14 December, 15

Novo-Molokovo Cultural Center

In December 2015, a Cultural Center opened in the Novo-Molokovo residential complex, for which the Aksenov Family Foundation produced a temporary exhibition from its collection. Within walking distance of Novo-Molokovo residents were works by the first names of the contemporary Russian art scene — Dmitry Gutov, Konstantin Zvezdochetov, Alexander Vinogradov and Vladimir Dubosarsky, and Alexey Kallima. The exhibition for residents continued the concept of the complex, where film screenings, lectures, and sport events make up an extensive leisure and educational programme.

  • Two works by Dmitry Gutov from the series "Far from the Dust" set a contemplative mood. Continuing the conceptual approach in art, for many years Gutov has been engaged in a dialogue with the great masters of the past, with passed schools and traditions. The subjects of his works were Rembrandt's engravings, ancient myths, and in these works — the Eastern tradition of ink writing. This technique is seen in the East as meditation, and in order to achieve the desired clarity of consciousness, one must detach oneself from the world and its vanity, or "dust," and focus on the process of controlling the brush.

Alexey Kallima's graphic sheet from the "Gray Days" series also encourages us to focus on details and see a kind of abstract drawing behind the contours of the wheel tracks. The interpenetration of the momentary and the eternal is also suggested by the colour of the work. The gray stripes on the gray snow turn, according to Kallima, into "a gray swarming mass of beetles-machines," thus presenting the colour of everyday life. At the same time, the landscape stretched literally behind the artist's window, on Spartakovskaya Square, combines the signs of the past, the present and the possible future, or, if you add them together, eternity.

Alexey Kallima, from the "Gray Days" series, 2013, red and black chalk on paper, 60x80 cm
  • Kallima's achromatic palette is contrasted with the bright colours of Alexander Vinogradov's and Vladimir Dubosarsky's paintings based on RDI Group's development projects. In 2014, they were included in the large-scale exhibition "Moscow: Escaping Reality", organized by the Triumph Gallery and the Museum of Moscow. In "New Settlement," the artists traditionally use images of mass culture to place Cheburashka and Crocodile Gena against the background of a newly constructed contemporary building, evoking a rush of nostalgia in the audience. Similarly, the image of the Olympic Bear works in the painting He's Back, which uses another favorite technique of the artistic duo — the combination of two non-overlapping realities' elements on the canvas. The work was painted in 2014 right before the Winter Olympics, inviting the viewer to compare eras, symbols, the houses' architecture, as well as the moods of their inhabitants.

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