MASTERPIECES

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

Before us is a great rarity. An example of a large, nervous painting by Vladimir Yakovlev. And one of his most important themes is the cat. There is a beautiful legend that Yakovlev once saw from the window of a psychiatric hospital how a cat caught a pigeon. He was shocked, imagining himself in the place of the unfortunate bird. But knowledgeable people say otherwise. The cat in Yakovlev's work was inspired by Picasso's “Cat Catching a Bird”. And then it's all right. Dramatic philosophical subject: a metaphor of human destinies, a conversation about the predator and the victim, about the defenselessness of man in the face of circumstances. Today such works are especially highly valued by collectors. Their prices reach 20–30 thousand dollars. They appear at auctions every few years — it's a great luck.

Our “Cat” is an oil from the 1980s. It's without a bird. There's less drama, and some people will just love that. But the main thing remains — the predatory look, the powerful energy. An exemplary collector's piece!

NEMUKHIN Vladimir Nikolaevich (1925–2016) Guitar-palette. 1999. Canvas, paper, acrylic, collage. 80 × 80

A very rare, memorial, autobiographical work. A monument to its time, woven from important memories. Nemukhin was very fond of talking about his friends and about himself. His speech was simple and understandable, but at the same time he liked that in the texts his ideas were formulated in a more complex, tricky manner. “Nemukhin Monologues” in the title of the collage article is the title of the book by Mark Uralsky written on the basis of conversations with the artist. It is a bit difficult to read, but it is known for a fact that this particular book, printed in 1999, Vladimir Nemukhin liked and advised very much. He had known the writer for a long time, back in the days of the artistic underground. Mark Uralsky (pseudonym Nikolay Marin) was a member of the unofficial literary and artistic group “Mansarda”, together with Lev Kropivnitsky and Heinrich Sapgir. The latter, as we remember, were members of the Lianozovo group. Mark Uralsky was not published in the USSR, and after Perestroika he left for Germany. “Nemukhin Monologues” has already had its second reprint, but it is not easy to find this book on sale. By the way, the cover of the second edition is decorated with a portrait of Nemukhin by his friend Anatoly Zverev.

Everything is clear with the cards and a schematic image of the card table. These are the main companions of Nemukhin's work. Born as a product of an impressionistic experience, cards in his paintings and drawings acquired a new symbolic meaning. As signs of fate, metaphorical symbols of success and failure.

And why is the guitar depicted? This is a long-standing association of Nemukhin with the image of the collector Kostaki, who discovered the first Russian avant-garde and who did much for nonconformists. In the newspaper photograph Geogory Dionisovich is depicted without a guitar, but Nemukhin corrects this oversight. However, the expert Valery Silaev points out that the deconstructed guitar in Nemukhin's work is primarily a dedication to the masters of the first Russian avant-garde, a dialogue with the works of Udaltsova and Popova.

1960s UNOFFICIAL ART

STEINBERG Eduard Arkadevich (1937–2012) Composition. 1974. Oil on canvas. 80 × 60

Steinberg's geometrical oil of the milestone 1974. Dark times were coming to the USSR, the authorities were fighting dissidents. The harassment of Sakharov, persecution of dissidents. In 1974, the question of Solzhenitsyn's expulsion and deprivation of Soviet citizenship was resolved at the Politburo level. As a punishment for the “Gulag Archipelago”. And finally, in 1974, pressure on independent artists intensified, the apotheosis of which was the beating on the wasteland in Belyaevo.

This painting by Steinberg was painted 2–4 weeks after the Bulldozer Exhibition. The artist was not there. However, the reaction extended to all participants in the unofficial artistic process. And the work at the same time is bright — with hope. The decoration of the collection.

ZVEREV Anatoly Timofeevich (1931–1986) Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. 1963. Paper, ink. 56 × 40 (in light)

The artist's favorite Cervantes characters. For Zverev, Don Quixote is an image with which he associated himself. A ridiculous wanderer, a marginal, a loner, a stranger in an unfriendly world. As alien as Zverev himself. “The Russian Picasso”, as we recall, could have been tried for loafing at any time. The only thing that saved him from the “article” was a Gorkom certificate from Nemukhin, which he kept losing. Zverev was constantly forced to hide in his own country. So that the police wouldn't beat him (he was terribly afraid of them) and the state wouldn't persecute him. The image of a holy fool (akin to Don Quixote) was a protection for him, a social camouflage. However, enough of this.

Before us is a rare, minimalist Don Quixote from 1963. Expressive. With verbal confirmation by Valery Silaev, which, after purchase, must be drawn up in writing.

ZUBAREV Vladislav Konstantinovich (1937–2013) The Going. 1980. Oil on canvas. 198 × 75

In the past he was a student of Ely Bielutin, a graduate of his group “New Reality”. But this is 1980 — Zubarev left Bielutin long ago, founded his own studio, “Temporal Reality”, and devoted a long phase to the study of the relationship between space and time. “The Going” is one of Zubarev's best, if not the best painting we have seen in recent years.

SVESHNIKOV Boris Petrovich (1927–1998) Nude at the barrel. 1950s Paper, ink, pen. 22.5 × 27

SVESHNIKOV Boris Petrovich (1927–1998) Direction. 1994. Oil on canvas. 52.5 × 53

Two works by Boris Sveshnikov — Petrovich, as his friends called him. There is about 40 years of time between them. Completely different. But without the first, there would be no second.

The sheet of paper is a 1950s graphic based on the famous prison camp drawings. Sveshnikov made similar drawings in the late 1940s, when he was serving time under an anti-Soviet article. Practically a child, he was sent to the camps at the age of 19 on trumped-up charges. To certain death. Exhausted by cold, hunger, illness young Sveshnikov escaped into a world of fantasy — he drew surrealistic scenes, Boschian plots. Not camp blackness and everyday life, but something fabulous. And sometimes even erotic, as in this case, where a young woman washes up by the barrel. It is a miracle that the camp drawings have survived. A significant part of them was taken out of the camp by Ludvig Seja, the former Latvian foreign minister, who was released from the same camps.

And “Direction” is the late Sveshnikov of the mid-1990s, metaphorical, philosophical, and strikingly decorative.

RUSSIAN ABROAD

BURLIUK David Davidovich (1882–1967) Bradenton Beach. Still life with flowers and fruits. 1949. Oil on canvas. 61 × 51

Admiration for the great Dutchman from the father of Russian futurism. This is his old love. In 1949, while traveling to France, Burliuk never parted with Van Gogh's album, visited memorable places, and became imbued with the spirit of Arles. It is no coincidence that this still life, painted later, in a house on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, is reminiscent in style of “Van Gogh's Chair with Pipe”, 1888. This similarity is also noted by the expert Yulia Rybakova in her conclusion.