lukutin lacquer

In 1818, Piotr Lukutin took over his father-in-law’s workshop. He expanded it to produce album covers, desk accessories, and various boxes, which artists began to hand paint with intricate decorative motifs. These became status symbols among the aristocracy and wealthy merchant class and by 1823 the workshop employed over 50 skilled painters, and a school at the factory was training apprentices.

In 1828, Lukutin began exhibiting products at industrial and handcraft fairs in Russia and Europe, winning awards and public acclaim. The same year, he received a royal edict allowing him to use the Imperial emblem of the double-headed eagle and his initials as the company trademark. Alexander Lukutin joined his father as factory manager in 1841, and together they transformed a simple craft into a genuine art form through daring innovation in subject-matter and technique.

Most of the lacquer miniature paintings from this era were hand-painted copies of famous paintings and popular illustrations. Although they distinguished themselves from the works that inspired them through the techniques used in their creation and the resulting depth and illumination in the painting. The techniques include the use of a primed papier-mâché surface with a background of metal powder over which several layers of thin oil paint were applied.

When the Lukutin workshop closed in 1904, some of the artists transferred to the Vishnyakov workshop and in 1910 banded together to form the Fedoskino Artel.