Chapter 5. An image not based on likeness: Shark

Kozlov’s mulitfigure painting Shark (1988) – on the cover of Portraiture and exhibited at Notes from the Underground – is a particularly important example of the internal migration of images. Shark integrates motifs from a considerable number of Kozlov’s photographic portraits, as well from follow-up works created from such portraits. Put differently, we see those images at different “waypoints” on their traveling routes. The artist also integrated certain scratching features from the negatives, in the first place hatches and zigzagging lines, but related all elements in a completely new way, as explained in Portraiture: 

This painting arranges a shark, Ágnes Horváth, Timur Novikov, Igor Verichev and Georgy Gurianov around a central axis that Kozlov calls ‘a massless globe’. The figures form a spiralling curve incorporating extremely dynamic movement, with the red cross on Timur Novikov’s T-shirt acting as a counterbalance, or anchor. This red cross, which did not figure in the original photograph, indeed constitutes a key element of the composition. It lends Timur the appearance of a knight, turning the plastic bag on his head into a helmet. Likewise, the way Igor Verichev is positioned, standing behind Georgy Gurianov, is very reminiscent of the positioning of the two knights riding on a single horse on the seal of the Knights Templar. A large number of small portraits, painted on Igor’s jacket, accompany the scene; among these is Kozlov’s self-portrait. On the left-hand border we can see Igor’s fingers, mirrored. It seems that the entire scene is mirrored beyond the painting’s large black frame – keeping it invisible to us.[1]

(E-E) Evgenij Kozlov and The New Artists Portraiture (1987–90), 2016 Cover of a 143 cm zigzag-fold leaflet with eleven pages, 13 x 21 cm each, see all pages >> edited by (E-E) Evgenij Kozlov and Hannelore Fobo in association with the exhibition ‘Notes from the Underground’, Muzeum Sztuki, Łódź, Poland, 2016 The cover highlights, in the main, features related to previous works.

A knight (Timur Novikov) wearing a head protection with the inscription "Leningrad" Detail of Shark

In 2012, film-maker and video artist Carmen pg Granxeiro external link >> assembled a collection of close-up images of "Shark" into a brief two-minute video piece, creating a sequence of fast cuts that oscillate between full views of the painting and detailed close-ups. She thereby intensified the momentum of "Shark" with the help of strobe transitions, fast zooming, and white light effects. The title of the video, "Leningrad", refers to Novikov's head-mask, which is akin to a warrior's helmet and bears the inscription "Leningrad".

"Leningrad" was edited in 2019 with music by Dmitri Pavlov, a composer and pianist with a background in classical as well as experimental music more >>. Pavlov's powerful soundtrack from 2019 enhances Granxeiro's approach, using a funky, rough industrial rhythm – transposing the visual zoom effects into sharp metallic sound rushes and "loading" the images with discharges of electronic thunder. 

For the video, Kozlov and I discussed the end credits and created an image with a list of the cast in Russian and English. Kozlov insisted on featuring not only “human” contributors, such as Horváth, Novikov, Verichev and Guryanov, but also objects (a hand, a bomb, x m 3 5, an airplane, a massless globe) and abstract concepts: the containment of movement (referring to the red cross) and the limit of knowledge (referring to the lower part of the painting). Together, figures, objects, and concepts form the composition’s dynamics – the beat that inspired both Granxeiro and Pavlov.

Although we recognise those portrayed in the composition, the example of Shark again demonstrates that in Kozlov’s portraiture, the principle of transformation supersedes the principle of mimesis, or representation by imitation – a principle that, according to Aristotle, leads to an image (in a material sense, as statue, too) based on likeness. In fact, “an image based on likeness” is a tautology Aristotle didn’t use, because the Greek noun εἰκών – eikon or icon, etymologically related to  ἔοικα (“eoika” to look like), und εἰκάζω (“eikazo”, to portrait, compare, liken) – can be translated as both image and likeness. Thus, an image based on likeness would be an eikon based on eikon.

The following passage is from Aristotle’s Poetics, and the translation taken from Perseus Digital Library employs “likeness” rather than “image” and “representation” rather than “imitation”.    

The reason why we enjoy seeing likenesses is that, as we look, we learn and infer what each is, for instance, “that is so and so.” If we have never happened to see the original, our pleasure is not due to the representation as such but to the technique or the color or some other such cause. [2]

Perhaps we may paraphrase Aristotle with regard to the painting Shark, stating that our pleasure is not due to the representation of figures as such, but to the degree of transformation they undergo while still remaining identifiable.

next page: Chapter 7. Working with pictures: Kozlov, Richter, and Sherman
(Chapter 6 forthcoming)

Introduction: E-E Kozlov’s photo archive as part of the his Atlas of Ontology

Part 1. The Atlas of Ontology - collages

Chapter 1. Aby Warburg's cosmography and E-E Kozlov's cosmogony

Chapter 2. From movie to mythology: changing emotive formulas

Chapter 3. The travelogue of a pair of strawberries

Part 2. The Atlas of Ontology - photographs

Chapter 4. From picture to painting: portraits of Timur Novikov and other New Artists

Chapter 5. An image not based on likeness: Shark

Chapter 6. Seeing colours in a black and white picture (forthcoming)

Chapter 7: Working with pictures: Kozlov, Richter, and Sherman

Chapter 8. Transformation and transfiguration

Chapter 9. From Abbild to Urbild (forthcoming)

Research / text / layout: Hannelore Fobo, January / February 2021.

Uploaded 15 February 2021
Last updated 18 May 2024