History and Fairy-Tale
may appear flabby and ineffective. But, in the first place, this does not apply to the whole of his output; and, secondly, in the evolution of art the most powerful works are not always those which are most significant. On the contrary, faint hints sometimes engender revolutions, and if Vasnetzov did not revolutionise Russian painting, he undoubtedly planted in it seeds which gave, and are still giving numerous sprouts.
This time we have in mind the "fairy-tale" and historical pictures of the master, on which we only touched in the analysis of his religious paintings. The former played a quite important part in the development of Russian art. V. Vasnetzov gave new motives and themes, he familiarised us with the Old-Russian forms and colours. It was he who popularised the old Russian "fairy-tale," and Helen Polyenov, Mary Yakunchikov, Golovin, and Malyutin, the most prominent Russian "fairy-tale" painters of the nineties, are undoubtedly indebted to him. Apart from them, and, especially, from V. Vasnetzov, stood only one artist, Vrubel. He had no need to recur to the narrow medium of Old-Russian forms for the expression of the fairy-tales, born of his spirit. A vigorous, broad, true genius, he drew his inspiration from everywhere and lent everything a splendour that was his own. Vasnetzov created a school of more or less close imi-
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