Art and nature are harmoniously combined in the art space at Krasnoarmeyskaya, 129. Here you can see about a hundred panels with botanical bas-reliefs and many other original works created by Oksana Tsepova.
Photo: Andrey Savelyev
Pictures growing from trash
Anna Akhmatova has these lines:
If only you knew what kind of rubbish
Poems grow without shame,
Like a light dandelion near a fence,
Like burdocks and quinoa.
These poems come to mind when you find yourself in Oksana Tsepova’s studio. True, it is not poems that “grow” here, but paintings. And all herbs for Oksana are not litter or weeds. Each plant has its own beauty for her.
Oksana Tsepova is a lawyer, private attorney, and deals with copyrights and inventions. But at heart she is an artist. He has been drawing since childhood.
Four years ago Oksana became interested in the rare technique of botanical bas-relief.
This is young art. Its founder is considered to be the English artist Rachel Dane. One day (this was in 2013), she had the idea to capture flowers from a wedding bouquet in a cast and give it to her husband. Since then, the art of botanical bas-relief has found its followers in many countries.
“My interest in this art began when,” Oksana recalls, “I saw a photograph of a plant bas-relief on the Internet. I thought: how is it possible to do this? Many people believe that this is a glued plant. In fact, the technique of botanical bas-relief is akin to ancient fossils. Plants and fruits are replaced with gypsum, and their imprint appears on the clay. I studied this art for a year and a half. I liked it because only natural materials are used here.
Already in 2021, Oksana Tsepova held her first exhibition. There, the aspiring craftswoman presented 70 of her plant bas-reliefs.
“Before starting work, we need to obtain suitable natural material,” says Oksana Tsepova. – Everything in the workshop is created based on real plants. In the summer I take them almost from under the braid. I go on “botanical expeditions” by car, and I load my finds – branches, fruits, herbs lying on the ground – into the trunk. I dry the plants; there is a certain technique for this.
Photo: Andrey Savelyev
Mirrors with bas-reliefs and a forest nymph
“We rarely lie down on the ground to look at the natural world from below,” says Oksana. – But the most ordinary plant, which is considered a weed, becomes beautiful if it is properly decorated. This technique helps you capture the moment. There are masters who first come up with a composition, and then adapt the plants to suit their design. On their bas-reliefs they stand like columns. I try to arrange the plants as they would in nature. So you can see how the breeze sways them. It is important that they come from the same environment. Roses can never be combined with wild plants.
Walking along the beaten path is not interesting for Oksana Tsepova. Know-how often appears in her works. Among the author’s works are mirrors decorated with bas-reliefs that symbolize the seasons. Here we see spring and summer grasses, nuts – signs of autumn.
Among the original creations of the Samara craftswoman are candlesticks, flowerpots, clocks and vases. All this is created from plant materials, using the same technique as botanical panels. An unusual bas-relief of a forest nymph, a female image in the work “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”.
Depending on the color of the clay, Oksana’s monochrome works have red, white, beige and green shades.
“The clay delicately gives its color to the print,” says the owner of the workshop. – Plaster absorbs the color of this material. Sometimes I use watercolor for shading.
“The plant gives itself to art”
Botany lessons could be taught in this workshop to get an idea of the rich flora of the Samara region. About flowers living on lawns, about herbs and trees.
“Much of what is here was found in the city,” says Oksana. – Zucchini, corn, gooseberries. I found a place in Samara where wild pears grow. Sometimes they give me materials for work. Here are the cucumbers, I kept them in salted water before making an impression from them. It is important to me that the panels can be used to trace different periods of plant life. For example, how the leaves of trees change throughout the year. Here is a chestnut in bloom, and then you can see how its fruits are formed, how the branch begins to bend under the weight of the balls. And finally, a ripe autumn fruit. In the workshop you can trace the life of a watermelon in its different stages. The plant here gives itself over to art, but then it does not die, but is reborn. I don’t throw them away. For example, I put daffodil bulbs in a dark place and plant them in the lawn in the fall.
