Interview with artist Yuri Kuper

ARTinvestment.RU – 02.08.2010,15:32

In July 2010 an artist, graphic artist, sculptor, designer and director Yuri L. Cooperman (Cooper) said 70-year anniversary. Did not hide his indifference to political protest, he left the USSR as one of the first, in 1972. For years, its fate there were only scraps of information: Yes, in France, yes, in America, yes, all right, works.

Now Yuri Kuper live mainly in Russia and continues to work hard. Here he has lots of interesting projects - theatrical, exhibition, architectural, design. At the finish line - a project of the theater in Perm, go gem-quality "book artist", are the embodiment of many projects in the field of interior design.

formed in the sixties, Cooper is also quite modern and willing to take to adopt modern technologies. Its new design and architectural designs - decorative and bold - not decorated in sketches, and in three-dimensional computer graphics. It is evident that the idea of the artist inexhaustible. A visit to Cooper admire the recently published "Book of Job» - livre d'artiste, published in an edition of 30 copies and the price of 25,000 euros each. And talking about art - in the world and in Russia.

ARTinvestment.RU: Summer in all senses dawned hot, vibrant artistic . Here's the other day became known sentence to organizers of the exhibition "Forbidden Art". On the eve of the rally was, in which artists expressed their support to the organizers. In general, what do you think about the current state of contemporary art and its place in and around the processes?

Yuri Kuper: for contemporary art watch, but more for overseas. My attitude to public shares is that they lie in the area of cheap PR, but not in the area of art. Nothing to do with the artistic process, and more to social complaints, as in housing office. Like that guy who "passed Teschin home I have no jokes do not go ..." For me it's all from the same region. But on the other hand, if I were in the shoes of those people, then I probably would do the same thing. And these guys are right that they are doing this. Because without this general had nothing to say - they would then fall into the zone of plastic art.

But we live in times when the painting itself has no such meaning. We are intelligent people do not try to sell paintings, they are trying to sell tickets to the exhibition. By "three rubles, but many. And to sell many tickets, it is necessary or bark like a dog, or something else. Just because people buy tickets will not be. We must show the action. And just like that, unless the painting to hang, the people will not go. Now art is becoming more curatorial. The system of buying and investment is another, more ostentatious. No chance now more keen to buy at auctions, rather than in galleries. After the auction the buyer becomes more noticed.

AI: And on the western scene of contemporary art which artists raise your interest?

JK : One of the most pressing for me painters - Anselm Kiefer (Anselm Kiefer). If we talk about art as a sport, then surely, this man - a scientist who is engaged in a pure form of modern painting. I can tell Cy Twombly (Cy Twombly). But this is not your generation. And your - they have long looked journals on art and scratched in this direction. How all this social art. Here Ilya Kabakov worked on a purely Soviet-material. Already Kosolapov , Juice - all this is some Americanisms, built according to principles of Western pop art. There is nothing peculiar. In general, many developing as though by a saying "Let Tweety to Europe. Ratings artists some write ... Provincial desire to be like that as there.

AI: What are your exhibitions are planned in Russia?

JK : In October will be the exhibition Natalia Kournikova (gallery "Our artists». - AI .) - paintings, book graphics , sculpture, ceramics and jewelry works. As of November planned a large exhibition in Petrograd, in the ethnographic museum. There will be installations on the theme "The Bronze Horseman". And yet in the Hermitage is to be held an exhibition devoted to the recently published "The Book of Job" (artist book) and works related to this project. But the precise date not yet determined.

Now I have a lot of projects in Russia, involving not only with painting and drawing. I do architectural and interior design. Now, in particular, worked out the design of the theater in Voronezh. There, the old theater, which was destroyed during the war. My friend Volodya Petrov, with whom we were doing performances at the Moscow Art Theatre named after Chekhov, was invited to the director. Petrov put the condition that it will work, if he repaired the old theater. Work is moving, sketches have already been made.

AI: You have emigrated to the 1972-m?

JK : Yes. First went to Israel, where he lived for six months, then to France. He lived in France and in America, where I now have a Connecticut studio. A citizenship - British.

AI: How do you always have time?

JK : Well, and do not have time.

AI: How did the creative life in exile?

JK : First hard. Then I started working with the gallery "Odermatt, then with Claude Bernard, then with the Gallery of the Jan Circles - Diteshaym" with "Bukinri de l'institut" and another with Valois and Benoit (Paris gallery owners. - AI .). In short, gradually began to learn to write and began to work with good galleries.

some miracle was not. But the meeting was turning. I met with photographer John Stewart, an intelligent man. We talked with him for a long time, but he has never seen my work. One says: "Can you show me?" And when I saw told me: "Listen, you're fine artist, and doing some nonsense. Why not just write the reality? Those objects that surround you. " And I also went to a time when the USSR was a period of such postsyurrrealizma. All were engaged in poetic speculation. And so after a conversation with Stewart, I instantly in the same technique began to write his studio, objects.

AI: How do I correct to call the style in which you are currently working on? The melancholic realism?

JK : I do not know. It makes sense for critics the event one ideology. And for an artist - that's what you show me 20 centimeters huge canvas, and I'll tell you, this artist did or no one.

AI: You've told that to our meeting prepared the text about the investments and processes on the art market?

JK : Yes, although I feel it can not publish. Why? Because it is contrary to what they do websites, magazines.

AI: Let's not conjecture. Our site is bold. Critical opinion we hold dear. Read that written?

