Art project "Cup of Fate" Valery Maloletkov

January 20, 2015 at 16.00 Russian Academy of Arts in the halls at: st. Prechistenka, house 21 presents the art project “Cup of Fate” by the famous master of contemporary decorative art, people’s artist of the Russian Federation, academician of the Russian Academy of Arts, professor Valery Maloletkov.

The exposition includes more than 200 decorative plastic works: reliefs, sculpture, porcelain, earthenware, ceramics compositions, as well as author’s graphics, photography and monumental art created in recent years.

V. Maloletkov is one of the most outstanding masters of contemporary decorative art in Russia, working at the junction of various types of art and materials. The artist miraculously fuses the love of eternal values, deep knowledge of domestic and world culture, a passionate search and constant experiment with the art form, color and space, which significantly expanded the palette and genre boundaries of this art form, deepened the content of plots and images. The creative range of the master is extremely large and diverse, he is distinguished by a variety of topics, philosophical depth and high professionalism. His works are always emotional and acutely modern, imbued with a poetic worldview.

V. Maloletkov was born in Kiev in 1945. In 1969 he graduated from the Moscow Higher Industrial School of Arts (former Stroganovskoye), then graduate school of the Moscow Higher Industrial School of Arts, doctor of art history Member of the Union of Artists of the Russian Federation, member of the International Academy of Architecture.

Among the topics V. Maloletkov is working on is theater, literature, music, history. The art project of the master represents a new attempt to comprehend the problem of the coexistence of a creative person and society on the example of the gallery of images of outstanding figures of world and national culture created by him. Among them are Dante Alighieri, D. Bocaccio, A. Pushkin, A. Akhmatova, M. Tsvetaeva, S. Yesenin, A. Duncan, J. Lennon, P. Bagration, V. Tatlin, which are united by a complex, sometimes tragic fate, painful and contradictory relationships with the outside world. The author of the project uses the language of metaphors, which allows one to consider the fate of a person within a conditional space, sometimes resembling the shape of a vessel or bowl, perceived as a spatial environment for solving complex spiritual and material relations between Man and Nature.

In his work, the master uses a wide palette of plastic, structural, volumetric, spatial and color means, solving this problem with the help of the oldest material on earth - ceramics. The artist successfully works in various ceramic materials: porcelain, biscuit, stone mass, terracotta, chamotte clay and faience, which allows him to create both unique exhibition art objects and works of monumental and decorative art designed for architecture and landscape environment. V. Maloletkov is the author of significant monumental works. The reliefs he co-authored with other artists for the Paleontological Museum of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow are included in the Guinness Book of Records as the largest works of architectural ceramics of the twentieth century.

Among the volumetric-spatial works created by the author in recent times, ceramic plastic in faience is of particular interest. This series features fifty compositions that demonstrate the author’s desire to discover new plastic and color possibilities of exquisite and ancient material. The main hero of the master’s new works, as before, remains a man, a source of the author’s creative aspirations.

Along with ceramics V. Maloletkov for the first time at his personal exhibition shows works made in bronze, confirming his constant desire to search for new materials and means of artistic expression.

An important place in the artist’s work is graphic, which was at first a kind of creative workshop in which new creative ideas and projects were born, and then became an independent type of creativity, allowing the author to realize his interest in portraiture, landscape, still life and complex multi-figure compositions.

The exhibition also features author’s photographs, reflecting the artist’s many wanderings around the world, his increased interest in the beauty and diversity of life. Solving his creative tasks, the artist often lives and works in Greece, India, Germany, France.

V. Maloletkov conducts teaching at MGHPA them. S.G. Stroganova. Creativity of the master is noted by many prestigious domestic and foreign awards.

The artist’s works are in the collections of the largest Russian museums: State Tretyakov Gallery, State Historical Museum, MMOMA, the State Museum of Ceramics “Kuskovo Estate of the 18th Century”, the State Literary Museum of A.S. Pushkin, as well as in foreign museums and private collections in the Czech Republic, Poland, Brazil, Italy, France, Greece, USA, India, Germany, China, Japan, Cuba and other countries.

An integral part of this art project is the voluminous monograph by V. Maloletkov “The Cup of Fate” (Moscow, 2015), which includes 600 illustrations, which clearly and in a new way reveals the creative abilities of V. Maloletkov.

The exhibition runs on February 8, 2015