Mikhail Shemyakin

MIKHAIL SHEMYAKIN (Moscow, 1943).
"Сон В. Нажинского" (Dream of V. Nijinsky), 1992.
Mixed media (oil and acrylic) on canvas.
Signed and dated in lower left corner; signed, dated and titled on verso.
With exhibition/sale label: Campo & Campo, Antwerp, 2003.
Measurements: 115 x 89 cm; 125,5 x 110,5 cm (frame).

The present composition belongs to one of the most singular aspects of Mikhail Shemyakin's universe: his theatrical imaginary, where mask, scenography, metamorphosis and visual psychology converge in an unmistakable language. The title situates the work in relation to the world of dance and the stage, fundamental areas in the artist's career. The painting is organized as a choral apparition of faces, profiles and hybrid creatures, suspended in an unreal space of intense chromatism, where the carnivalesque and the disturbing coexist in equilibrium.

Shemyakin builds here an image of symbolic resonance, almost visionary. The figures, with sharp and theatricalized features, refer to the tradition of commedia, ballet and grotesque. The presence of ambiguous characters reinforces this atmosphere of mental representation, of inner theater, in which the dream becomes a territory of metamorphosis.

Mikhail Shemyakin is an essential figure of dissident Russian art. Born in Moscow, he soon came into conflict with the Soviet cultural system for his rejection of the canons of socialist realism. He was interned and finally expelled from the USSR in 1971. After a period in Paris, he settled in the United States, developing an international career as a painter, sculptor and set designer.

His exhibition activity has been extensive - with hundreds of exhibitions throughout Europe, Russia and the United States - and his work is preserved in collections and institutions of the first order, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the State Russian Museum in St. Petersburg and the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow. In St. Petersburg, moreover, his foundation - today the Mikhail Shemyakin Center - holds thousands of works and research materials, and organizes regular exhibitions and cultural programs.