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(E-E) Evgenij Kozlov: Leningrad 80s • No.115 >>
Slides 1980-1983. Towards Spiritual Realism. 1. 1980-1982. The Russian Period and its transition 2. 1983. The Second TEII Exhibition 3. 1982-1983. Searching for the language of the future Throughout the correspondence with his friend Catherine Mannick, Evgenij Kozlov sent her images of his artworks, among them numerous slides. Mannick, for her part, also documented some of Kozlov’s art with slides when she came to Leningrad. Later she had the slides scanned with a 1764 × 2647px resolution. The scans are part of the Harvard collection; the original slides no longer exist. This page presents three sets of slides: Kozlov slide gifts from 1982 and 1983, taken at his Peterhof flat and studio Galaxy Gallery, and Catherine Mannick’s pictures of Kozlov’s works exhibited at the Second TEII[1] Exhibition in April 1983. The images show works from 1980 to 1983, documenting a gradual transition from Kozlov’s so-called “Russian period” to a new style emerging towards the end of 1982 “reflecting the twentieth century more clearly” (Diary III, pp 3-76-77 more >>). The artist tentatively defined it as “spiritual realism” (духовный реализм), speaking of the “Boldness of the idea, Freedom of expression / realisation of inner desires, permission for any compositional and pictorial embodiment“ (Diary III, pp.3-53-54 more >>). Works on paper from the 1982 Peterhof Book of Hours cycle are present in all three sets of slides, which demonstrates their significance in Kozlov’s body of work. In his Diary entry from 24 January 1983, Kozlov wrote that the previous year, he dedicated much of his time to them (Diary III, p. 3-37 more >>). His 1982 birthday present to Mannick, The Mystic Light of America, belongs to this cycle see Letter D, Letter E. Yet the artist’s search for “the language of the future” (Diary IV, p. 4-40 more >>) becomes apparent in the first place with the four paintings from the 1983 slides; some of their features will be discussed here. Besides, these paintings constitute themselves a period of transition, leading to yet another style in 1984 – New Wave see Letter G – and , again, in 1985 – B(L)ack art Letter L. The quality of Kozlov’s slide images varies, since in the Soviet Union, slide features depended, to a large degree, on the type of the colour reversal film available and how it was processed. Generally speaking, East-German Orwo film yielded better results than Soviet film more >>. The 1982 slides were probably shot with Orwo film, while the slides from 1983, of which one duplicate remained in Kozlov’s archive, were taken with Soviet film. Their quality is inferior to the 1982 slides, but they still permit identification of the works. • See also: Kozlov’s slide gifts from 1984 Letter G, Alexander Boyko’s colour reproductions of works by five New Artists, 1984 >>
1. 1980-1982. The Russian Period and its transition A small piece of paper, inscribed on both sides, bears a sequence of 37 image titles, all written in capital letters and each preceded with an accurately encircled number. Kozlov’s note is dated 14 May 1982, Leningrad, and it has an additional message for Catherine Mannick, written upside-down below a dotted arrow-line containing two tiny stars:
This is a small gift. May it be loved by you and be good and huge for you. I embrace you, Zhenya.
 The small gift, intended to become huge in the eyes of the beholder, consists of thirty-seven slide reproductions of Kozlov’s works from the period of 1980 to May (?) 1982 – thirty-one works on paper and six paintings. Most likely, the artist found a private messenger to send the slides across the ocean. At least it is not clear whether they would have been admitted by a Soviet post office – Kozlov’s parcels to Mannick normally contained just books or records. One way or another, Mannick’s comment in Letter 13, written 25 June 1982 and received 18 July 1982, suggests that the slides arrived not long after:
Through the letters, Mannick had already received several original artworks as “mail art”. The slide reproductions now provided her with a general idea about Kozlov’s stylistic approaches since the time they had first met in 1979. Mannick’s reaction and the fact that she translated the titles into English show that she was aware of Kozlov’s unspoken wish – that she might promote his art in the West in one way or another. The scanned images, probably all from the same film, display the yellow-brownish tint typical for Orwo film, possibly enhanced by using artificial light for shooting the works. Yet when processed with a computer programme, the colours are extraordinarily true when compared to those works that are still in Kozlov’s own collection. This makes them particularly valuable with respect to those nineteen of the thirty-seven images that constitute first-time colour reproductions of the respective works – works that have not been documented otherwise, or only as fragments or black and white prints. There is also a scan of a painting that is not in the list, adding to a total of thirty-eight scans.
