Artist of the week: Ilya Kabakov. Towards the retrospective in Russia
ARTinvestment.RU   18 апреля 2018

From 21 April to 29 June 2018 at the Main headquarters of the St. Petersburg Hermitage will host an exhibition of Ilya and Emilia Kabakov "In the future take not all" — scale retrospective of the key figures of Moscow conceptualism and of the pioneer total installations

Already in September we will see her in Moscow in the Tretyakov gallery.

Ilya and Emilia Kabakov — the most famous Russian artists in the West from among the living. Abroad about them have been published dozens of art studies. The heads on them are already included in textbooks on the history of modern art. Their show almost 30 years pass in the best world museums, and the work became known in private collections. It is the work of simulated belongs to the absolute auction record for Russian postwar art. Of all the living Russian artists of Kabakov's work, only six times has surpassed a million dollars in international auctions. Success Kabakov — partly luck, but more the result of colossal work, begun more than 50 years ago. The West only strengthened the priority Kabakov in a new direction of art. Working in the USSR in 1960-х, having donned the mask of the "little man", playing the character and playing him, Kabakov showed an example of how to set and perform self-daring tasks in the art.

Ilya Kabakov born on September 30, 1933 in Dnepropetrovsk in the family of Joseph locksmith Bentsionovich Kabakov and accountant Bella's Udeleni Solodukhin. When Kabakov was ten years old, he decided to become an artist. In 1941 the German offensive forced the family to flee, first to the Caucasus and then to Uzbekistan, where they are a few years settled in Samarkand. There in 1943, Ilya began to attend a school for evacuated children at the Leningrad Institute of painting, sculpture and architecture. After the war, with the assistance of the Director of the Leningrad Academy of arts Kabakov, he entered the Moscow secondary art school, and upon graduation in 1951-м — and-графический faculty of the Institute. V. I. Surikov, in the second year chose the main subject book illustration and began to make design children's books. Until 1987, a full thirty years, illustration was his main source of income: all he has designed some 150 children's books.

Years of study of the profession was held without much enthusiasm, from both sides: "Our teachers not only loved his work, many of them came, some of them came half-drunk... I don't remember any teacher of any art school or art Institute, which I'm not saying now, that interested me, and which is generally loved this activity and would like someone-то-то to teach". Why don't you? "No. I couldn't quit. I am a man of institutions". Important was the status that he's a student he goes to school, etc. moreover, "Surikov Institute — is the best Institute of the Soviet Union. The Surikov school and at the Surikov Institute — the best art schools. As if I belonged to this profession, except the profession I have nothing".

It is in the time the student is in Kabakov finally learned about his artistic activities: there is something he does "for them", that is, for system, and is working "for himself". At what point did this duality? Perhaps when Kabakov, together with the Institute friend Kirill Sokolov was working on histhe first book (they illustrated a "Green ink" Nicholas Luptakova). Elijah was deeply impressed by the atmosphere reigning in the house of Sokolov, and banned in the Soviet Union book in their library. From his youth the artist was oppressed with the idea that the Soviet state system without asking the person determines for him what-то role. One of these roles — "role of a private in the army of docile patriots" who without objection ready to do what they are ordered, disciplined, responsible, and take their place in the hierarchy of the Soviet planning bureaucracy. To avoid overpressure system, Kabakov has decided to "become invisible", pretend to mimic. Since the mid 1950-х he began to create works for themselves, about the things that interested him. In 1953-1960, in terms of "mimicry" he did 600-700 pencil drawings in the style of abstract expressionism. Most of those works were lost or given away, preserved little.

student became friends Kabakov, Erik Bulatov and Oleg Vasiliev (now his neighbors in the ranking of the most expensive of the sixties), they worked together at the dacha outside Moscow Bulatov, Kabakov, and it was there he created some of his "stanitski paintings": portraits, landscapes, still lifes. Where did the fascination with post-impressionism? At that time, together with Bulatov they communicated with Robert Falk. And the young Kabakov took "some extent" as an example of genuine art, lost in the Soviet culture of the modernist tradition, which was the "Muse" of many unofficial artists of the time. On its visits to the workshop Falk Kabakov later recalled as "the penetration and contact with great Painting". In one interview he even calls to some extent, "grandartоппозиционного art".

After the Institute had to decide how to exist without open confrontation in the Soviet system and Soviet way of life, but to save himself as an artist. Kabakov decided that "it is necessary to isolate ourselves, to escape from this Soviet life". At this point in his life, a wife and child. They lived in a usual communal, illustration of children's books were given livelihood and leave time to seek its own forms and means of expression, to work "for yourself" — in the evenings, sometimes until dawn.

