“Vassiliev’s principal themes, which were born while he was in Russia and continue to the present day, are his memories of home and houses, roads, forests, fields, friends, and family. Vassiliev always starts his creative process from very personal memory, from his sacred space, the safeguarded inner center, and connects it with the visual image. Vassiliev masterfully incorporates elements from different times and spaces and arranges them throughout his paintings according to the logic and ‘energetic’ space of the painting”, 2004: Ye. Petrova, N. Kolodzei, et al., Oleg Vassiliev: Memory Speaks: Themes and Variations, St Petersburg: Palace Editions, Moscow, Russia.

Oleg Vasiliev was born on November 4, 1931, in Moscow. Since childhood, he loved to draw, initially – to sketch from postcards. Having entered the Tretyakov Gallery (Russia) for the first time, the future artist became its regular visitor. In 1952-1958 he studied at the graphic (although he dreamed of getting into the painting) faculty of the Moscow State Art Institute named after V. I. Surikov. But in the academic school of painting, Vasiliev did not find ways of artistic expressiveness, consonant with his own inner vision of the world. After graduating from the institute, he continues his creative search and turned to the experience of the Russian avant-garde of the 1920s.

In the early 1990s, a strong interest in the art of Soviet nonconformist artists arose in the West, and Vasiliev, as a brilliant representative of this art, flew to the United States, where his personal exhibition was successfully held, and since then, the artist has emigrated to the United States (died on January 26, 2013, in New York, USA).

“For the first time, I saw in nature reflections of the light and understood the laws of energy in the white canvas during our trip, together with Eric Bulatov, to the North of Russia on island Anzer in the White See. A House of the Island Anzer, 1965, is the first painting that I decided to sign as my own. I consciously put aside everything and began to work on the interactions of the surface space in the canvas. That was the beginning of my so-called “abstractionist period,” – Oleg Vassiliev. 

“By the early 1960s, Favorsky’s theories about physics for color and the movement of color through space had led Vassiliev to a series of experiments that culminated with the House on the Island Anzer in 1965. With the House on the Island Anzer, Vassiliev found his voice. “It was the first time I realized that this was mine. These were not Falk’s ideas, not Favorsky’s. This was mine.” The quote is from Amei Walach (OlegVassiliev: The Treachery of Memory, the Space of Light in “Oleg Vassiliev Memory Speaks”), and I personally think that it in its deepest way reflect the importance of this piece to the artist and his background, because it reflects the beginning of his creative and truly unique path as a person who found the important knowledge and experience.

As for me, it reflects so much at one moment, even though it is ably made in its minimalistic transitions and forms. The spectrum of the colors in it is so active and intense that they translate what the artist felt at that moment yourself because colors in the most masterful way give us the idea and feeling of the atmosphere of what the artist wanted us to see.

“The work of Oleg Vasiliev resembles a road, a path where each step opens another dimension of reality. By its storyline, it is really connected with the theme of the road that an artist, a person must walk along in order to discover himself and his future possibilities. Steppe or forest, highway or path – this road determines human destiny, full of uncertainty and expectations” was meditating about the works he infused Vitaly Patsyukov. And again, this is an accurate interpretation of the experience and knowledge which the artist wanted to explore and in the end give to humanity because this is exactly what he wanted to evoke in people’s minds. He certainly did a great job with that!

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oleg_Vassiliev_(painter)#cite_note-2

https://www.artsy.net/artist/oleg-vassiliev

https://www.saatchigallery.com/artist/vassiliev_oleg_breaking_the_ice

https://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2018/russian-paintings-online-n09913/lot.14.html

4 ноября родился Олег Владимирович ВАСИЛЬЕВ

https://www.art4.ru/museum/vasilev-oleg/

Alexander Liberman was an artist with a huge past and unique view and way of thinking, which was full of artistic passion and which made people remember him throughout history. To understand more about this artist in the first lines of this blog, this quote from the Artnet, “known for his signature red steel sculptures and geometric paintings, in addition to his 30-year tenure at the helm of Condé Nast as its editorial director”, suits the best. 

Alexander Liberman was born on September 4, 1912, in Kyiv, Ukraine. In 1921 he left his home country which was part of the Soviet Union and settled in Paris, where he was studying and gaining precious experience and knowledge at the Sorbonne and the École des Beaux-Arts, focusing on philosophy and architecture. In New York he arrives in 1941, bringing in it a modern, protean approach, ideas, and feel of true beauty, combined with European delicacy and Soviet’s futuristic Constructivism. All that was a beautiful and unique mix of taste, which then was translated into the Vogue magazine, as this man was an art director in it too.

He was a graphic designer, but it did not stop him from being a sculptor, painter, architect. His artworks on the same scale made him recognizable in the world of art. “His minimalist paintings are often comprised of circular forms in primary colors and display his [experience and] knowledge of graphic design. Liberman’s industrial-sized sculptures are almost all in the same cherry-red color and intertwined geometric and organic forms.”, Kelly Koester in Galerie magazine.

I can state that I am deeply inspired by this man, but I think it also important to include the opinion of a former Design Director at Vogue and Vanity Fair, who had the same aftertaste of pure emotion and respect, “by [offering] graphic proof of the consistency of his vision, which married the iconoclasm of Russian Constructivism with old-world savoir-faire and American know-how. It is also a disciple’s affectionate tribute to an elusive master”, Vogue magazine.

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Liberman

The Extraordinary Influence of Alexander Liberman

https://www.vogue.com/article/legendary-editorial-director-alexander-libermans-influence-endures

https://www.condenast.com

For this assignment I came up with a simple design which was meant to not distract from the typefaces and their “biography”. I included complementary colours with a slight gradient, which in my opinion worked out just fine. The small detail with the white lines under the examples of each typeface are meant to focus and divide from each other. In general, I am pleased with the final work and its minimalistic approach which reflects assigned epoch, so I will mark myself just excellent. The time spent was around three hours and for this work I used gouache.

“[In the process of continuous research], a team of scientists led by Christian Körner [found out] that trees of different species exchange huge amounts of carbon via the fungal internet, [the wood-wide web], that connects their roots”, states the Yong, Ed.  in the beginning of the “The Wood Wide Web” article. According to the author, scientists that appear in the article used special equipment to organize it on the five wild spruces by making on their tubes “a series of tiny holes, which pumped out carbon dioxide”. The “end results” of that research were fascinating, and so it made scientists abroad continue it all around the world. Eventually, with the development and new understanding they came up with the conclusion that this process happens due to the existence of fungi Mycorrhiza which inhabits roots of the plants and it “provides phosphorus and nitrogen in exchange for carbon-based sugars” of the plants. It is truly fascinating research which proves the fact that our planet is unique in all sorts of ways, from the living organisms that exist on it, to the particular, strange and interesting way they communicate, exchange and deliver.