Educational Activities of the Abramtsevo Artistic Circle and Vasilii Polenov’s House of Theatrical Enlightenment

Abstract

This article examines the activity of the Abramtsevo circle, mainly in the spheres of theater and church architecture. The partnership of two close friends, Savva Mamontov and Vasilii Polenov, generated most of the circle’s ideas and shaped its grand plans. The article analyzes the group’s cultural and educational projects, revealing the different ways in which the educational ideas of the Abramtsevo community influenced the realization of Polenov’s concepts and plans, which in turn were implemented in the artist’s social and theatrical life during the 1910s and 1920s.