Vienna) and the Armoury Chamber of the State Historical and Cultural Museum-Reserve “Moscow Kremlin”, its tasks include determining the model range of actual forms and designs, identifying the characteristic artistic methods, techniques of execution and decorative motifs of rococo. For the first time it is proposed to consider carriages from Russian museum collections in the context of the European carriage school that created them, combining the knowledge of foreign and domestic researchers about carriages of the 18th century. A separate research task is the integration of Viennese carriages from the Armoury Chamber of the Moscow Kremlin into a single analogue series with models from Wagenburg, which allows to expand the understanding of the Viennese carriage school of the 18 century.

A review of the main models of rococo parade carriages created in the Viennese royal workshops from the 1720s to the 1760s is made. They are considered from the point of view of artistic value of the carriages, emphasis is made on the description of objects, decorative techniques and methods of artistic work. The material is divided into groups according to the statuses of the carriages: ceremonial official gala carriages of the emperor, retinue carriages and running holiday carriages. The specimens are arranged in chronological order, which illustrates the development of carriage-making from the model of the large carriage to the more technically advanced Berlines. It is shown that Viennese carriages are masterpieces of decorative and applied art, combining the highest level of skill of the creators of carriage projects (architects, decorators) and performers (carpenters, carvers, gilders, painters, weavers, embroiderers, blacksmiths and foundry workers).

The informatization of modern society motivates library management and staff to modernize their professional activities and apply various strategies to position a new, relevant image. As a consequence, libraries and many other cultural institutions are striving to move from faceless number designations to a strategically justified name, as it is one of the most important tools for forming a vivid brand. These phenomena are referred to by experts as “naming”. A successful library name, if successfully positioned in general, attracts new audiences to the library and can increase the effectiveness of the cultural institution. There is a growing number of studies of the history and current activities of named libraries. Despite the large volume of thematic materials, the problem of terminological disunity in the researched topic is increasing. In this regard, the author justified the use of the term “naming” as a universal and the most accurate designation of the activity on creation and functioning of an effective name of an organisation, product or service. The author’s generalised classification of approaches to the formation of names of public libraries (personified, toponymic and conceptual), which formed the basis for the study of current trends in naming in the Corporate Network of Public Libraries of St. Petersburg (CNPL SPb), is proposed. Personalised names are given to libraries named after writers and other important representatives of culture and art. Toponymic names characterize the relationship with the territory where the library is located. The conceptual variant of the name is connected with the reflection of the priority direction of the cultural institution’s activity, as well as with associative names, the basis of which is a certain image. The study concluded that the concept of “named library” is increasingly used by specialists in the context of toponymic and conceptual naming. It was found that there are more named libraries in the CNPL SPb than numbered libraries, the prevalence of personified and conceptual naming was found, and the trend towards the further spread of named libraries was noted. The article is of interest to librarians, librarians, specialists and students of higher education institutions of culture.

The article is devoted to the peculiarities of embodiment of typical images of Chinese traditional opera in works of oil painting. Depicting the actors in their stage roles, the artists strive to recreate the aesthetic impact that Chinese opera has on the viewer. However, they use a system of artistic and expressive means characteristic of the fine arts. The aim of the study is to determine the peculiarities of embodiment of typical images of Chinese traditional opera by contemporary Chinese artists. The works of Peng Xiaohan, Wang Qijun, and Yue Haitao serve as the object. Although the typical images of Chinese traditional opera are characterised by their own set of symbols and signs, each author depicts the plots and characters of the productions in their own way. Some of them strive for a realistic portrayal of what is happening on stage: they capture the expressive poses of the main character, capture the plot scenes of the production. Others create a collective image of a character or separate parts of the plot, using the symbolism of colour, costume, theatrical make-up. On the example of paintings by the above artists, the author identifies the main creative approaches to the embodiment of typical images of Chinese traditional opera in oil painting. These include following the iconographic canons of Chinese opera, combining the traditions of Chinese art with the tendencies of Western painting, etc. For the first time, on the basis of works by contemporary Chinese painters, different approaches to the reflection of typical images of Chinese traditional opera in oil painting were identified and the peculiarities of their embodiment in the language of fine arts were determined, which can be useful for further research in this area.

For a modern user, a calendar is usually a reference table that lists all the days of the year in sequential order, dividing them into months and weeks, and highlighting weekends and holidays with a special color. People of the 18th century gave the calendar similar definitions, but its functions were much broader: the calendar became a desk book, fulfilled the functions of a notebook, an individual for each family home directory — for this purpose in the copies, even at the stage of conclusion in the cover or binding, blank sheets were bound to keep family and household records. Throughout most of the 18th century, the Imperial Academy of Sciences in St Petersburg had the exclusive right to issue calendars, and the calendars, along with other academic publications, were subject to state and church control, as they contained current information about persons serving at the court and about the highest Russian officialdom. The Russian State Library as part of the collection of the Research Department of Rare Books (Museum of Books) holds a representative collection of calendars and monthbooks of the 18th century, which makes it possible to get acquainted with the repertoire of this type of publications. The present study examines the subjects and readers’ address of calendars or monthbooks of the 18th century, reveals the content of the “Calendar or Monthbook for the summer from the Nativity of Christ...”, court, historical, geographical, economic, travel, church, “fortune-telling” calendars on the example of copies from the collection of the Book Museum.

The calendar as a type of publishing reacted sensitively to the changes that took place in society and in the book business in different historical periods, tried to record the information that seemed important to contemporaries, helped owners to structure their lives and the lives of their families, their homes and households. Calendars had their readers and admirers. It is in the calendar that one finds information that has not passed the test of time, but is so necessary to reconstruct the history of everyday life of a particular era.

The phenomenon of spontaneous hierotopia is considered as a process of spontaneous sacralization of places, which, according to the participants of this activity, have supernatural properties. Its development is conditioned, on the one hand, by the effect of the image of the sacred rooted in the cultural consciousness, on the other hand, by modern socio-cultural problems, in relation to which spontaneous hierotopia acts as a compensating factor. This phenomenon has insufficiently reflected positive potential embodied in a set of vital functions. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to analyze the peculiarities of spontaneous hierotopia, which expresses the real needs of the subjects involved in this activity, who act outside the institutional systems, including confessional ones. Therefore, their cultural creation is characterized by eclecticism and bricolage way of creating sacred artefacts, which is typical for spontaneous myth — making in general.

The autonomy and uncontrollability of this phenomenon to the generally accepted institutional systems generates a sharply critical reaction from secular (scientific) and religious (traditional-confessional) authorities. The analysis shows the lack of objectivity of such criticism: claims to the unscientific nature of spontaneous hierotopia are unfounded due to the fact that it is based on mythological imagination; the inconsistency with canonical attitudes is an irreversible consequence of personal and creative situational construction of sacred objects.

Concretization of the peculiarities of spontaneous hierotopia, made on the example of the archeological monument Arkaim, allowed to reveal the main regularities of the process of spontaneous sacralization and to establish the urgency of the problems reflected in it. Specific features of the formation of sacralized loci are analyzed. The special atmosphere of tolerance, peacefulness and positive interaction inherent in such places due to the totality of their subjective and objective properties is characterized.

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