Free Open House on Sept. 14 Kicks Off Neuberger Museum Show on Contemporary Russian Art

As world attention is riveted by current events in Ukraine, an upcoming exhibition of works by contemporary Russian artists at the Neuberger Museum of Art takes on a new urgency. In This Leads to Fire: Russian Art From Nonconformism to Global Capitalism, Selections from the Kolodzei Art Foundation Collection, on view at the Neuberger Museum of Art of Purchase College from September 14, 2014 to January 11, 2015, the challenges that Russian contemporary artists pose to both Russian and Western culture are vividly portrayed. A free Open House will be held on Sept. 14, from 1 to 3 pm.

“Today’s artists are still burdened by the legacy of Soviet Realism and face an increasingly repressive environment,” says Sarah Warren, assistant professor of art history at Purchase College, the State University of New York. She adds that though many of the artists have exhibited extensively in the West, this exhibition will consider the challenges the artists still face, and familiarize viewers with an important yet underappreciated body of work.

According to Professor Warren, many of the artists represented in this exhibition were dissidents, who refused the dictates of Soviet authority. Warren says, “They struggled to assert their individuality, but also banded together to counter Socialist Realism, the officially sanctioned style that dominated Russian art for much of the 20th century.” She frames the history of this period around two crucial moments in the relationship of these artists with Soviet authorities, which coincide with key developments in contemporary art in the West.

Warren explains: “The systematic repression experienced by unofficial artists was a grave violation of civil rights. Hindsight also provides another, perhaps more surprising, revelation—the degree to which visual art was considered a crucial component of public life in the USSR. In contrast, the anti-establishment extremes of vanguard artists in the West yielded almost no response from authorities. Considering the all-encompassing efforts made by Western governments to suppress such political opposition groups as the Black Panthers and the Red Army Faction, the freedom afforded to Western artists implied that art was seen as so separate from public life as to be completely harmless. The aesthetic autonomy of Western art practice was thus the other side of a profound disempowerment in the public sphere. Many of the artists working today struggle, in some way, with this separation.”

Founded in 1991 with the support of American sponsors, the Foundation comprises the joint collection of Tatiana Kolodzei, who organized exhibitions of works by Nonconformist artists in the former Soviet Union, and her daughter Natalia Kolodzei. Today, the collection contains approximately 7,000 paintings, drawings, prints, sculptures, photography and video, by more than 300 artists, acquired during four decades of Russian and Soviet Nonconformist art, from the post-Stalinist era to the present.

The following programs and events will be held in conjunction with the exhibition:

Open House, Sunday, September 14, 2014, 1 to 3 pm

Free and open to the public

Neu First Wednesday Lecture, Wednesday, November 5, 6:30 pm

Masha Gessen: Russian Power, Russian Dissent

Russian-American journalist Masha Gessen, author of The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin and Words Will Break Cement: The Passion of Pussy Riot, will discuss contemporary issues in Russia. Held at the Purchase College Music Conservatory Recital Hall. Refreshments following the lecture at the Neuberger Museum of Art.

Conversation: Collecting Art in Russia, Tuesday, November 18, 11 am

Join Natalia Kolodzei in a conversation about collecting art in Russia. Kolodzei’s family daringly amassed one of the most extensive collections of Nonconformist and contemporary Russian art in the world, that is now part of the Kolodzei Art Foundation Collection.

Neu First Wednesdays

Media Lecture: Artists Speak–Vitaly Komar, Wednesday, December 3, 4:30 pm

Vitaly Komar has spent much of his career reacting to what he calls “the overproduction of ideology and its propaganda,” most notably Soviet Socialist Realism. From 1967 to 2003, Komar and Alexander Melamid organized various conceptual projects, ranging from painting and performance to installation, public sculpture, photography, music, and poetry, which form a powerful response to contemporary political and social climates. This New Media Lecture is presented by the Neuberger Museum of Art and the New Media Board of Study, School of Film and Media Studies, Purchase College. Free admission and refreshments will be served.

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The Neuberger Museum of Art is an integral part of Purchase College, State University of New York. The Museum is supported in part by the State University of New York. Support for the Museum’s collection, exhibitions, publications, and education programs is provided by grants from public and private agencies, individual contributions, and the Friends of the Neuberger Museum of Art’s members and Board.

The Museum is located at 735 Anderson Hill Road in Purchase, N.Y. (Westchester)

914-251-6100

www.neuberger.org

Photo caption: Anton S. Kandinsky. Post-Soviet-Ism, 2012. Oil on canvas, 60 x 40 in (152.4 x 101.6 cm). Photo credit: Jose Smith, Neuberger Museum of Art. Courtesy of the Kolodzei Art Foundation.