This exhibition of authentic Bulgarian folk garments from the collections of Liliya Getova, Daniela Dimitrova and Anton Gudov offers the opportunity to explore the diversity of Bulgarian women’s festive dress from various regions of the country. It includes rare and antique costumes, jewellery and headdresses from the Thracian ethnographic area, which the Kazanlak region is part of, as well as those worn by the local Karakachans, festive garments from Northwestern Bulgaria, the Rhodope Mountains, Pirin, and rare wedding outfits of settlers from Banat and Belomorie (Eastern Macedonia and Thrace). The exhibits are among the rarest on view in a museum or private collection.
Liliya Getova, Daniela Dimitrova and Anton Gudov began their collaboration in 2014 with the formation of the female vocal trio Kalina, in which Liliya and Daniela, together with Slavena Sadova, perform as singers, while Anton serves as the trio’s director. Their passion for authentic folk songs naturally extended to the traditional dress of Bulgarians who lived a hundred years and more ago. Their collecting efforts began with the hunt for antique garments and jewellery in various settlements, which they then restored and curated into unique collections. Over the years, they have enriched their collections with rare costumes and antique head coverings, many of which are unknown to people today. Some invaluable pieces were gifted by friends, such as the costume of the Rhodope singer Boyka Prisadova, along with other traditional costumes and costume elements that have been included in their exhibitions.
The trio has co-organised over ten ethnographic exhibitions at the Stoyan Staynov House in Kazanlak, the Iskra History Museum, the Ivan Milev Hall in Kazanlak, the Regional Ethnographic Museum in Plovdiv, as well as numerous other showcases at gatherings and thematic exhibitions.
This exhibition of authentic Bulgarian costumes from the collections of Liliya Getova, Daniela Dimitrova and Anton Gudov is presented as an intervention within the gallery’s representative exhibition Choices, which showcases different generations of artists with a wide range of creative interests. A key group of these artists have been deeply inspired by the theme of national heritage (or “the native”), which is reflected in their art, both in emblematic works on display in the exhibition and in lesser-known pieces from its rich archive collection. This trend began before Bulgaria’s Liberation and continued in the post-liberation period, during which time the Kingdom of Bulgaria underwent a strong process of Europeanisation across all cultural spheres. This process heightened interest in preserving antiquities and safeguarding intangible cultural heritage. In 1901, Kazanlak, a city with an exceptionally active civic community, laid the foundations for the Museum of Antiquities and Arts, where all artefacts and artworks found in Kazanlak and its surroundings were to be collected and preserved for eternity. Over the years, some of the most significant figures in Bulgaria’s cultural history contributed to expanding the museum’s collection, as well as the country’s first regional art collection.
In 1930, the museum’s management was taken over by Dimitar Chorbadjisky – Chudomir, who began gathering material for an ethnographic department. Just a year later, visitors to the museum were able to see a display case featuring embroidery from the Kazanlak region for the first time. After 1938, when Chudomir donated his personal collection of 114 embroidered pieces, the foundation of the ethnographic department was firmly established. Another key contributor was Ivan Enchev – Vidyu, who in 1934 donated a collection of diverse Bulgarian embroidery to the museum. After his passing in 1936, Kazanlak received a significant bequest, including jewellery and embroidery gathered from all corners of Bulgaria. In his work Ethnography of Bulgaria, Hristo Vakarelski explains that the word “ethnography” originates from a complex Greek term that literally means “writing about peoples,” a way to describe a culture and its people. Ethnography not only explores this cultural heritage but also examines the society that created it. In Bulgarian traditional folk culture, clothing, as a branch of ethnography, serves not only a practical function but also signifies an individual’s status within the community, reflecting regional and generational distinctions. Women, in particular, expressed themselves through their craftsmanship, often showcased in the ornamentation of their garments, where colours blend not merely as separate hues but as a vibrant melody, a narrative of a person and their soul. __ The dialogue between museum institutions and private collectors is an essential step in expanding our understanding of shared history. This is why the team at Art Gallery Kazanlak established The Searchers programme, of which this exhibition is a part. This long-term project presents fragments of private collections formed through the dedication of various collectors. Our goal is not only to offer residents and visitors of Kazanlak the opportunity to experience rare artefacts—without which both Bulgarian and European art history would be incomplete—but also to raise important questions about the phenomenon of private collections and their crucial role in the preservation of contemporary art and cultural heritage. Another key aim of this programme is to initiate meaningful discussion on the challenges of the art market, the role of art historians within it, and the possible initiatives and policies to encourage collecting.