 The
elegiac illusiveness and density of Venice’s cultural layers noted by
Joseph Brodsky’s “Venetian Strophes” have become the theme of Vladimir
Nasedkin’s new artistic project. The book consists of 16 poems and 16
engravings that show a piercing sincerity and clarity of artistic
expression. The
genre of the “Artist’s Book” (Livre d’Artiste) attracts modern artists
for a special reason. In the attempt to try and create one’s own
artefact in a traditional or perhaps more archaeological form of a book,
there is a certain provocation and specific artistic temptation.
While
offering a wide range for improvisation, books with poetic texts rank
high in this domain. As an artist with an analytical type of mind,
Vladimir Nasedkin has elaborated an approach that excludes any kind of
these temptations of freedom. Whilst favouring a responsible path that
correlates his own visual experience with world-wide artistic traditions
to “soaring in empiricism”, the artist not only creates a visual row as
an annex for the poetic expression but also fills it with a great
number of links and allusions, not explicit but nevertheless convincing.
This fact is apparent in the choice of the technique. Woodcarving arose at the dawn of the 15th
century on Venetian shores. Skilfully using all its full potential of
transmitting the transition of colour tints, which allows a
representation of the “textures” of sky, water and earth, the artist
intentionally uses only a black-and-white palette. The recognizable
Venetian haze and the humid suspension covering the whole city appear in
the engraving’s silvery tone, erasing distant details of city facades
and the bright colours of its streets and squares. Handmade cuts and
natural patterns of the boxwood create a landscape, pierced with lots of
associations. Even accidental defects of the wood are transformed by
the artist into elegant reminders and delicate allusions which hide
either the Venetian city silhouette with its contours of churches and
cathedrals, the outlines of a sea gull or a lone gondolier suddenly
appearing and disappearing like a ghost.
Even
though with all their sincerity of execution and their fragmentation of
images, Nasedkin’s engravings are absolutely free from any accidental
character. All the elements are clearly separated from each other with
contour lines and they contrast one another like a negative and a
positive. The compositions are minimalistic and are prominently
structured similar to the well known engraving series “Sea Shore” (1994)
and “Khakassia” (1991-1992), which were exhibited and bought numerous
times by European and American museums. Executed in the same technique
almost twenty years ago they declared the unique author’s manner of
working with cross-sectioned wood, which allows in general and abstract
forms a reproduction of not only the water surface with ripples but it
also helps guess the silhouettes associated with ritual images of
ancient caves.
Nonetheless
the main affinity with the current project lies in the artist’s ability
to unite a metaphorical contemplation with an exact, almost
geographical “location binding” which may seem paradoxical at first
sight yet it defines Nasedkin’s artistic image and position in modern
art. In this instance the engravings represent the artists vision of a
particular space of Venice as a city, which is physical and speculative,
that is present as well as timeless, of that unique space that can
exist only there - between the sky and the earth and the enormous
surface of the water.
This
unity of metaphors and topographical precision engenders the impression
of being surrounded by the fundamental cultural layers of one specific genius loci, sensed as personal experience.
It
seems as if this is the exact place where the affinity appears, which
links the engravings created under the impression of “Venetian Strophes”
with the poetic text that allows believing the book to be a serious
artistic project. Joseph Brodsky is one of the most difficult authors to
draw visual parallels for. It is not by chance that the majority of the
illustrations for his texts (perhaps except for his own ones) cannot be
considered as convincing ones. However Nasedkin’s works do not present
direct allusions. The reason why they suit the poems best is for their
eye-catching contours and silhouettes that abruptly appear from the
silvery haze of the engraving plates. They also contain the same
poignancy and bare vision just like the poet’s, who forever engraved in
words “the wet tethering post of quayside”, “the violin necks of
gondolas” and “the golden scales of the windows flushing in the
channel”. Both in the strophes as well as in the engravings, it is
precisely the concrete objects that play the role of metaphor which is
why the noisy city, imprinted with its own cultural memories is
transformed into an enigmatic continent which is similar to Antarctica
in Alexander Ponomarev’s project “The First Biannual Exhibition of
Modern Art in Antarctica”, in the framework of which Vladimir Nasedkin’s
“Venetian Strophes” will be brought out for the first time. But once
again, it is very significant and important that the book will begin its
journey exactly in Venice, which unites things that cannot be united,
just like what is seen in the Venice inspired worlds created by one
eminent poet and one outstanding artist.
Andrey Tolstoy,
Professor & Doctor of History of Art, London
Vladimir Nasedkin at Iosif Brodsky\' tomb.
Vladimir Nasedkin, russian contemporary artist, with his wife Tatiana visits the tomb of a russian poet, Iosif Brodsky.
Venice, 06.06.2011.
Vladimir Nasedkin, russian contemporary artist, shows his book with poems by Iosifh Brodsky at the Venice Biennale.
Venice, 05.06.2011.
Vladimir Nasedkin, russian contemporary artist, shows his book with poems by Iosifh Brodsky at the Venice Biennale.
Venice, 05.06.2011.
Vladimir Nasedkin, russian contemporary artist, shows his book with poems by Iosifh Brodsky at the Venice Biennale.
Venice, 05.06.2011.
|