The title list does not indicate years, dimensions, or techniques, but stylistic features and additional information from Kozlov’s archive help to determine them for the “first-time” reproductions. It turns out that the sequence of images is not random, but methodical. The works on paper come first. The list starts with six works from the Peterhof Book of Hours cycle from 1982, possibly the first six of the cycle’s twenty-five compositions painted on pages from an old book of prayers. The cycle was given its name retrospectively, as the pages are from a Church Slavonic horarium from the nineteenth century, a book with prayers to be prayed at canonical hours. Kozlov called them работы на листах из Евангелия / works on pages from a gospel and defined them as живопись малых размеров / small format paintings (Diary III, p. 3-37 more >>). Next on the list are ten gouache works from 1980, followed by fifteen wax crayon drawings – eight from 1981 and seven from 1982. Six paintings on canvas, in the main from 1981, conclude the list. Although Kozlov has always attached importance to titles and chooses them with care, his body of works comprehends numerous untitled compositions. But not in this case: each of the thirty-seven works is given a title. The titles are descriptive and help identify the composition’s main subject. The works from the Peterhof Book of Hours are an exception, since here, the titles frequently refer to the word placed at the foot of a page – the catchword anticipating the first word of the following page – page – as in О, УТОЛИ… / O, Appease, ДОМ / House, and И ныне / And Now.. What is more, the catchword often inspired the composition as such.
However, comparing the titles from the list with the notes on the reverse of the original works (whenever this is possible) leads to unexpected conclusions – contrary to what should be expected, some of the original works are untitled. Examples are no. 30 (List title: Frescoes of the City) and number 31 (List title: The Purity of a Youth – Dreams of a Man); in both cases, there is no title on the reverse of the original work. In other instances, the title from the list is more elaborate than the original one. Thus, no. 29, Magical Relations. The King of Water, the Queen of the Mountains, the Princes and Princesses of the Air, is simply entitled Happy Figures’ II 43 on the reverse. Likewise, no 33, Speak Your Mind – 10 Figures, is just entitled Speak Your Mind. The table below indicates both versions. Kozlov might have considered that American art lovers were not only unfamiliar with his own art, but with contemporary art from Russia in general. Hence, poetic and intriguing titles could attract a potential viewer‘s attention. Taken together, the thirty-eight reproductions provide insight into what can be called Kozlov’s Russian period – narrative compositions displaying the colourful decorativeness of Russian folk art, where geometrical shapes are often combined with exuberant ornamental details.[2] This applies especially to the wax crayon drawings. The six works from the Peterhof Book of Hours cycle are a somewhat different case, because like medieval illuminated manuscripts, they integrate printed script that thus bears both a semantical and an ornamental function. (For a detailed description see Works on paper: The Peterhof Book of Hours more >> and The Peterhof Book of Hours and The Homilies of Gregory more >>.) The majority of the figurative compositions reflect mythological and religious themes, (fairy-tale) festivities, and urban genre scenes, often displaying naïve eroticism. Not included are rural genre scenes, another frequent subject from that period (possibly stimulated by Kozlov’s visits to his mother’s village see Letter D), and some early allegorical works illustrating the Soviet-American relationship.[3] Non-figurative subjects are nature, urban landscapes and palaces of Leningrad and Petrodvorets – Saint Petersburg and Peterhof. Kozlov had already shown some of the works from 1980 and 1981 at private and public exhibitions (see table). Regarding the gouache paintings from 1980, a diary entry from 12 May 1980 resumes his position: “I strive not to see life as it actually is, but as I would like it to be.” (Diary I, p. 1-48 more >>). Some months later, on 28 September 1980, the artist exemplifies this concept with a direct reference to one of the works from the list, no 11, Olga`s Pond[4] (and, possibly, no 13, Houses Around a Garden.)
Olga’s Pond, The Courtyard Inside the Houses THE CULT OF HAPPINESS AND CELEBRATION (Diary II, p.2-34 more >>)
In these and most other works from the slides, the constraints of everyday life are absent, and when such situations occasionally appear, as in no. 14, Hospital, Petrodvorets (Peterhof), they convey a leisurely atmosphere – if it wasn’t for the title, one wouldn’t suspect its subject matter. Only one of the images unmistakeably refers to a sombre aspect of human existence – no 24, Stroll in the Encirclement of Walls. The title is a euphemism, as the image depicts prisoners inside a camp – nine inmates, easily identified by their striped clothes, watched by a prison guard from a tower. Yet the prisoners do no look subdued and, paradoxically, the scene depicts a relaxed atmosphere, not least because of the colourful wax crayons.
