Cathy's Art Diary

Interesting day of lectures from London Art History Society held at Friend’s House on the reaction against Modernist art by the dictators of the inter war years. Richard Humphreys organised the talks by country starting with an overview of what was happening at the centre of the avant-garde in Paris. We tend to concentrate on the major modern movements which started there like Cubism and Surrealism but Humprey’s looked at the reaction against these movements often led by the right wing and nationalism. He then used this discussion of the reaction to lead to talks on Italy and Mussolini, Russia and Stalin and Germany and Hitler where similar themes and subjects emerged such as the role of technology and how it represented in art, the desire to memorialise and use the history of the countries and the propaganda use of art. Because of the similar themes the country talks became a bit repetitive so I wonder if it might have been better to arrange it by theme, flagging what was happe...

Fascinating online lecture from the York Festival of Ideas on the Russian 20th century artist Natalia Goncharova. Elena Kashina from the Centre of Lifelong Learning, University of York took us through the artists career via a series of paintings showing how she forged a ground-breaking style based on tradition and innovation, was the conduit of the Russian avant-garde to the rest of the west and influenced developments in the performing arts in the 20th century. I had really enjoyed the Goncharova exhibition at Tate Modern a few years ago so it was lovely to revisit these pictures and to have the various art groups she started explained in more detailed. I loved the idea of the Donkey’s Tail group painted their faces and advertised where they were going to be to attract crowds and the press. I liked the section on her work for the Ballet Russe and the artistic family she joined there as I have been doing some research on them recently.  

Fascinating online lecture from York Festival of Ideas looking at 19th century Russian landscape painting. Elena Kashina from the Centre for Lifelong Learning, University of York pointed out that Western panting had not really been known in Russia before the time of Peter the Great and when an academy was founded in 1757 it took on the French pattern of history painting being the highest genre. However Russia needed more grounded art and a form for itself. Landscape emerged and filled this role. She took us through the main artists, highlighting some of their works and pointing out what they brought to the genre. She talked us through the symbolism of the work and how it was upholding Russian ideas of rural life and folk culture as well as religious and spiritual ideals. I knew none of these artists and like her clear structured approach. I will certainly be looking out for them in the future. The picture I liked best that she showed was “Spring – Big Water” by Isaac Levitan fro...

Stunning exhibition at Tate Modern on the life and work of the Russian artist Natalia Goncharova. The show was wonderfully colourful and included paintings, textile designs, book illustrations and theatrical designs. It chartered her work from rural Imperial Russia to her life in Paris after the 1920s. I loved the early work and it was a nice touch to show it with a peasants outfit of the time to show you where the colours and vibrancy came from. She showed an interest in textiles throughout her life and in fact the name of her family estate meant “cloth factory” and a number of the pictures in this section looked at the process of cloth making. The show looked at how Moscow, where Goncharova moved when she was eleven, was one of the best places in the world to see modern part as two industrialists, Ivan Morozov and Sergie Shchukin, had huge collections which they opened to the public and there was a room of pictures Goncharova would have seen there plus works they purc...

Sumptuous exhibition at the Queen’s Gallery looking at the relationship between the English and Russian royal families. The show started with Peter the Great’s visit to London in 1698, the first Russian ruler to visit Britain and ranged through to portraits of the Queen and Queen Mother commissioned from a Russian artists in late 1940s. I found the narrative of the show a bit muddled with lots of names of British and Russian minor royals I’d not heard of before. It livened up as it hit the Victorian era and looked at Victoria’s marital ambitions for her family. I liked the fact that the show included objects and documents as well as paintings and of course it’s always fun to see the Queen’s Faberge. Some of the large malachite and ceramic vases did make me wonder what the English reaction was to the Russian’s arriving for a visit with these vast gifts of bling! The slight elephant in the room was why, given the close links shown in the show, our royal family didn’t help...

Fascinating workshop at the Conway Hall organised by the London Art History Society looking at Russian art in the years after the Revolution. In the morning we looked at now the revolutionaries used art to create the Soviet myth. We discussed how many established artists fled Russia in 1917 so the Bolsheviks has to choose the avant garde to further their cause and these artists were inspired by the events. Kandinsky returned to Russia after 16 years in Germany. We also looked at the use posters to spread propaganda and the idea of Monumental propaganda with great parades for the anniversaries of the revolution. We then looked at the work of Malevich and Russian Futurism focusing on the work following the Black Square in 1915 and we explored the possible meanings of this work. We also talked about how a lot of his work was left in Berlin on a trip he was allowed to make outside of Russia which meant that he is one of the best know Russian artists of this period in the West....

Fascinating exhibition at the British Museum looking at a nomadic people, Scythians, who originated in Siberia and from 800-200 BC controlled the land between North China and the Black Sea. This exhibition had some stunning gold objects but most interesting was how the Scythians had no written language so we have to work out their beliefs and how their society worked from the objects they have left. Also they were largely forgotten about until the early 18th century when their tombs were found. I was very interested in the section on how Peter the Great sent out expeditions to investigate and excavate the tombs and had the finds systematically recorded and drawn when they were brought back to St Petersburg. There was a wonderful section looking at some of the tombs and including a head plus the skin off a body to show the intricate tattoos as well as a lovely selection of gold jewellery. I loved the sets of tiny gold plaques which were sewn on their clothes like gold sequi...