In 1966 Kabakov joined the AOA, and two years later got his first solo Studio — in the attic of a former insurance society "Russia" on Sretensky Boulevard. Next, in the same house is his friend Julo Sooster, with whom he had shared a workshop. In the Studio Kabakov came Pivovarov, Yankilevsky, Sobolev-Нолев and other artists, whose workshops are mostly was nearby, so later on a geographic basis they were called Sretensky Boulevard group, or screencam. In the new workshop in Kabakov have the opportunity to create great work, and it was here he began making his "white" painting — white panels made of hardboard with a neatly written text and tables, filled with names, numbers and dates.

In the first half of 1980-х interest in cooperation with Moscow artists began to show Western curators and collectors. Kabakov was able to obtain permission to export individual works for two solo exhibitions — in Paris, Dina Vierny gallery and the Art Museum of Bern in 1985. Allowed to export things from two personal computers were not collected, but Kabakov has found an ingenious solution: he wrote clear instructions for creating copies of their works, the originals of which were in Moscow. And exhibitions took place.

In the mid-1980-х Kabakov invented total installation (if by-простому, from installations they differ in that the viewer to see the artwork (installation), must be in his space, and go through it, and become part of it). Perhaps the first such experience completed was the installation "the Man flown away into space from his room" (1985), which he exhibited in his Studio in Moscow, but most of the work of the new format was created in the West.

In 1988 Kabakov finally decided to emigrate, this time to America — in new-Йорк (before he thought about Germany, and after returning from the first overseas trip to the GDR in 1960-м, he persistently taught the German language). Here, he opened access to large exhibition spaces that are necessary to show total installations. After the great success of the installation "Ten characters" ("the Man flown away into space from his room" and "the Man who didn't throw anything away" was among the ten stories about the tenants of some mystical communal) Kabakov are being invited to take part in exhibitions in Paris, Berlin, Kassel Document and the Venice Biennale.

In 1989, Emilia Lekah, a distant relative Kabakov, became the wife and co-author of the artist (officially they have registered the relationship in 1992). Since they work together.

1990-е were years of global recognition and Kabakov, Kabakov, exhibition time of their triumph. In 1991 at the Kunsthalle in düsseldorf Stadlische was exhibited the installation "Red wagon", which later entered the collection of the Wiesbaden Museum. Then, right next to each other, were implemented: "the Bridge" (Museum of modern art, new-Йорк); "Life flies" (Kunsthalle, Cologne) and "toilet" (Documenta IX, Kassel, 1992). Since then, Kabakov became the most popular of modern Russian artists, works and exhibitions which are struggling the leading museums of the world.

Now Ilya and Emilia Kabakov live and work in new-Йорке. Their exhibitions are regularly held around the world. In 2018 Russian audience will see a retrospective project in Saint-Петебурге in Moscow.

Kabakov today Have formed a quite developed the gallery and auction market. In auction databases contain information about several hundred exhibited and sold lots. Public record for works by Ilya Kabakov was installed at the peak of the Russian art market in 2008. Then a large picture of a beetle with the text was sold in London for a fantastic $5 839 781. According to some, the new owner was the billionaire collector Viatcheslav Kantor ("Akron").

For the entire auction history of the works of Kabakov, six times to overcome the price level of one million dollars. That's a lot, definitely more than any living Russian artists. However, millions remain rather-таки results that much out of the price range of his works. Fair price range for his large paintings at auction now should be considered all the same $300 000-600 000.

Prices on the original schedule can vary greatly depending on the recognition and conceptualization of the plot, degree of completion, size, period, etc. Say gently: today, good drawings with a convenient opportunity to buy at auction between $3 000-5 000, plus-минус. There are on the market and more exotic formats. For example, a spectacular ceramic layer Kabakov can be hung on the wall (or place on a stand, like a plate) for about $2 500. But the most affordable for the money format on the market works Kabakov is, of course, draw graphics. Album sheets, lithographs on Russian reality cost about $1 200-2 000, although there are more expensive and cheaper.

Colored lithography, which until Friday exhibited at the Auction, — is a leaf "Rank" (1989 original 1969) from the famous album "Mikhail Grobman. Ilya Kabakov. Wonderful sixties". Take a look: this recognizable and relatively inexpensive subscription graphics can be a good addition to qualitative collection of informal post-war art.

Alexandra Danilova, AI
Vladimir Bogdanov, AI

Sources: hermitagemuseum.org; documentary (3 parts) of the First channel "Ilya Kabakov. In the future take not all" (2015): 1tv.com; ilya-emilia-kabakov.com; svoykrug.com; I. Kabakov 60-70-е... Notes on unofficial life in Moscow. — M., 2008

What else to read on the topic on AI:
AI: Ilya Kabakov at the Tate Modern;
AI: artist of the week: Ilya Kabakov;
AI: Sensation Phillips: "beetle" Kabakov for 6 million;
the Ratings of AI: Unofficial post-war art. Artists-шестидесятники;
the Ratings of AI: Now living Russian artist and.