Today at the State Literary Museum opens exhibition of paintings and graphic art Russian artist beginning of XX century Alexander Konovalov

Today, October 29, at the State Literary Museum opens exhibition of paintings and graphic art Russian artist beginning of XX century Alexander Konovalov « I am all - tone pearl watercolor. The exhibition, prepared by gallery "Vellum", will be presented to some 100 watercolors and graphic works by 1900's - 1910-ies, as well as more recent series of Kamchatka types. In fact, this is indeed the return of Russian Art Nouveau artist in contemporary cultural space.

lines from a poem «I am all - tone pearl watercolor "fine art characterize addiction Alexander Konovalov, and the very time the Art Nouveau style. Themes of many artist's watercolors are drawn from dragging the entire Russian intelligentsia "fairy tale", as well as classical mythology.

From the creative heritage of this remarkable artist to have survived mostly watercolors, most 1900's - 1920's and a series of works of pre-war time. Them - from work to work from notes on the note in periodicals, and now from the directory to the directory from the exhibition to exhibition - Gallery "Vellum" meticulously collected over several years.

S. Alexander Konovalov was born in Moscow in 1883. In the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, where she received a very young, in 1899, Konovalova studied simultaneously with the creators of the famous "Blue Rose» - P. Utkin , N. Milioti , N. Sapunov , P. Kuznetsov .

Watercolors abroad Konovalova 1900's - 1910's - the reflection of her artistic life in modern, subtle quotation of Russian Art Nouveau era. Pupil Vrubel , Nivinsky , Shechtel, an artist, professing the same principles as its contemporaries, the Symbolists, immersed in the overall cultural environment with them, also a compilation of them, as they are in relation to each other: How, for example, Sapunov to Utkin: the same half-tones, the same "Sfumato, the same delicate musical images. Long, like threads of rain, watercolor brush strokes are replaced by their pearly transparency. By the end of teens Konovalova commitment to originality resulting in colorful poster candor tracks familiar to Kuzma Sergeevich Petrov-Vodkin , to compile the figures. Later, in the thirties, were "Antiformalist attack" officialdom, the artist becomes hard realist, but the attraction to myths, fairy tales and love for the mysterious and did not leave her. Konovalova, living in Chukotka, where she threw the terrible reality of the Stalinist era, is drawn to the mystical traditions of the aborigines. Playing the shamans, it illustrates the sacramental life of the North.

Her deep knowledge of Russian and European mythology, his poetry of the Symbolists raised intriguingly mysterious ways, though an open window to another world with the era inherent affective, mythological delights.

Director of the gallery "Vellum" Love Agafonov: "In the symbolist, mythological watercolors Alexander Konovalov, there is a sense of simultaneity yesterday and now, real and infernal. It plunges, with no less skill than Milioti or Viktor Borisov-Musatov , in space unknown, not forcing the viewer's consciousness, and music easily pulling in dance hoaxes. This is akin to children's feelings when you listen to a fairy tale: Every new word increases the interest - what's next, what the clue from the mysterious history? I have no strength to not get carried away, do not succumb to this temptation, wrapped in mystery ».

In 1915-1917 her work exhibited at the Christmas exhibition of the Society of Artists "free creativity". Here is the full Moscow audiences could enjoy Konovalov interpretations of the "fairy tale", to absorb the Russian folk flavor and European pictorial language.

It seems that the artist just goes by "goluborozovskoy" trajectory. Her watercolors abroad 1900 - 1910-ies - aesthetically, a bit bookish, Russian Art Nouveau style quest. In 1920, she creates works of time, with clear colors, designing forms, but a synthesis of aesthetics reminds poster.

vague myth and life itself is like an artist, blurring the outlines of which in a bloody haze. Her biography takes an unexpected, tragic, somewhat paradoxical turn. If her early works in the Art Nouveau style were deprived of historicism, the few remaining in the second half of life we have, by contrast, are trying to read her biography. The drawings and watercolors by early 1920 - nurses, officers, boats against the backdrop of hills. White Army? No wonder, then, that in the thirties was an artist in Kamchatka. It is for her salvation or creative business trip? More questions than answers. Externally, it is realistic, but even simple workflow sees myth and mysticism. Koryak shamans like coming into a reality of its modernist dream.

It is known that the mythology of the Silver Age in the converted form was featured on the formation of Soviet mythology. Obviously no accident itself biography Alexander Konovalov, acquired a mythic dimension.

The exhibition is open until November 22, 2009.

Source: press-release.ru