A whole cycle of pictorial dedications to like-minded people, friends and associates in the art underground can be distinguished in the work of the sixties artist Eduard Steinberg. In particular, he has a dedication to Viktor Pivovarov, a dedication to Dmitry Krasnopevtsev and now a dedication to Ilya Kabakov.
Geometric Steinberg of the valuable Moscow pre-emigration period. 1970s. And one meter museum size. And the plot is a godsend for collectors. This is not the usual compositional “geometry”, but a suprematic concentrate. In the center — the planetary model, and in the left corner — a picture-in-picture. An experimental piece! Rarity!
The porcelain black sculptures and their white counterparts are Oleg Tselkov's first and only experience of transferring his characters into small sculptural plastic. In other words: he had plates, vase, dishes and even a porcelain egg, but there the technique of transferring flat images was used. Tselkov had volumetric plasticity only in porcelain and bronze.
1971 — Steinberg's Moscow-Tarusian period. A light, airy, luminous piece. Figurative basis dominates in this work. Although if you look closely, the background on which the bird flies is dissected by a geometric element, typical of the artist's Suprematist line.
The exemplary Steinberg of the late 1970s. Even before France, before emigration, before the Claude Bernard Gallery. This is the Moscow-Tarusian Steinberg. And this is the high point of his explorations into the depths of suprematist abstraction.
«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.
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.
A masterpiece by the acknowledged master of Kafkaesque romance. The most valuable period. 1975. Large size. The highest degree of elaboration. Absolutely museum level. Looking at this soft, sublime painting, it is difficult to suggest that painting for Sveshnikov in the late 1940s — early 1950s was a way of preserving sanity in the harsh conditions of the camp. The young artist, tormented by hunger and illness, imagined and painted imaginary worlds. In the evenings in the barracks, after hard work, ladies and gentlemen would begin to twirl on sheets of paper. And their gallant pas was watched by the death-girlfriend.
The inventor of the sfumato technique is considered to be the great Leonardo da Vinci. He figured out how to give an image a subtle blur, and learned how to reach a state “on the edge” — when the texture just begins to dissolve in the air and a haze appears. It is this technique that partly explains the mystery of Mona Lisa's smile. Sfumato sets the mood for many of the works of the 1960s artist Yuri Kuper. Even the word itself is associated with his name today. And the very old technique in his hands has received a new development.