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.

“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.

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.

Natalia Nesterova created her very recognizable, distinctive contemplative neo-primitivism almost 50 years ago. And her language remains contemporary even today. Her paintings are a conversation about life here and now. She tries more often to remind of modest pleasures and moments of happiness. Nesterova does not reproach or educate. Her paintings are about rejoicing in good weather, pleasant company, delicious food and the opportunity to travel to interesting places.

This work was painted 57 years ago by the sixties artist Igor Vulokh. It has been exhibited many times and published in catalogs. It was last seen in 2008. And recently it was confirmed that the painting no longer exists. That's what happens sometimes. But in this story, all ends well. And what really happened — we tell you in another video from the series “Examining Artworks”.

Thirty years ago, Valery Koshlyakov, together with Avdey Ter-Oganyan, were associates in the “Art or Death” partnership. The artists lived, worked and organized exhibitions in the legendary squat on Trekhprudny Lane. Today, Valery Koshlyakov is already a classic of contemporary Russian art. He lives and works in Paris. And auction prices for some of his works are approaching $ 150,000.

The artists of the duo Komar and Melamid are known primarily as the inventors of Sots Art, which they coined in 1972. The term itself is a combination of “pop-art” and “socialist realism”. But unlike American pop-art, which drove advertising to the point of absurdity, Vitaly Komar and Alexander Melamid came up with the idea of bringing symbols of ideological propaganda to the point of absurdity.

Why did Nikolina Gora become such a place of power in Zverev's work? Oksana Aseeva had a dacha in this picturesque village near Moscow. She was a widow of the poet Nikolay Aseev, a friend of Mayakovsky. A woman of progressive views, she was the “muse of Russian futurism”. But today we often think of her as the muse of Anatoly Zverev. Zverev loved to visit Nikolina Gora, lived in pleasant company and worked with pleasure.

A new way of filling in the backgrounds and techniques for the embedding of objects in assemblages and abstractions was shown to his friend from Leningrad, Yevgeny Rukhin, by Vladimir Nemukhin in the 1960s. A geologist by training, Rukhin became one of the most brilliant artists of unofficial art. And one of the most daring. Rukhin's intransigence and courage, his open confrontation with the authorities gave rise to the version of his murder for political reasons.