JK ( Reads. ): Once many years ago I had be at the dinner. It was arranged on the opening day of one of the artists the gallery Claude Bernard. It was in Paris. My neighbor was a pretty big collector - a banker dealing with investments. It is quite a long time asking me who the artists can be considered a genius who should be buying. I have long and patiently listened and then asked another question - and one of you, bankers involved in risky investments, can be considered a genius? He smiled: "In our case all elementary. If you hear from each of the concierge what to buy futures on sugar, so they must sell ».

How many times I've seen the dark, ignorant aunts and uncles, running with lists of artists, which "must take". Lists were drawn up as dark, but slightly more advanced friends. If you listen to all their arguments, then you will hear words such as liquidity, rating, even something like the prestige, the phrase "no one would accuse you of bad taste" and so on. These people live in houses built for them by strangers, but fashion designers, whose names were also listed. Their walls are hung with works bought on the list of "must take". Their whole life - this is a fashion magazine, ratings, avenues of liquidity. They dress the same way. In my time it was known as gentleman's set. They have everything except his own choice. They do not have their affections, their own taste, the space in which they exist. They go to a strange and often uncomfortable clothes just out of fear of being out of fashion, is not the topic.

They do not understand the meaning of high fashion and high style lies precisely in the fact that be fashionable. A simple, sometimes naive purchaser, does not understand that all ratings and investment programs just there for them, "suckers" that will lead to the lists and pamphlets liquidity. And they are prepared as dark sellers - "thieves in law". So they live, feeling the need for each other. They can not understand that the meaning of collecting quite different. And it has nothing to do with liquidity, not to ratings. A sense of wanting to have this thing. It's like love at first sight. You can not abandon your impulse. You must have this, have the opportunity to look at it, admiring it. Otherwise you are just ridiculous and meaningless nerd and your collection - lohodrom. And to understand and comprehend your "lohodromiyu", try to sell the product rating back to the person who sold it to you.

Price - a thing quite conventional. A kilogram of gold or a pound of salt? During the war, the salt may be more expensive. Costaki , a great collector, became the object of envy and admiration of his extraordinary talent to buy cheap. During the war he bought and Shagalov at a price that never dreamed of a modern Marchand - a loaf of bread, 100 grams of butter, a pound of flour.

And he did not run to resell. I have not thought about liquidity. He thought of eternity, creating a monument. He created himself as a legendary chronicler of his time. No collections he would have been just a Greek who served in the Canadian Embassy. And no collection no one would know that he lived at all, except his family and relatives.

AI: I do not agree. "Trendy" is not taken on an empty place. Gallery owners, curators, and consultants are doing a tremendous job. They subscribed to all the world, read, watch, carry out a competent selection and eventually offer the buyer a special intellectual product, which can be confused with the installation mode. Many buyers do not have such amount of time to delve as deeply into the topic.

Yu.K. : I'm talking about the gathering, when for man is part of life. How is "no time»?

AI: Man at least the first stage should be sent, otherwise it ponakupit such that then totally disappointed in collecting and in general all the cast. And on the investment component is useful to think.

JK : It can happen. If I was Marchand, it is probably also would work as they were. But I have many years he engaged in creative work, and a lot to me seems ridiculous. Here's an example. One kollektsionerka asked me - well, anyone buying? I told her that was a great Russian artist Ivan Pokhitonov . She asks in her Marchand, who sold her Tarkhova and others. The Marshal said to her that Pokhitonov - is "vtororeytingovy" or "tretereytingovy" artist. And she gets tangled up: an artist who uses her respect, alleges that Pokhitonov - a good artist, but Marshal - that all this nonsense. Instead he sold her ten things Tarkhova. How can she understand?

AI: It is natural that collectors are thinking not only about aesthetic pleasure, but also on the investment component. Do not underestimate the view of market prospects of purchased works.

JK : In some cases, even the people who like Pokhitonov, begin to doubt . When prices fell Pohitonova, I told my friends say: 'What are you now not buy cheaper? "And they answered:" We are already thinking about liquidity. And you can not judge these people. What should I consider that my opinion is the only sure thing. What am I - guru?

in every genre of art has its champions. When we talk about painting, then in this "sport discipline" has its own master. That's what I can argue who is who. And when it comes to conceptual art, this "sport", which I was not engaged. Itself can, of course, by the look smarter than someone who is more stupid, but I will not attempt to give solid assessment. Are quite different rules. You can not judge an artist who is not engaged in painting, and say that it is poorly written. He does not need to write well. That is not his task.

AI: In an interview, read what you Levitan very much. Is it true? Indeed, favorite artist?

JK : True, like. But why love? From this period, there are two prominent painter in Russian painting - and the Kuindzhi . Two air painter who has great qualities. Once they showed me a picture with a fake signature Levitan. Sketch, which depicts the trees and sky. But the tree branches were made, it seemed to me, the largest master. Poddelschik do not do. Looking at these branches, I said that I do not know, Levitan or not, but it made a major artist. The owner made examination. It turned out that the signature is forged, and the picture Levitan.

But to say that Levitan and Kuindzhi - two of my favorite artist, I can not. If you ask about Italy, I can call Fra Angelico and Leonardo. This is not just loved it the gods. In the same way about Spain - it Velasquez. But if you pin me against the wall that said, who loved, then Fra Angelico.

AI: What are you working on now? What attracts you most?

JK : many projects. I'm making another book project - "The Bronze Horseman" was published by the Rare Book from St. Petersburg, with whom I made the Book of Job. " What carries the most? Perhaps a change of hands - fun to do different things, one thing after another.

C Yuri Cooper interviewed Vladimir Bogdanov, AI

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