Cookie Consent by Free Privacy Policy website It's OK to change your mind! Contemporary Russian art from the Gazprombank Collection
january 23, 2018 - Mambo

It's OK to change your mind! Contemporary Russian art from the Gazprombank Collection

Villa delle Rose reopens to the public from the 20th of January to the 18th of March 2018 with an exhibition that draws attention to the intriguing #contemporaryart scene of Russia. 

In conjunction with the exhibition Revolutija. From Chagall to Malevich from Repin to Kandinsky, on view atMAMbo – The Museum of Modern Art of #bologna from the 12th of December, the venue in via Saragozza presents It’s OK to change your mind! Russian #contemporaryart from the Gazprombank collection, curated by Lorenzo Balbi (Art Director of the MAMbo) and Suad Garayeva-Maleki (Chief Curator and Collection Director of YARAT #contemporaryart Space in Baku, Azerbaijan). 


On the centennial anniversary of the October Revolution and within the social context sprouting from the Soviet era and the fall of the Berlin Wall, how does art come to terms with the past and develop in the present? Within Russia torn between openness to and isolation from the European Union and the United States, how do the artists of the latest generations navigate between the need to preserve their own cultural identity, history, memory and the need to experiment  and open up to international audiences? 

As stated by Bart De, of the M HKA, the Museum of #contemporaryart of Antwerp and one of the authors of the exhibition catalogue, even though Russia has been one of the cradles of modern art and still harbours a varied, intellectually stimulating and visually sophisticated artistic community, there is still a lack of awareness at international level of the extraordinary liveliness of its contemporary production.


Within this context and in line with the curatorial decision to host international projects at Villa delle Rose from 2018 –, It’s OK to change your mind! offers a possible interpretation of Russian #contemporaryart and a new vantage point for reflection on the legacy of the early 20th century avant-garde, through the works of twenty-one artists and collectives in various media, from the Gazprombank Collection. At a time of  global political uncertainty and turmoil, protest once again takes a form of abstraction and seemingly apolitical quotidian encounters become a push for social change. The exhibition charts a spectrum of various artistic positions, from those commenting on individual struggles and local vernacular to those exploring the dystopian dreams of building alternative realities.


While the Russian avant-garde of the last century called for concentrated action towards a certain goal, the artistic force today seems to be diffused and indeterminate. Many of the works emit an aura of being suspended in time and space in a state of perpetual expectation of a better future. Nostalgic sentiments describe a desire for a peaceful and more equitable society while the new Russian identity is being negotiated through juxtaposition of old traditions with the new global youth culture.

Evoking at times the philosophy of Russian Cosmism, according to which colonizing space would lead to immortality, one way of achieving a new beginning becomes possible by breaking away from the ordinary and into a new, often post-human realm. Many works in the show re-appropriate the hard architectural forms of the avant-garde in order to deconstruct them into the building blocks of the new world order. Architecture thus acts as both a stand in for humanity in its intimate habitat and a mise-en-scene for the new societal play.

Artists in the exhibition together herald a paradigm shift despite the confusion and uncertainty facing their generation. The title of the show, suggested by Svetlana Shuvaeva’s eponymous work and itself borrowed from a popular slogan of a multinational corporation IKEA, highlights the sense of play inherent within current artistic practice. The processes of achieving a new status quo remain fluid and manifold, and whether it is through repurposing our immediate environment or landing us on the moon change is coming and it will be OK.


The exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue in English and Russian, with an insert in Italian published by Corraini Edizioni.


A guided tour organized by the #mambo Educational Department will be held every Saturday at 4.00 pm. Every Sunday from 3.00 pm to 6.30 pm a free mediation service will be provided to the public to visit It's OK to change your mind!


Artists in the show


Sergey Bugaev (Afrika)Elena Kovylina

Victor AlimpievMishMash (Mikhail Leykin and Maria Sumnina)

Sergey BratkovAnatoliy Osmolovsky

Olga ChernyshevaYuri Palmin

Vladimir DubossarskyAlexandra Paperno

Semyon FaibisovichPavel Pepperstein

Alexandra GalkinaMikhail Rozanov

Alexander GronskySergey Sapozhnikov

Alina GutkinaSvetlana Shuvaeva
Daria IrincheevaArseny Zhilyaev
Irina Korina



Technical sheet

Istituzione #bologna Musei | Villa delle Rose

It's OK to change your mind!
Contemporary Russian art from the Gazprombank Collection
Curated by Lorenzo Balbi and Suad Garayeva-Maleki

20 January – 18 March 2018
Opening Friday 19 January 2018 h 6.00 p.m.



Curated by:
Lorenzo Balbi and Suad Garayeva-Maleki


Promoted by:
Istituzione #bologna Musei | Area #arte Moderna e Contemporanea

Venue:
Villa delle Rose
via Saragozza 228/230 | 40135 #bologna


Opening hours:
Thursday and Fridayh 2.00 p.m. - 6.00 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday h 10.00 a.m. –  6.30 p.m.

Prolonged opening hours will be scheduled during ART CITY #bologna 2018

Tickets:
full € 5 intero | reduced € 3 | free for Card Musei Metropolitani #bologna and REVOLUTIJA or MAMbo/Museo Morandi ticket holders. It's OK to change your mind! ticket allows to buy a reduced REVOLUTIJA ticket. 


Information:
Villa delle Rose
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tel. +39 051 436818 / +39 051 6496611

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