BELIUYIN Eliy (Eligy) Mikhailovich

Forget about everything. There is no home; there is no work; there is no Moscow. Don’t go to bed if you haven’t drawn two-three good sketches. Draw and paint everything you see — there is nothing uninteresting; there is a subject for the painter everywhere. Be independent, be original; don’t fear to exaggerate, to change, and to emphasize something. Remember, that exaggeration and metaphor are the fundamentals of art.
E. Beliutin

June 10, 1925 (Moscow)

Painter, graphic artist, collector, art historian, teacher

Eliy Beliutin studied at Moscow Art institute named after V. I. Surikov (1942–1946); he also finished postgraduate course (1949). Beliutin began to participate in different exhibitions in 1947. He was a member of the Union of artists of the USSR (SKh SSSR) since 1947, but in 1948 he was expelled from the Union. In 1953 Beliutin became Candidate of Art History.

In 1946 Beliutin founded the art studio, which was the basis of the art movement New Reality. Subsequently studio became the first workshop of the non-figurative art under the Professional Union of graphic artists (1959–1962).

One of the objectives of our studies will be liberation of the emotions of an artist, which were suppressed by the demands of the imitative handicraft. You need to have faith in yourself and in your true art feelings, in manifestation of your art individuality. We need to return ability and capability of bright perception to the intimidated artist, to return fresh impressions and ability to express and reproduce artist’s thoughts and feelings for people — consumers of art. The Soviet art must be on a level with the world modern art.
E. Beliutin

In 1964 art studio was organized in the dacha of Beliutin in Abramtsevo. In 1960s–1970s annual autumn and spring exhibitions of the studio were held in Abramtsevo.

Since 1954 Beliutin lectured at the Studio of advanced trainings under Moscow Polygraphic Institute. In 1959 he was dismissed from the Institute for propaganda of abstractionism.

Beliutin took part in a lot of exhibitions in the Soviet Union and abroad. His first personal exhibition was held in Moscow in 1948. Later personal exhibitions of the artist were organized in Warsaw, Paris, Rome, and Washington.

In 1962 Beliutin organized exhibition of works of artists from his studio in Moscow (Bolshaya Kommunisticheskaya Street, Taganka). Participants of the exhibition were E. Neizvestny, Y. Nolev-Sobolev, Ü. Sooster, and V. Yankilevsky. The exhibition was moved to the Manezh, was severely and ideologically criticized together with the exposition 30 years of MOSKh (Moscow Section of the Union of Artists).

In 1990 big exhibition of the artists of the Beliutin’s circle was held in Manezh in Moscow.

Eliy Beliutin was the author of books about Russian Art Pedagogy History of the 18th — beginning of the 20th centuries (often in co-authorship with his wife and art historian N. M. Moleva).

Beliutin’s style of painting evolved from expressionism to non-figurative art; his late paintings-modules were entirely void of figurative component.

Works by Eliy Beliutin are in the State Tretyakov Gallery (Moscow), in the State Russian Museum (St. Petersburg), in the Pompidou Center (Paris, France) and in other museum and private collections.