Description

Maya Polsky Gallery, Chicago, 1990. Exhibition Catalog, 12 pp. In very good condition. Illustrated paper covers have light bumping to edges and corners and light overall scuffing. Binding tight (staple bound). Pages clean and unmarked. NOT Ex-library. NO remainder marks. Includes 12 color plates of Kantorov's works, Introduction by Kantorov, and biography/ exhibition list to date. [From introduction] My series Rusted Silver is dedicated to the Silver Age, one of the most exciting periods in Russian history, from the end of the 1890's through 1917. These paintings were conceived as a postscript to the aesthetics of decadence which preceded the Russian Revolution. It was this period which gravely foreshadowed a crisis of humanitarian values. Christian concepts of love, salvation, and eternal life were replaced by the idea of eternal death. This change of ideology led to the establishment of what I call New Paganism. The cubism of Rodchenko, Popov, and Tatlin, mummification of Lenin, and the erection of the Mausoleum in the center of Moscow are all expressions of paganism which occurred as a result of the revolution. It was during this time that Kasimir Malevich wrote his manifesto in which he described his ideas about Suprematism in art. He believed that creativity existed only in the geometry of form rather than in nature. His painting titled Black Square, executed in 1914, became a symbol of Suprematism. In the series, Rusted Silver, these different art movements and cultural changes are portrayed in my paintings. Images, quotations, colors, and textures are used to depict the colorful world of decadence, salon art, impressionism, supremative constructions, their colors, textures, totalitarian and Christian symbols. My female figures represent the aesthetics of decadence which incorporates cynicism, mannerism, and love for detail. Geometric signs are in conflict with the fluid lines of the female form. The inherent conflict is a symbolic warning of the approaching revolution, civil war, and world catastrophies. DMITRI KANTOROV