Exhibition of works by Alexander Yastrebenetsky. On the occasion of the 60th birthday

October 4, 2016 at 16.00 in the exhibition halls of the Russian Academy of Arts (Prechistenka, 21) will open the exhibition of works by academician of the Russian Academy of Arts, Honored Artist of the Russian Federation Alexander Yastrebenetsky. The exhibition is dedicated to the 60th anniversary of the master.

The composition of the exposition includes paintings and drawings of different years.

Alexander Yastrebenetsky is an outstanding and bright personality, a master with a unique individual creative style. His engravings, etchings and silk-screen printing became the embodiment of a high professional culture, the author’s transformation of traditions and discoveries of Russian and world graphics.

The universal talent of the artist was clearly manifested both in easel graphic works and in the illustration of books, and in the field of painting.

Alexander Yastrebenetsky was born in 1956 in Leningrad in the family of the remarkable artist Grigory Danilovich Yastrebenetsky. He graduated from the Leningrad Secondary Art School, in 1980 - I.E. Repin Institute of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. The romantic charm of St. Petersburg, the “rumble of the shores and streets” of his native city had a fruitful effect on the aesthetic preferences and taste of the future master.

A. Yastrebenetsky is a participant in more than 300 city, union and international exhibitions. About 20 personal exhibitions of the artist took place in Russia and abroad - in Germany, Great Britain, Spain. In 1979, he was a fellow of the Scottish Council for the Arts and completed an internship at Glasgow Print Studio (Glasgow, UK).

The breadth of horizons, the desire for full-fledged author’s self-expression forced A. Yastrebenetsky to try himself in various difficult areas of professional activity. Passion for design and architectural design never took him away from drawing, on the contrary, the craftsmen entered the work as new formal and figurative-plastic qualities.

The artist constantly experimented in various techniques of printing and unique graphics. Perfectly mastering the pattern, cutter engraving, aquatint and mezzo-tinto, monotype, he preferred etching and at the same time mastered the expressive features of silk-screen printing.

An impeccable sense of harmony of form and space, the relations of light and shadow, line and spot, color counterpoints allow Yastrebenetsky in such works as “Boats”, “Lighthouse” from the series “End of the Season”, “Night Flight”, “St. Petersburg. Silver Age ”,“ Cathedral and Tower ”,“ Warm Evening ”,“ Neva. Ice drift ”and others to achieve emotional polyphony with minimal artistic means and techniques.

His graphic pages: “Excavations in the South of the Desert,” “Illustrations for the Short Course of Paleontology,” and “The British Museum,” devoted to the architecture and art of ancient civilizations, evoke a wide variety of associations; reality and fantasy, time and space are connected in them.

The works of A. Yastrebenetsky are in numerous private and state collections in Russia and abroad, including in the Pskov State Museum of Art, Norilsk State Art Gallery, Pushkin Museum im. A.S. Pushkin (Moscow), Gallery of the Jaume I University (Spain), Museum of Modern Art (Mexico City, Mexico), Collection of Contemporary Art (Dusseldorf, Germany).

Being vice-president of the Russian Academy of Arts, director of the Moscow Academic Art Lyceum, A. Yastrebenetsky did a lot to improve art education, to fully educate young talents, future generations of Russian artists.

Paintings and graphic works by A. Yastrebenetsky, exquisite in color, marked by impeccable taste, tremendous emotional strength and philosophical depth, enable the viewer to fully appreciate the artist’s multifaceted work.

The exhibition is open to the public until October 23, 2016.