Materials: Natural Wool. Embroidery.
Size: 35 cm x 35 cm
Year: 2017
Design: The work is framed
Status: for sale
Ancient pattern «North Star», restored from archival records of patterns of traditional
Slavic embroidery.
The Slavic people had a whole system of signs, symbols that were used to protect
against dark forces, attract good luck, improve health, happiness in personal life. Signs
decorated houses, embroidered on clothing, depicted on household items, weapons. The name of such
symbols - amulets.
Each amulet symbol was patronized by pagan gods, who, according to the legends of the
forefathers, gave each sign a special magical power.
The four-part composition is one of the main ones in the distribution of the main elements of the ornament on
«all four sides»: for the farmer these four directions were not only
the sides of the world - noon, midnight, sunset and sunrise, but also the sides of his rectangular
field. The field was plowed in two directions (a furrow in one direction, a furrow in
the opposite direction), and then harrowed in two directions, often perpendicular
to the furrows. This is how the daily rhythm of the basic farming work created the idea of
movement» — the principle of the four sides of the world.
The reflection of this mode of orientation is preserved in Russian Slavic words and expressions:
«four parts of the world. Four elements. A house of four corners. To the four winds.»
