Complex research of local pottery schools during 1894−1941 in the Dnieper River region of Ukraine was made for the first time in Ukrainian ethnology and ceramic studies. Five periods in problematics of historiography were defined. Ways of passing professional pottery knowledge that existed before pottery educational establishments are studied in complete. It is proved that in different periods passing pottery professional knowledge was carried out through inheriting of handicraft in family, studying in craft guilds or potter’s family.
It is determined that pottery was one of the mast widespread home crafts in the observed territory in the late 19th – early 20th century. Main concepts of pottery schools organization in 1894−1915 are traced. Government action steps that influenced the pottery craft development and specific peculiarities of pottery schools state regulation in terms of occupational totalitarian system development in Ukraine are characterized.
Opening preconditions, development and closing reasons of pottery educational establishments are analyzed; directions of their activity in studying and popularization of traditional pottery are observed. Ethno-pedagogic principles of functioning and persons, education plans and programs are investigated.
Four main periods are outlined in pottery schools development: 1) 1894−1918 (first state educational establishments, concentrated on pottery craft development, were working); 2) 1918−1929/1930s (pottery schools, colleges and institutes, which changed their speciality for educating workers of plant and factory industry later, were working); 3) 1929−1933 (pottery educational establishments were transformed into glass and porcelain ones); 4) 1936−1941 (the last pottery educational establishment in the Dnieper River Ukraine territory, which prepared specialists in ceramic art – the Opishnia School of Ceramic Art Masters). Three pottery educational establishments, whose work cannot be classified according to the abovementioned scheme, were found during the research: the Makariv Yar Ceramic Craft Industry School (1927−1935), the Opishnia Pottery Exemplary Point (1912−1924), the Opishnia Ceramic Industrial School (1927−1931).
Pottery schools centers, which popularized traditional forms and decorative style, and influenced pottery creative development sufficiently, were outlined: in Poltava Region – Opishnia, Hlynsk and Myrhorod; in Ukrainian Polissia – Oleshnia, in Slobozhanshchyna – Makariv Yar; in Podillia – Kamianets-Podilskyi. They were cultural, educational, artistic and industrial centers, which popularized new pottery knowledge in different ways. As a result: 1) activation of art work of separate potters, who used received art and technical skills for widening and improving their production, happened; 2) assortment range and quality of clay products in pottery centers were widened: 3) basis of new art style in clay products decoration was formed.
Performed compound scientific studies in exploring pottery schools as a dominant factor of Ukrainian creative development in 1894−1941 demonstrated its variety and restiveness. Such establishment net development became a specific field of cultural improvement in the Dnieper River Ukraine in the first decades of the 20th century. They cared about passing professional knowledge; creative realization of pottery ethnic peculiarities was in the basis of this process. Main directions of pottery educational establishments dedicated to study and popularization of traditional pottery (educational, exhibitory, ethnographic expeditionary, museum, publishing), were found out. Ways, which helped traditional pottery to become an achievement of its apprentices, are shown.
It is proved, that pottery schools in Makariv Yar, Opishnia, Hlynsk and Kamianets-Podilskyi turned into strong centers of Ukrainians’ national revival, though repressive actions of Soviet government in the late 1920s – 1930s were meant to destroy pottery schools as a dominant factor of traditional pottery creative development in Ukraine.