Towards the end of 1981, Kozlov noted in his diary:
As Kozlov remembers, the “photographs from the 1930s” refer to scenes in prison camps, although not necessarily from the Soviet Union. Image no 35 is another prisoner camp scene, and the title is even more cryptic – How the Clouds and the Sun are Connected by a Common Obstacle… / 8 Figures/. The quality of the reproduction is not very good, but there is a wax crayon drawing displaying the same scene: In an open field, close to a forest, an overseer standing on a pedestal is handing down something to people standing in line. The context marks them as forced labour.
The exact sources of these two compositions could not be identified, but around the same time, Kozlov came across an illustrated book from 1934,The Stalin White Sea-Baltic Canal. The History of its Construction, 1931-1934 Wikipedia External link >>. Written by a team of authors with Maxim Gorky as its main editor, it glorified the Soviet system of forced labour, describing the construction of the Belomorkanal, as it was commonly known in the Soviet Union,[5] as a re-education policy for criminals and “class enemies”. Three years later, during the 1937 purges, almost the entire edition was destroyed when high-ranking members of the Soviet Political Police (OGPU) in charge of the project were executed. Kozlov got hold of one of the few remaining copies.[6] An illustration in chapter 6, Люди меняют профессию / People are changing their profession, prompted him to paint Speak Your Mind – 10 Figures, listed as no 9. The picture on page 243 presents a group of people looking attentively at a scheme on a blackboard to which a person (outside the picture) is pointing with a pointer. The caption is Школа шоферов. Каналармейцам объяснают устройство магнето. / The school of chauffeurs. The magneto device is being explained to the channel soldiers. Here, the term “soldiers” is just another word for “prisoners”, implying that they, like soldiers, were serving a cause.[7]
In Kozlov’s interpretation, the original message is no longer present:
2. The Second TEII Exhibition, April 1983 When selecting the works for the Second TEII Exhibition in April 1983, Evgenij Kozlov reflected thoroughly on what he considered to be the “language of the future” (Diary IV, p. 4-40 more >>). Diary entries show how the selection process went through several steps of including and excluding works; a detailed analysis is available here >>. Catherine Mannick visited the opening on 5 April (see Letter E). Thanks to her pictures, we know that in the end, Kozlov opted for a combination of older and newer works. Two surrealistic Peterhof landscape paintings from 1981, The Square Near the Station and Red Pond, are from the Russian period. Three works belong to The Peterhof Book of Hours (1982), Folio V, Human Beings Equal Themselves, and another one with an unknown title. Last but not least, there is WASP (also W.A.S.P), a “new” painting from 1982 or 1983. WASP is based on a gouache painting on paper from 1982 which, in turn, is based on a black and white photograph taken in the streets of London by an acquaintance.
The picture gives an example of the type of “strangeness” Kozlov found intriguing and how he metamorphosed it through two steps. The following is a quote from an earlier article discussing the exhibition:
After her return to the States, Mannick showed the slides to a friend:
3. 1982-1983. Searching for the language of the future
It is possible that it was Mannick’s comment that encouraged Kozlov to send her another set of slides in 1983 – fifteen slides with reproductions of sixteen works; recent works from the April 1983 exhibition are part of his selection. There is no written note related to the gift, but since the slides include a wax crayon drawing from the summer of 1983, they might have been taken after Kozlov received Mannick’s letter at the end of August. This time, he used Soviet film; the images are grainy and display intensive violet-blue hues. Luckily, most works have been documented otherwise, and such images complete the corresponding table, Table 3. With ten works, the outstanding role of The Peterhof Book of Hours is once more evident; one of these images also shows the drawing from 1983. It depicts an army training camp, more precisely, an atomic mushroom cloud monument protected by a tall fence.
The odd-looking construction, across the street from Kozlov’s temporary workplace, caught the artist’s attention as he was sitting in a small guardhouse translating an illustrated book on Chagall (see Letter D, Footnote 3). The four paintings are WASP (discussed above), Double Painting, Tuaregs, and Sit Venia Verbo. Traditions of the Twentieth Century. They reflect Kozlov’s discussion in his diary regarding his selection for the Second TEII Exhibition, where he was defining for himself “the language of the future”. His criteria are, among others, “to pay more attention to the selection of subjects”, “Do not lull the viewer's attention with excessive beauty, give each of the works an impulsive point, a breathing active one”, “Don’t make a painting boring or monotonous”, and, last but not least, “The subject of a painting must be clearly expressed and would constitute the extreme point of my desire in relation to myself as an artist”. (Diary IV, pp. 4-40-43 more >>) There is also a reproduction of Kozlov’s poster for the Second TEII Exhibition. On the last day of the exhibition, he asked his fellow-artists to sign it on the reverse. Today, those thirty-five signatures make it an important document of the history of Leningrad’s independent art-scene.
