Before us is a profound philosophical reflection on human destiny. What does man live for? What is his purpose? To preserve himself and savor the joys of life? Or to bear a burden? Or is all life a preparation for a feat? Ernst Neizvestny's favorite personages and protagonists of his works are people of the mission, restless, seeking, ready for self-sacrifice. Those who live not for joy, but for conscience. His heroes are icaruses and prometheuses. Devotees, flying into the sun and bringing light to people.

1996 — the golden period of the famous duo Vinogradov-Dubosarsky, when they split the community of connoisseurs. Some considered them deliberately kitsch artists, almost opportunists to please the tastes of merchants. And they were definitely considered art hooligans. Knowledgeable people, on the contrary, noted the thoughtful conceptual irony of Vinogradov and Dubosarsky and predicted the role of the duo as spokesmen for the spirit of all the 1990s. Now, at a distance, it is clear that they were right.

Before us is Nemukhin's work from a cycle dedicated to the leaders of the Russian avant-garde. He has Jack Mayakovsky. Jack Marc Chagall. In this case, it is a dedication to the figure of the theatrical avant-garde, director, theater innovator, reformer and experimenter Vsevolod Meyerhold. The figure is very complex, ambiguous and colorful. It is not without reason that Meyerhold was painted by Yuri Annenkov, Boris Grigoriev, Alexander Golovin and other outstanding portrait painters of their time. Malevich made the sets for his production of Mystery-Buff based on Mayakovsky's material. And Mayakovsky personally played several roles at the premiere instead of the actors who did not appear.

Among the dozens of artists of the Vladimir school of painting there are three pillars: Kim Britov, Valery Kokurin and Vladimir Yukin. The most expensive, the most famous. Pioneers and discoverers. Russian landscapes, painted in incredibly vivid colors, emitting light themselves, created a sensation in 1960 at the republican exhibition in Moscow. And, like the “Impressionists” after the “Salon of the Outcasts”, the term “Vladimirites” was fixed in our language after the exhibition “Soviet Russia”.