Every piece of nature that has become a work of art carries energy. And you can feel this when you enter Oksana Tsepova’s studio.
Photo: Andrey Savelyev
Wheat field. Dandelions. Lilies of the valley and blooming lilac. Branch of birch, Tatar maple, oak from Malo-Malyshevsky forest. Filigree work – lily branch. The life of nature is shown in all the smallest details. On the bas-reliefs you can see traces of stamens and pollen.
Compositions with plants for the author of a kind of allegory of human relations:
– We are also part of nature. The cucumbers in one of my compositions are a man, a woman and a child, and there is a whole world around them. The theme of family is also presented through the images of daffodils. There are people with low self-esteem who consider themselves uninteresting. The same as weeds in the garden. But if someone sees beauty in him, the person is transformed. This is what they sometimes say about a woman: she blossoms in love. I have bas-reliefs where plants interact. One wraps around the other. This can be transferred to relationships between people. When interacting with another, you can love him, or you can strangle him.
Caterpillar Eva and doors filled with acrylic
Oksana both works and conducts master classes in the art space. Using the technique of botanical bas-relief, painting clothes, creating works using liquid acrylic. Among the students are children with disabilities.
“I recently conducted a master class for children from Chapaevsk,” says Oksana. – We made paintings using liquid acrylic. This is a technique where it is impossible to do something ugly. They chose the colors themselves. I am glad that the coloring of their work is bright and festive. The children took the pictures they created with them. Last fall, I brought grass from the Buzuluksky forest to the studio for bas-reliefs. And with it – a beautiful swallowtail butterfly caterpillar. She crawled around the dill, ate well and grew noticeably in two to three weeks. The children at the master class watched her with great interest, stroked her and named her Eva.
The doors in the workshop, previously white, are now filled with bright liquid acrylic. They also became a kind of work of art. This delights both children and adults.
Oksana Tsepova’s clients, coming to her office (aka workshop) for the first time, find themselves in an unexpected magical world. Meetings sometimes drag on for a long time. Because at such moments, not only legal issues arise.
Photo: Andrey Savelyev
Wonders of the underwater world
– I try myself in a variety of directions. I paint with pastels, watercolors, dry brushes, and oils,” says Oksana. “I don’t understand how people can stop at just one thing.”
In some of Tsepova’s voluminous works presented in the studio, painting is combined with natural materials – here are pebbles from the Volga, bark, and moss. Marine images with swimming dolphins and turtles are rendered using epoxy resin. There is a painting depicting the underwater world.
Oksana herself is fond of diving. And he dreams of preparing an exhibition of paintings depicting the underwater world with its wonders.
She also works in ceramics. In the workshop you can see unusual examples of this craft. For example, a fruit plate in the shape of a burdock.
There are also works created from plaster. Particularly noteworthy are two figures of pregnant women, symbolizing Mother Earth.
The workshop also presents Oksana Tsepova’s original dolls, which convey different states of the human soul. Here, for example, is a shapeshifting doll. On the one hand – an angel, on the other – a hooligan.
Photo: Andrey Savelyev
The magic of returning to yourself
At the end of 2022, Oksana Tsepova was awarded the title “Ambassador of Peace”. Her botanical bas-reliefs travel to many exhibitions. They could be seen, for example, in Turkey, in the floriculture pavilion at VDNKh, at a recent exhibition-fair in the Samara Regional Museum of History and Local Lore named after P. V. Alabin.
Soon the fruits of the joint creativity of nature and Oksana Tsepova will appear before the audience at the “Night of Museums” (12+).
Surely many of them will feel the same as the people who come to her workshop.
“No matter how busy they are, here they experience the magic of returning to themselves,” says Oksana. – This is what I strive for. A colossal amount of natural energy is concentrated here, which affects humans. Sometimes they tell me: “Once you visit your workshop, you feel like living“Nature is the only thing that always remains stable. No matter what happens to us, spring will always come and leaves will appear on the trees.
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Vadim Karasev
Tags: Life plants panel Night Museums Samara residents unusual works Oksana Tsepova Samara
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