Double Painting was inspired by one of the Peterhof Book of Hours folios, Grace, which is present in both the 1982 and 1983 lists.
The title reflects the painting’s division into an upper and a lower part that are compositionality unrelated. In 1987, Kozlov partly repainted it with a bright magenta paint and gave it a new title, Oile more >>. Kozlov’s new style fully emerged with the group portrait Tuaregs, which he first mentioned in his diary towards the end of 1982:
Five sitting Tuaregs, unmoved like seated Egyptian statues, are looking straight at the viewer, their eyes framed by turbans and mouth-veils. Despite their traditional clothes, the multi-figure composition is anything but traditional. The artist created the figures’ volumes with the help of coloured shadows, achieving an almost palpable three-dimensional effect. It is a painterly approach he used in 1980/1981, as in one of his gifts to Mannick – the gouache miniature Petrograd Serenades on Christmas Night (1980) (see Letter C). But now he intensified the figures’ expressiveness by lowering the contrast between the shadow colours, adding details to the drapery and using realistic features of faces and hands. The effect is striking. Kozlov emphasised the audacity in painting, new relationships and forms (смелость в живописи, новые отношения и формы) (Diary III, pp. 3-78 more >>).
Later, he applied several elements of pop art – dashed lines and paper cut-outs referring to fashion and dance – and replaced the title Tuaregs with Noli me Tangere. The new title is from a handwritten list of Latin phrases with Russian translations Kozlov compiled in 1983 or 1984.
The translation is не прикасайся к мне, Touch Me Not. The phrase is actually a reference to the Gospel of John: Christ, after his resurrection, asked Mary Magdalene not to touch him. It is unlikely that Kozlov was aware of this – instead, the new title could be a reference to the Tuaregs’ stern gazes. Sit venia verbo. Традиции ХХ века / Sit Venia Verbo. Traditions of the Twentieth Century (1983) is another painting with a Latin phrase attached to the title, literally Excuse the Verb, meaning pardon my French. Its semantics are difficult to relate to the subject matter, which visualises the busy coming and going in an airport. Since Kozlov knew the meaning of the phrase – in the note it translates as да позволено будет сказать / may it be allowed to say – he must have chosen it deliberately, perhaps following the principle of introducing “at least one element of the mystery of the soul”.
It is one of the first paintings combining impressionistic brushwork with carefully created stencilled figures and objects[9] and obviously made an impact on visitors of the Fourth Exhibition TEII exhibition in March 1984 more >>. In his review of the exhibition, Luka Kuznetsov highlighted the modernity of Kozlov’s works:
The comment about “the technique of illustrations in magazines from the 1920s” probably refers to Kozlov’s stencil technique. A connection to the 1920s becomes even more evident in his exhibition poster for the Second TEII Exhibition. The artist employed the stencils from Sit Venio Verbo. Traditions of the Twentieth Century, but without an additional background; here, the dynamic red, green, black and blue figures, framed by black transfer letters, stand out against the brownish paper.
