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«Moscow Morandi» Vladimir Weisberg is one of the main and most expensive artists of unofficial post-war art. He was a loner. Weisberg used to say that “the only thing I have in common with my contemporaries is a wall”.

Rare in mood Belenok. The inventor of “panic realism” suddenly turned to a warm, optimistic plot, even if not without a slight melancholy. The author's title is “Sheer Joy”. Where did this come from? One might speculate. The year of 1987 was a time of hope and optimism.

Russian Bosch. Leonid Purygin. Or “Lenya Purygin the Genius”, as he later wrote. In Nara, in Naro-Fominsk, in the local palace of culture there was a drawing circle, which became all Purygin's universities. The artist is loved and appreciated as a creator of amazing fairy-tale worlds, where good magic neighbors with hellish images.

“The Moon with Letters” is an uncommon, conceptual subject in the work of the sixties artist Vladimir Nemukhin. We are used to card tables and jacks. And here the moon, and also strange syllables. We can assume that this is a dialogue with Velimir Khlebnikov, a reference to the poetry of the Russian avant-garde.

One and a half meter Steinberg of amazing beauty and the highest museum level. This is a classic subject for one of the main representatives of the second avant-garde. The laconic language of Suprematism, a dialogue with Malevich, but at the same time a very special aestheticism. No wonder one of his first teachers was “Petrovich” — Boris Petrovich Sveshnikov.

The title of this painting by Ernst Neizvestny refers to the Latin saying “Per aspera ad astra” by the Roman stoic philosopher Seneca. It translates as “through hardships to the stars”, a metaphor for the relentless pursuit of victory in spite of all difficulties. But in Neizvestny's painting, the title should be taken not metaphorically, but literally. It is a painting about space, about the conquest of the unknown, a hymn to human courage.

Boruch was the pseudonym of Boris Steinberg, son of Arkady Steinberg and brother of Eduard Steinberg. Considered a talented poet by his family, Boruch never published a line of his poetry, but became one of the most brilliant figures of unofficial art. He was an uncompromising and independent figure.

The context is important here. Remember, what is 1979? In the “decaying West”, there is a computer revolution. There is an incredible seething of energies, a passionate explosion. In the U.S., there is a consumption boom. At the same time, in the USSR, the era of stagnation is in full swing. Propaganda on the background of growing scarcity. But at the same time, 1979 was a time of rapid scientific and technological progress and a paradoxical flowering of culture! Such a strange time of disappointments, successes and hopes. And all these fears, doubts and optimism became part of the large-scale work of Petr Belenok — the creator of the unique concept of “panic realism”.

Nemukhin's original super-elephants exist in many designs. There are even exotic pink elephants. I suppose that initially the construction of Suprematist symbols should have been called “SUPRE-elephant”. But in our latitudes, the elephant became Russified and turned into “super”. This program plot without cards was much beloved by collectors. Everyone wanted one of these.