Exhibition of works by Andrei Nikolaevich Bliok. Painting and Graphics

On January 22, 2019, in the exhibition halls of the Russian Academy of Arts (Prechistenka 21), an exhibition of works by the people’s artist of the Russian Federation, academician of the Russian Academy of Arts, professor of the department of painting and composition of the St. Petersburg State Academic Institute of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture named after I.E. Repin at the Russian Academy of Arts - Andrei Nikolaevich Bliok. The exposition of the retrospective exhibition presents more than 100 paintings and graphic works of the master.

Andrei Nikolaevich Bliok was born in Leningrad a year after the end of World War II - June 1, 1946. In 1965 he graduated from the Leningrad Secondary Art School, which was then located in a building on the University Embankment. In 1971, he graduated from the I.E. Institute of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. Repin Academy of Arts of the USSR, where he studied in the studio of the people’s artist of the USSR, academician, professor A.A. Mylnikova. Then there were years of post-graduate studies, internships, leadership of student practice - this was the beginning of his pedagogical activity at the faculty of painting. Today A.N. Flare is a widely recognized artist, his works are stored in the collections of the Russian Museum, the Tretyakov Gallery and more than 30 leading museums of the country. He received many titles, awards and prizes, but his whole life is closely connected with the Alma Mater, where he has been a professor for almost half a century. All these years A.N. Blik did not stop painting, this is his profession, passion, element, duty.

For Nikolai Nikolaevich, his beloved city on earth has always been and remains his native St. Petersburg, where he lives and works. It was this city that became the "hero" of many of his works. Only here is such a land that shines with the luxury of nature and architecture, and which keeps the holy memory of both the bloody and the greatest events of Russian history. One of the significant paintings in the artist’s work about the blockade pore is “January 18, 1943” (2015). The day of the breaking of the siege of Leningrad is revealed through the majestic image of the city of Peter, through the image of the beautiful in its architectural design metal arches and spans of the Bolsheokhtinsky bridge, through the beauty of a frosty snowy day and the harsh January sky of St. Petersburg. A somewhat dry-graphic style of painting by A.N. Blioca in this work corresponds exactly to a refined, sublime, and at the same time, monumental and expressive image.

In the famous triptych “Leningrad” created in 1989, the artist used the technique of constructing space in the spirit of the masters of OST and the “Circle of Artists”. Kryukov’s canal is shown from a high point, from the “Houses with Atlantes” window, overlooking the Trinity Cathedral, shopping malls, the bell tower and kindergarten of St. Nicholas Cathedral, bridges thrown over the canal illuminated by the white winter sun. The author lovingly conveys the state of ringing silence during late autumn with the still “golden” trees that have not completely covered the crowns of trees and the first light snow that fell.

The artist travels a lot around the world - China, Italy, Greece, Bulgaria, Egypt, Austria, Hungary, Scandinavia - this is not a complete list of those places on Earth where he has visited and where he has returned many times. Among this vast geography, Paris occupies a special place. The result of close acquaintance with the capital of France was a cycle of paintings and graphic works, consisting of more than 125 works. These are landscapes and portraits, studies, sketches, large plot paintings. The famous bohemian region of Paris is dedicated to the landscape painting "Montmartre" (1995), painted as if intentionally in the spirit of the old French masters and placed in a baroque frame. The cobbled, crooked streets leading to the top of the hill, the old houses whitening in the distance Sacre Coeur seem to immerse us in the atmosphere of the last century, and only the bright red police car in the foreground makes us remember the present.

Paris does not let go so easily from its captivity. Several years A.N. Blik worked on the painting "Nostalgia" (1995-2015), which was born from a relatively small sketch made using the pastel technique in 1995. In the foreground is the artist himself, drawing at the table of the Parisian cafe “Da Dauphin”, behind his back - the vibrant and hectic nightlife of Paris, reflected in the windows and windows of the cafe. This is a peculiar modern paraphrase of “Bara in the Foley Berger” by E. Manet. “Nostalgia” is a painting dedicated to Paris itself and to the relatively few representatives of Russian emigration who find themselves in this city. This is also, perhaps, a conversation about the state of this emigration, which is close to the artist in recent years.

Everything that the artist creates, he does as a true perfectionist, thoroughly and creatively, behind all his canvases is an academic school, which he represents with honor. In 2017, in the halls of the Marble Palace of the State Russian Museum, a personal exhibition of Andrei Nikolaevich Bliok was successfully held, a fundamental catalog was published. The exhibition showed how great the range of his work, from monumental paintings, historical paintings to portraits and landscapes. Now the artist’s works are presented in the halls of the Russian Academy of Arts for viewing by the metropolitan audience.