Fascinating exhibition at the British Library marking the centenary of the Russian Revolution and looking at its causes and consequences. The show told the story really well using the objects and books to illustrate it rather than letting the story be driven by the objects. The commentary was clear and interesting. It felt a bit wordy in places but this was needed as so many of the books and posters were in Russian so they couldn’t explain themselves. I loved the entrance hall with opulent red velvet curtains and chandeliers but with a copy of the Communist Manifesto displayed in it. The section on the Tsar and the period before the Revolution was wonderful and packed full of stories. There was a good section on the coronation and the stampede following it to get free souvenirs which was rumoured to have killed 1389 people. They had one of the original tin souvenir mugs nicknamed since the “Cup of Sorrows”. It was a lovely touch to include Lenin’s application form for the ...

Interesting exhibition at the Design Museum tracing the history of post-revolution Russian design through six unrealised architectural projects. The idea of using the six projects is clever in that each sets a theme but in some cases there seems to be very little on the actual project itself. For example the first section looked at Cloud Iron, El Lissitzky’s horizontal skyscraper which was used to show how images of aviation were used to show Communist ideals but there were only a few sketches of the actual imagined building. It was interesting to ponder what some of these projects would have been like. Most of them had the gem of a good idea but it all felt like it was being imposed on people for their own good. I loved El Lissitzky’s idea for a health factory where workers could retreat and spend time in isolated rest cubical and get their food off conveyor belts in communal areas all with the idea of ‘productive rest’. As with the Royal Academy show I loved the inc...

Fantastic exhibition at the Royal Academy looking at how art and design was used following the Russian Revolution to embed its ideals. From the wonderful red of the first room I was hooked and my O level history came rushing back! The show concentrated on art but incorporated posters, textiles, ceramics and film. It   also blended the art and history well. It didn’t assume you knew the history but wasn’t patronising in its narrative. The rooms were a good mix of themes and looking at artists. I discovered lots of fascinating modern artists I’d not come across before. I loved the portraits of Lenin by Issak Brodsky. I also kept being drawn to work by Pavel Filonov such as a picture of a tractor workshop with tractor parts forming the pattern in the middle of the composition. I also liked his dense pictures, which he called formula, which looked a bit like maps on first view but were lots of small images brought together in pattern. I loved the reconstruction of Mal...

Fascinating exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery of pictures of writers, actors, musicians and art patrons from Russia at the end of the 19th century. The portraits were collected and commissioned by Pavel Tretakov for the state gallery he set up. This proved to be a golden age for Russian portraiture and the arts there. The pictures were really well hung with interesting dialogues being set up. I loved the wall with Turgenev, Dostoevsky and Tolstoy in a line. I also discovered lots of interesting new people I want to investigate further such as the patron Savva Mamontov who founded an artists’ colony and financed an opera company and yet he looks like a very serious railway magnate in his picture. My two favourite pictures were both of women. I loved the poster girl Baroness Varvara Ikskill von Holdenbandt in a wonderful red dress with the finest black veil on her hat which seemed to split her face in half. I also liked a full length picture of the actress Mari...

Fantastic exhibition at the Science Museum looking at the story of Russia’s relationship with space. The show was visually stunning with lots of fantastic objects and stories. It was brilliantly laid out with good vistas through the displays and there was always something ahead to catch the eye! I was fascinated that it not only looked at the science but also at the philosophy of space in Russia. The 1917 revolution encouraged people to think of new worlds on earth and the Cosmos. Soon after the revolution clubs grew up which encouraged people to exchange ideas of space and there looked at the imaginative possibilities. A philosopher called Tsiokovsky imaged the science and he was followed by Korolev, who developed the science off the back of missile research. It told the stories of the people so well with a great section on the early Cosmonauts with a particular look at Yuri Gagarin and how he was chosen for his character as well as his abilities as they realised the...

Fascinating exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum on Russian theatre from 1913-1933. I began this show on the corridor by the theatre galleries in which the museum often hold small shows and displays so I was expecting it to be about 5 cases in size so I lingered there! Then I turned a corner and it went on into the galleries and actually turned out to be quite a large exhibition! I found it fascinating as it became not only a history of the theatre but also a history of art and design in Russia at that time.   It was interesting to see the radical art which fed into the Revolution and then the effects of Stalin. I had studied the Russia from the Revolution to the Cold War at O level but never thought of it in terms of art before! I particularly liked a section in the middle with a series of small set models. I did wonder how actors moved on some of the more sets which had stairs and floors at odd angles. Similarly how they would have worn some of the Cubis...

