Raise your hand who does not know the Pinocchio’s fable!


Today children read it again, Svyatoslav Ryabkin’s friend (who is also my friend) teaches in an elementary school in Italy and she confirmed it.


In the picture “Aged Pinocchio” (100x60 cm) the Ukrainian artist has depicted for the first time a character of the fables: Pinocchio. It is the famous wooden puppet of the novel for boys and girls “Le avventure di Pinocchio. Storia di un burattino” (in ingl. Pinocchio’s adventures. History of a puppet”) by Carlo Collodi who wrote it in 1883.


Ryabkin has dedicated many paintings to the childhood word such as “The Birdie Sings” (2009) in which a lovely yellow bird is in a forest and the sweet “Hunting Butterfly” (2010) in which a little girl is chasing a butterfly.


This Pinocchio has got a sad expression on his face and the curved posture. His shoulders are low, his hands are dangling along his body and the neck is ahead. He wears a simple T-shirt and shorts. His soft hat emphasizes the artist's message that becomes Pinocchio’s thought: life has passed very quickly and one day he discovered that he is no longer a happy boy.


Pinocchio is behind a grate that continues throughout the canvas. It encloses everything including his most important dreams that he has failed to realize in his life. You can see them cirwrapped several times with the yellow colour. They take the form of gloomy circles and rectangles.


In the lower left corner a beautiful and perfect golden key would open every cell but it is too far away and everything is destined to remain as it is. It is the key to happiness.


This interpretation is very different from the educational message of the Pinocchio’s history: the growth of the child until the adulthood, facing in first person many themes belonging to the family and social sphere.


Overall the picture is very colorful and the style is lively for the red and yellow warm colour sketches used. Then the black colour, dirted with the green, creates the web of the infinite netting.


In the lower right corner there is the typical signature of the artist Svyatoslav Ryabkin: an "R" without a piece!


Also Antonio Menegazzo called Amen, a Paduan painter, realized a beautiful Pinocchio on the grass near a daisy.


Dear Readers, write us what is your favorite character of this famous fable! The Blue Fairy has conquered the girls of every generation like me and Ryabkin’s daughter! Instead, boys prefer the characters of the cat and the fox. Do you know the very famous italian funny song “Il gatto e la volpe” (1977, in ingl. the cat and the fox) by Edoardo Bennato?


Let's listen to it together waiting for the Carnival. A lot of young children will wear a mask as Pinocchio in the most beautiful cities in the world as Venice (from 16 February 2019), Viareggio (from 9 February 2019) and Rio de Janeiro in Brazil (from 28 February 2019)! Do not miss the opportunity to have fun and masquerade because on March 5, 2019 is Shrove Tuesday and the carnival finishes.


“Aged Pinocchio” was painted in 2014 and, at the moment, "Cornici" by Giorgio Girotto (a framer in Mogliano Veneto, in Italy) has got it.