MASTERPIECES

BURLIUK David Davidovich (1882–1967) French girl. 1949. Oil on canvas. 46 × 36

A work of rare beauty. Burliuk, full of strength and inspiration. The expert Valery Silaev considers that this work was written during the Burliuk couple's trip to France in 1949 and, most likely, from nature. Burliuk liked traveling, so he was gaining strength. The voyage on the steamship New York to Cannes and the trips to the museums of France became a source of new vivid impressions for him. It is no coincidence that after the trip to Europe, pronounced, Van Gogh-like motifs appeared in his work.

David Burliuk is known as the father of Russian futurism. As a young man, he and his friend Vladimir Mayakovsky gave out a lot of slaps to public taste. The futurists painted their faces, wore bright clothes, decorated the buttonhole of their jackets with spoons — in general, they terrified the average man. Then the revolution — emigration — quiet fruitful work in America. It is no coincidence that the majority of works we see today on the market are items from the American period. Our picture comes from the collection of a friend of the artist Ella Dreyfus. The authenticity is confirmed by the expert opinion of Valery Silaev.

1960s UNOFFICIAL ART

ZVEREV Anatoly Timofeevich (1931–1986) Head (self-portrait). 1950s. Tempera on paper. 60 × 41

Creative confession of one of the most important artists of the post-war unofficial art. Zverev's avant-garde Tashist self-portrait from Costakis’ collection. Museum significance.

NEMUKHIN Vladimir Nikolaevich (1925–2016) Labyrinth. 2010. Cardboard, pastel, collage (cards), mixed media. 50 × 50

Nemukhin's “Labyrinth” is not an abstract conceptual construction. The plot is — as it often was with him — impressionistic. It is a conventional topographic plan, the intersections of roads and paths in his beloved Priluki. Loops of roads with cards as a metaphor for the twists and turns of fate, accidents and chances. He called them Russian Barbizon. There stood the old house of the prosperous Nemukhin butchers. Oskar Rabin, Evgeny Rukhin and Lianozovo circle artists came there, to Vladimir Nemukhin, for sketches in the summer. Soon the labyrinth of Priluki roads will lead to the museum of the second Russian avant-garde, which will open in Nemukhin’s house.

SOKOV Leonid Petrovich (1941–2018) Old and new symbols of Russia. 1990. Papier-mâché, gold paint, mixed media. 78.5 × 57.5

A master of postmodern irony. Artist of the 1960s. One of the main artists of socialist art. Everyone remembers his meeting of two sculptures — an unnamed monument to Lenin and the walking man Giacometti. Or the embrace of Stalin with Marilyn Monroe. The signature artistic technique of Leonid Sokov is the absurdist collision of two opposites. And this time, too, everything is correct: the communist hammer and sickle opposes the monarchist double-headed eagle. The work appeared in 1990. And the concept turned out to be prophetic. More than thirty years have passed since then, but peace in the minds has not come. No eagle, no sickle — something in between won out. Sokov watched what was happening from America. He left the USSR in 1979. In the 2000s, his work triumphantly returned to the country's museum life. Sokov's personal exhibition took place in the Tretyakov Gallery in 2016.

YAKOVLEV Vladimir Igorevich (1934–1998) Cat. Late 1980s. Plywood, oil. 75 × 105

One of the favorite subjects of the nonconformist Vladimir Yakovlev. A striking example of his nervous, expressive painting. Painted with mood. Yakovlev usually did oil works in the workshops of his friends. At home he was not allowed to work with odorous paints. How the image of a cat appeared in his work is not known for certain. There is a version that he saw from the window of a psychiatric hospital how a local cat grabbed a pigeon, and the beauty of the bloody scene became a vivid shock. But a more plausible version is that Yakovlev fell in love with Picasso's “Cat and Bird”, which he saw in reproductions. This, however, does not diminish the importance of Yakovlev's cats. “Shakespeare remade ancient plots, too!” The cat and the bird is a metaphor for the vicissitudes of fate, its fragility, the eternal “predator-prey” confrontation. And Yakovlev knew a lot about this.

The authenticity of the work is confirmed by the expert opinion of Valery Silaev.

VECHTOMOV Nikolay Evgenievich (1923–2007) Reflections. 1995. Oil on canvas. 80 × 60

A shocking thing. Bright, attention-grabbing — “burning out” everything around within a radius of a meter. This is the biomorphic cosmism of Nikolay Vechtomov, which is appreciated by connoisseurs — the play of naturalless forms in space. For those who are not familiar with the artist's oeuvre, let us repeat that his bright structures-stains are recollections from the explosions, which the artist saw in the war. Vechtomov is a member of the Lianozovo group, a friend of Rabin and Nemukhin. He was at the forefront of participants of historical exhibitions in the club “Friendship” (1967), in the pavilion “Beekeeping” at the Exhibition of Economic Achievements of the USSR (1975). Nikolay Vechtomov's works are very liquid. They are consistently among the hits of our auctions. The prices of them are growing. It is no coincidence that we recommend his work for inclusion in investment collections.

BELENOK Petr Ivanovich (1938–1991) Hope. 1990. Paper, ink, collage. 70 × 50

Neat, clear, concise and relatively affordable Belenok on paper. Let me remind you that Belenok is a classic of catastrophism, which he himself called “panic realism”. In his prime, he dramatically changed his life. He gave up his career of a successful provincial applied sculptor (Belenok was a master in sculpting busts of Lenin), left for Moscow and became an independent artist. The price of freedom turned out to be huge. He lived stuff today and starve tomorrow. His works turned out to be too avant-garde in terms of optics. Of course, Belenok was immediately spotted by visionary collectors. First and foremost Costakis. Belenok's “panic realism” was shown many times at foreign exhibitions. But the artist did not live to see widespread recognition and auction records. And today it is impossible to imagine a strong collection of unofficial art without Belenok's works. And the prices of his works for the past two years are growing at a rate significantly higher than the market average.

CONTEMPORARY ART

BATYNKOV Konstantin Alexandrovich (1959) Maskva. 2011. Paper, acrylic. 86 × 61

Here there is a particularly valuable metropolitan theme and the expressive inscription “Maskva” — exactly as it is, with an “a”. The recognizable, ironic, absurdist Konstantin Batynkov. Rider of the merry apocalypse. The paintings and graphic works of this Moscow “mitiok” adorn many well-known Moscow collections. But his works — which is important — are available to a wide range of collectors, including art connoisseurs with an average income.

PEPPERSTEIN Pavel (1966) Exhibitionist. 2021. Paper, ink, gouache. 23.3 × 15

A former “inspector” of the “Medical Hermeneutics” group and author of the resonant book “The Mythogenic Love of Castes”, Pavel Pepperstein still remains a mocking man, a banterer and a connoisseur of strong language. He is what they call a sharp-tongued artist who never changes his habits, even in these strange times of unbridled searches for extremism in art. The drawing “Exhibitionist” was made as a daring gift. Instead of balloons and a cake with champagne — a man with an unhealthy attraction. Well, that's Pepper's style, as they call him. It's not hard to guess where he gets it from. Pavel Pepperstein's father is the well-known conceptualist Viktor Pivovarov. Pepperstein played with Kabakov, Yankilevsky and many other artists of the Sretensky Boulevard circle as a child. He listened to their conversations and was imbued with the spirit of freedom. Today Pavel Pepperstein is one of the brightest figures of modern Russian art. And one of the most expensive artists of his generation.