Dorich House Museum

Friday 4 December | 11am – 12:30pm | Book here

Hear art historian Dr Lousie Hardiman tell the fascinating story of the friendship between Russian illustrator Elena Polenova and British arts journalist and translator Netta Peacock, their unsuccessful attempt to publish a book of Russian folk tales and illustrations in Britain in 1890s, and Hardiman’s realisation of this project in 2014. While studying for her PhD on British-Russian art at Cambridge University, Hardiman discovered the unpunlished manuscipts for Polenova and Peacock’s book and, with the help of the Polenov family in Russia and the publisher Fontanka in London, was able to publish the pair’s book in 2014 as Why the Bear has no Tail and other Russian Folk Tales. Hardiman was also able to publish the companion volume of more tales The Story of Synko-Filipko and other Russian Folk Tales in 2019 using her own translations.

Following the talk, Belarussian artist and performer Irena Mihalkovich will deliver a reimagined episode from the tale of The Princess Frog using classical Indian dance and shadow puppetry. Mihalkovich spent a decade in India training in traditional dance and theatre and produces performances which explore transcultural motifs of the human psyche in Slavic folk memory and Indian myth. In this performance, Mihalkovich brings the story to life using the ancient theatre tradition of Kudiyattam, where hand gestures (mudras) become a language of their own. The live movement unfolds alongside a shadow-puppetry film created with hereditary masters Tholpavakoothu Sangam from Kerala, set to an original score by Chay Strawbridge.

Both parts of the event are included in your ticket along with a free tea or coffee from our Museum café to enjoy while listening to Hardiman’s talk.

Dr Louise Hardiman MA (London) PhD (Cantab) is an independent art historian specialising in Russian and Ukrainian art and the history of British-Russian cultural relations. Her research focuses on Imperial Russia in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and the history of Russian Art in Victorian and Edwardian Britain. Her books include two edited volumes: Modernism and the Spiritual in Russian Art: New Perspectives(2017) and Courtly Gifts and Cultural Diplomacy: Art, Material Culture, and British-Russian Relations(2023) and two books of translated folk tales by Elena Polenova (Why the Bear has no Tail (2014) and The Story of Synko-Filipko (2019)). In recent years, she has been a consultant to Dorich House Museum on projects to catalogue Russian art in the Hare-Gordine collection (funded by ArtFund and The Decorative Arts Society) and has given many tours of the collection as a volunteer. She is a Panel Tutor for the Institute of Continuing Education, University of Cambridge, and a board member of the Society of Historians of East European, Eurasian, and Russian Art (SHERA).

Irena Mihalkovich is a Belarusian-born, London-based interdisciplinary artist working across Indian classical dance, theatre, puppetry, film, and analogue photography. She spent a decade in India training in traditional dance and theatre, and holds an Erasmus Mundus master’s degree, Choreomundus – International Master in Dance Knowledge, Practice and Heritage. Her practice explores transcultural motifs of the human psyche in Slavic folk memory and Indian myth, and has been presented at The Nehru Centre London, the Kochi-Muziris Biennale collateral programme, and festivals in India and Europe.