USA-CCCP. Points of Contact.
Catherine Mannick – (E-E) Evgenij Kozlov
Correspondence 1979 – 1990

Letter C (New Year 1980 / 1981) – Mail Art

Of Letter C, sent at the end of 1980 / beginning of 1981, only the envelope (18.5 x 14 cm) has remained, but none of its written content. Yet due to the full-format painting below Catherine Mannick’s address and a special arrangement of stamps on the reverse of the envelope, it can be said that among all of Kozlov’s letters still preserved, this one comes closest to what is typically considered as mail art – images and other compositions created on an envelope or postcard to be sent via a postal service (see Chapter 7). In fact, one might expect that Mannick would have kept any envelope designed by her friend, but there are no others. To be precise, apart from this one, envelopes of Kozlov’s letters exist for another three letters (Letter M, Letter P, Letter Q), but none of them has an additional drawing. Put differently, all other “mail art” – paintings, drawings, painted postcards and photographs – went inside an envelope or was sent through a personal courier.

The composition is a colourful gouache painting of a harlequin wearing the checkered costume and soft flat cap of the commedia dell’arte Arlecchino. It displays, in the lower left corner, a large rock with some houses behind, seen at a far distance, while the upper right corner is filled with a fragment of a wheel from which flowers emanate – perhaps a wheel of fortune. With one of his legs posed on the rock, the other one suspended in mid-air, the harlequin is performing a complicated movement. Stretching out his arms in an effort to keep his balance, he is looking down to control his action. 

At the very bottom of the envelope, there is a strange signature, “Hi Spraque – DM”. When asked, Evgenij Kozlov said that he isn’t sure whether he wrote it himself – and if so, what it refers to, besides any wild guesses, for instance that “DM” is short for Для Mannick, for Mannick, or that the note was written by a postal worker. “At any rate”, he added, “It’s quite surprising that my letter was accepted at the post office in the first place. After all, this is anything but a conventional design for an envelope, and what is more, its destination was a country considered the ideological adversary. Perhaps the staff of Leningrad’s main post office, where I normally went to post my letters, was used to dealing with eccentric foreign tourists and thus became more lenient regarding such oddities.” (see synopsis)

At the top, where the envelope was cut open, a fragment of the rectangular stamp for registered letters can still be seen. For lack of space, Kozlov attached the postage stamps on the reverse, next to his own address, creating a geometrical, column-like pattern with four stamps of different sizes. They offer a good idea of the Soviet Union’s self-image during the late Brezhnev period. Three are standard stamps from 1976 – a 10 kopek Орден Трудовая Слава (Medal of Labour Glory), a 30 kopek Совет Экономической Взаимопомощи (The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance, Comecon) and a 50 kopek with a Lenin portrait. The largest and also the prettiest one is a 15 kopek stamp from 1980.

Below the heading Международные полеты в космос  (International Space Flights) are the flags of the Soviet Union and Cuba, a reference to the space flight from September 1980. The illustration shows four men inside a spaceship, two of them floating around the cabin, while another two are conducting their activities in an upright position – running on a treadmill and taking a shower, respectively – as if overcoming zero gravity. The stamp belongs to a large series edited after 1978 to commemorate the Soviet Union’s Interkosmos programme, launched for space missions with crews from various countries, mostly socialist, but not only Wikipedia External link >> . The series highlights, on the one hand, the country’s prominent role in conquering the space, and on the other hand, its readiness to share its success with other nations.

The postmarks from the Leningrad post office are hardly readable. Regarding the date, only three of the eight digits indicating day, month, year plus something else, appear more or less clearly – 3, 2, and 8. The 2 in front of the 8 might refer to 12 80, December 1980, which would mean that the letter was sent before the end of 1980. In any case, the postmarks from the delivery – Boston, Feb 17, 1981 and Somerville Feb 18, 1981– suggest that the letter was Kozlov’s New Year message, and this might also explain why he chose a harlequin for the envelope. 

As the harlequin is typically known for his acrobatic skills, the viewer focuses on his agility – on his arms and legs forming two intersecting diagonals, like a large X. A larger gouache drawing in Kozlov’s archive helps to understand a more dramatic aspect of the picture that can be easily overlooked – the harlequin’s impending fall into the abyss.

In this drawing, we see him balancing on a knife’s edge or, rather, on a sword’s blade stained with blood. The blade replaces the underarm of a sinister winged monster dominating the composition – the blade is the artificial limb of a fallen angel (see also Letter B, E-E-180004-06). The harlequin’s gaze expresses outright fear, as any false move could cost him his life.

Gouache paintings constitute an important part of Kozlov’s body of work from the early 1980s, often in combination with tempera and watercolour and applied to various media, including canvas (see Pictures 1981 and Slides 1980-1983). When asked in 2023, the artist confirmed that he most likely created the larger gouache drawing first, and then selected, for the envelope, the fragment with the harlequin. The harlequin conveys a much more optimistic message when taken by himself, though as in the earlier drawing, there is also a dark spot beneath his eye, some kind of bruise.

In essence, this harlequin represents the sad clown, the Pierrot. “In the Soviet Union, clowns were regarded as an indispensable feature of the circus,” Kozlov added, “but for some reason, I remember these clowns as being constantly disenchanted by life. The circus was a central element of Soviet mass culture, like cinema, and it seems to me that it reflected the three main traits of Russian psychology – the athlete or strongman representing the veneration of sheer power (see also Letter B, E-E-180004-06), the magician representing the readiness to believe in all kind of desired wonders, and the sad clown, a skilful dreamer interpreting the world according to his fantasies, which leads to tragic moments all the time. Taken as symbols, these three figures compose the mystic Russian soul.”

Mannick didn’t discuss this particular drawing, but referred to it in a more general way in her answer from 31 March, 1981:

My dear Zhenya!
First of all, excuse me for not having written to you for so long. I received your letters and drawings. They are wonderful. (Letter 10)

The envelope might have included another gouache painting from 1980 executed in a 15 x 12 cm format, possibly Kozlov’s Christmas present to Catherine Mannick. It shares some features with the composition described above: the artist’s fast and elegant brush strokes, the ornamental x-pattern of lines and the coloured shadows. The bright, ostensibly naïve and slightly satirical composition is based on one of Kozlov’s pencil drawings created for monotypes, a technique discussed in Letter A. Kozlov dedicated it on the reverse: Дорогой Кате (To Dear Katia), and titled it Петроградские серенады в рождественскую ночь (Petrograd Serenades on Christmas Night).

The composition presents a charming lady resting in a Victorian parlour chair, listening to a cavalier enchanting her with a mandolin or lute. She is wearing a loosely-fitted gown made of some light material, such as tulle or muslin, displaying a low, wide neckline that exposes her generous bosom. The moustached cavalier is serenading his adored one with ardour, his nonchalantly tied bow stressing artistry while the epaulettes speak of his position in society. We are looking at a bygone world of courtly elegance and eroticism.

Yet again, the composition is less serene than appears at first sight. We recognise the blade from the larger harlequin drawing; here, it is an extension of the instrument’s neck, although not quite so. The cavalier, apparently posing his right hand on the mandolin’s or lute’s neck, is actually swinging a sword to decapitate an angel coming down from heaven – on Christmas Night! In this respect, the pencil drawing is even more drastic, because, here, the hand swinging the sword is disconnected from the instrument, and the meaning of the blade touching the angel’s head is quite unambiguous.