Exhibition "Surrealism in the Country of the Bolsheviks"

In the gallery "On Shabolovka" Association "Exhibition Halls of Moscow" will open an exhibition-study "Surrealism in the country of the Bolsheviks", dedicated to the 90th anniversary of OBERIU *, which arose in Leningrad in 1927.

In the anniversary year for the unification, the exhibition raises the question of the existence in the unofficial Soviet art, graphic design and theater of the 1930-1940s of a language close to European surrealism.

In addition to the graphics and paintings of Pavel Zaltsman, Alexander Labas, Eduard Krimmer, Alice Poret, photographs and projects of Boris Smirnov and several other artists, the context will also be shown - books, magazines, films that existed outside the framework of socialist realism, in a single space with texts by Daniil Kharms, Alexander Vvedensky, Konstantin Vaginov.

Most of the works presented come from private collections and archives of artists’ families and are rarely exhibited.

* The Union of Real Art - a group of writers and cultural figures that existed in the late 1920s - early 1930s. in Leningrad. The group included Daniil Harms, Alexander Vvedensky, Nikolai Zabolotsky, Konstantin Vaginov, Yuri Vladimirov, Igor Bakhterev, Doivber (Boris Mikhailovich) Levin. Oberiuts declared a rejection of traditional forms of art, the need to update the methods of depicting reality, cultivated the grotesque, illogism, poetics of the absurd.

Exhibition "Surrealism in the country of the Bolsheviks"
Dates: May 26 - July 23, 2017
Opening hours: Tuesday - Sunday, 11:00 - 20:00
Cost: 100 rubles (50 rubles - discount ticket)
(12+)

Daniel Harms and Alice Poret. Around 1932. Photograph glued on a mounting cardboard. 15.5x16 cm. Private collection

Alice Poret. Portrait (sheet from the album). The second half of the 1930s Graphite and color pencils on paper. 26x18.9 cm. Private collection

Pavel Salzman. Werewolf. 1940. Lead pencil on paper. 19.5x21.5 cm. Collection E. Zaltsman and M. Zusmanovich

Boris Smirnov. Photo from the series "Doll". 1934–35 Galey Gallery Collection

Boris Smirnov. Sketch of an invitation card to the carnival in the State Security Committee. 1938. Watercolor, ink and pencil on paper. 18.5x25.4. Galey Gallery Collection

Edward Krimmer Figures. 1925. L. – M., Rainbow, 1925.12 p. with silt. Circulation 10 000 copies. In col. publishing lithographic cover. 28x22 cm. Galeev Gallery Collection

Alexander Labas. Sketch of the curtain for the play "Army of the World" in the Theater. M.N. Ermolova. 1932. Watercolor on paper. 20x29.5 cm. Collection by O. Beskina-Labas