Colourful exhibition at the Courtauld Gallery of work by the Russian Jack of Diamonds group. This group was formed following an exhibition of modern art in Russia in 1910 which reminded me of a similar show in London that year organised by Roger Fry of work by the post impressionists. There seemed to be a lot of women in the group and they looked back to folk art and playing cards, which they called “people’s pictures”, for their inspiration. There was a lovely picture by Olga Rozanova “Queen of Diamonds” which showed a card design in a colourful , bold design. I loved Aristarkh Lentulov’s “Flowers” an abstract picture of pink and red roses on a surface of blocks of colour. Also Mikhail Larlonov’s two still lives described as being in the major and minor key which had not been shown together since 1910. This is a group I will look out for in the future, they had a slight feel of the Scottish Colourists but without the big hats!

Interesting exhibition at the Photographers’ Gallery looking at colour photography in Russian both from a technical point of view but also to show the social history of the country. I loved the early works which were hand tinted. You couldn’t help but look at formal late Victorian pictures without a sense of foreboding as to what was to come. My favourite was a picture of a lady in a bustle out collecting flowers with a basket but behind he was a bare foot peasant boy carrying her bag and umbrella. All very Tolstoy and yes there was a photograph of Tolstoy! It was interesting to see how this fashion for hand tinted family photographs came back at least twice in the twentieth century bringing with it a sense of nostalgia. The revolutionary section was very purposeful. I liked the fact that the show included pictures of food which had been produced to go in cookery books to try to education the population on nutrition. The photographer had done his best with a pile of l...

Clever exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum looking at trade and diplomacy between England and Russia in the 16th and 17th centuries. The basis of the exhibition was a loan from Russia of an amazing collection of silver which had been given to Russia as diplomatic gifts in this period. These were items which could have been melted down in the Civil War if they had not gone abroad so they are almost unique pieces. Around this loan the museum then used other objects to discuss what the Tudor and Stuart courts were like and the role of diplomacy. I liked the display of armour beside an armorers record book. I loved the little chain mail ankle socks! The best item was a beautiful portrait of Thomas Smith, governor of the Muscovy Company and the best fact I learnt was that the pelicans in St James Park are descended from those given to Charles II by the Then Tsar! I’ll save that one up for a pub quiz! Reviews Telegraph Evening Standard   ...

Interesting exhibition at the Saatchi Gallery looking at the art which came out of the Moscow underground from about 1960 to 1990. I would have liked more explanation with these works as my Russian history was not good enough to put the works in context. Also I didn’t understand some of the section heading such an analytical art. I think this would have helped me appreciate the works more. I liked the super real large paintings near the end by Vitaly Komar and Alexander Lemamid such as the Stalin in front of a mirror. Also the works by Illya Kabakov with rosettes of the colours used in the picture stuck on to them.   Reviews Evening Standard  

Exhibition of works by contemporary Russian artists at the Saatchi Gallery. Oh dear I think I started by not understanding the title as I found most of the works quite depressing. I liked the way they were shown and allowed to stand on their own without explanation but maybe in my case a bit of explanation was needed! There were interesting vertigo inducing large photographs of people sitting in the windows of high rise buildings by Vikenti Nilin. However I found the photos of the homeless by Boris Mikhailov moving but profoundly depressing. I did however love the large townscapes by Yalery Koshlyakov particularly the one of the Paris Opera painted on torn up cardboard boxes. Despite the fact it looks quite coarsely painted they worked from a distance and close to. Reviews Times Observer    

Charming exhibition at the V&A of the ceremonia clothes of the Tsars. Held in the fashion gallery this is a small exhibition but has some amazing clothes to see. Most of it is taken up by coronation clothes of the Tsars and their entourage. It shows how they change of using Western style uniforms to moving back to more peasant style garb. Most stunning was a mantle from the Coronation of Nicholas II with the freshest ermine. However most exciting was the clothes of Peter the Great’s grandson Peter II, who dies aged 14 after ruling for 3 years. These were the clothes of a teenage boy and having spent New Year with friends teenage boys I can’t imagine them in anything like this. There were wonderful sets of coats ad waistcoats with deep gold embroidery. Some, which he wore more often, had had the seams let out as he grew. These items were so poignant. Reviews Times Guardian Evening Standard

Exhibition at the Royal Academy showing modern masterpieces drawn from Russia’s principal collections. This was a superb exhibition and I may well try to go again. Split into two halves the first showed French works which had been collected by Russians and the second half the effect on Russian art of having these pictures on display in the country. It was really as case of name a French artist of the late C19th/early C20th and they were there, Monet, Renoir, Cezanne, Matisse, Picasso and more. A real visual feast, but also a look at the trends in collecting which seems to be a recurring theme in exhibitions t the moment. How to pick a favorite when Matisse’s Dance II was there dominating the main room? As ever I seem to be drawn to the portraits of women from that of Nadezhola Polovtsova by Carolus-Duran in the first room, with stunning contasts of a black dress against a red chair to that of Anna Akhmalova by Altman, this time a contrast in yellow and blue. Throw in a wonderfully ta...