This makes the composition reminiscent of ROSTA Window posters from the early Soviet period, best known for the designs by Vladimir Lebedev and Vladimir Mayakovksy’s texts. But Kozlov indeed presents “a modern view of life”, with urban business people instead of peasants and workers. On closer examination, none of the four paintings from the 1983 slides represents Soviet reality: Tuaregs / Noli Me Tangere relates to North Africa, WASP to London, Sit Venia Verbo. Traditions of the Twentieth Century to international architecture and business, while Double Painting focuses on a purely compositional task. It isn’t that there aren’t any Soviet subjects in the “new” paintings from that time. There is the fabulous group portrait “Kommissars” – the original title was The Strike Brigades Had Their Own Musicians. (see Diary IV, p. 4-03). There is also subject matter of a private character such as Funeral, depicting the burial of Kozlov’s father more >>, and Vox Humana, a chiaroscuro self-portrait see Letter F. Yet Kozlov’s understanding of creation is comprehensive. When, at the end of 1982, he spoke of the “Boldness of the idea, Freedom of expression “ (Diary III, pp.3-53-54), he was reclaiming, for his art, the universal territory that the Soviet system denied its citizens. Still, as often when experimenting with a new style, he did not entirely renounce previous stylistic concepts. Poetic narrations continued to appear in his drawings from 1983, as in his “Gulf of Finland” series, one of which was a gift to his American friend see Letter F, Letter M, until his “New Wave” compositions, based on collages and photographs, took the lead in 1984 see Letter G. Here and later, the “Russian period” is present and metamorphosed through the artist’s love for complex narrations. They fluctuate between what is perceived by the senses and what he called the “realisation of inner desires, permission for any compositional and pictorial embodiment” – spiritual realism. Hannelore Fobo, 9 September 2024
[1]TEII, ТЭИИ – Товариществo экспериментального изобразительного искусства / The Society for Experimental Visual Art, Leningrad (1981-1991), see also The Bronnitskaya flat exhibition in: Pictures 1981 – Flat Exhibitions / Letopis ("Chronicle”) [2]A stylistic turn to folk art was not unusual among Kozlov’s fellow artists, who integrated its principles to different degrees and at different times. In this, they followed the example of the Russian avant-garde of the early twentieth century – Malevich, Goncharova, Larionov, Mayakovsky, to name just a few – although this doesn’t mean that they were all directly influenced by them. [3] An important gouache painting from 1980 provides an early example of Kozlov‘s approach to CCCP-USA subject matter. The composition, stylistically close to Kasimir Malevitch’s interpretation of Russian folk art and of Vladimir Lebedev’s poster art (see previous footnote), has a double title, Внешний облик отношений двух держав / The Outward Appearance of the Relationship between the Two World Powers and Мертвые Ласки Века, До … / This Century's Dead Affections, Up Until .... Kozlov elaborated its concept in several small-format drawings and paintings from the same year; none is among the works from the list.. [4]In the 19th century, Tsar Nikolai I created a pond near Peterhof Palace and named it after his daughter Olga. Later, two charming palaces in the style of antique Italian villas, each on its own artificial island, completed the scenery. Olga’s Pond was at a short walking distance from Kozlov’s home, and Kozlov came by frequently. Ibid., Chapter 10. Fishing at Peter the Great’s pond more >>. [5] Belomorkanal became a household name as a brand for cheap Soviet cigarettes, the papirosy. [6] See also: Hannelore Fobo. (E-E) Evgenij Kozlov's Participation in the Second TEII Exhibition in His Diary and Photographs (1983), 2021. Chapter 10: Searching for the language of the future more >>. [7] The Book also presented contrasting examples of the inhumane capitalist penitentiary system. It was translated into English in 1935 to convince western readers of the moral superiority of Soviet Communism. [8] Hannelore Fobo. (E-E) Evgenij Kozlov's Participation in the Second TEII Exhibition (1983) in His Diary and Photographs, 2021. Chapter 7: Paintings: WASP (1983) more >>. [9] Stencil techniques became particularly important after 1987. An outstanding example is the New Classicals cycle form 1989-1990 see Letter R. [10] Что такое современное мироощущение и как его передать в живописи, можно понять, увидев работы Евгения Козлова. Три его картины (все почему то без этикеток) были довольно странным способом повешены на кронштейны щитов под потолком. Сюжеты всех трех неясны: вот интерьер то ли банка, то ли вокзала, вот, похоже, пикник или гулянье. И все сделано остро, убедительно и очень свежо. Интересно, что в одной из картин явно использованы приемы журнальных иллюстраций 1920-х годов, но воспринимается она очень современно. От Ленинграда к Санкт-Петербургу. ТЭИИ – Товариществo экспериментального изобразительного искусства – «Неофициальное» искусство 1981 – 1991 годов / Сост. С. Ковальский, Е. Орлов, Ю. Рыбаков. From Leningrad to Saint-Petersburg. TEII – The Society for Experimental Visual Art. “Non-Official” Art 1981-1991 / Edited by S. Kovalsky, E. Orlov, Yu. Rybakov. The Museum of Nonconformist Art, Saint-Petersburg, 2007, p. 148
see also (E-E) Evgenij Kozlov, Catherine Mannick, and Hannelore Fobo papers, 1979-2022 (inclusive) Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies Special Collection Harvard University>> |
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Published 18 September 2024 Last updated 17 November 2024 |
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