Face to Face Exhibition Automatic translate

On the eve of International Women’s Day from March 4 to April 10, 2017, the All-Russian Museum of Decorative, Applied and Folk Art, the Italian Institute of Culture in Moscow and EAST MEETS WEST GALLERY present the international exhibition "Face to Face".

They often say: “Face to face you can’t see… But you can look through the looking glass…”, and there is not only a meeting of the Italian artist and sculptor Chriss Guenzati Dubini and Moscow artist Ekaterina Rozhkova, but also a meeting of the meanings of two worlds, two cultures. (Evelina Schatz)

Studying the faces of her contemporaries, each artist focuses not only on the external and internal state of the characters, but also on the symbols and attributes of their national, social and personal life. And here the portraits of the Milanese artist Chriss Dubini more emphasize the high social status of the models and less carefully examine their psychological state. “So, Chriss Dubini has, and these are perhaps the most interesting attributes, subtle, even rather sophisticated portraits of charcoal, mate with antique figures or details of Greek temples, creating a renaissance memory of history (Chriss and her Goddess). Thus proving that antiquity still nourishes European culture. And the picturesque secular or family portraits of Kriss often carry a symphony of the glamorous details of modernity… ”(E. Schatz). Along with ancient sculptures, details of temples, her contemporaries rise to the level of heroes.

Her sculptural works and ceramic plastic look different. The lines of female torsos become simpler and more relevant, often without any frills. The choice of objects is dictated by materials and design tasks: mainly Italian materials and techniques, such as terracotta, mosaics, glazes, are used. In these works there is no social paraphernalia or symbolism, which makes them very modern.

Chriss Guenzati Dubini. 3 generations of women, 1994. Paper, charcoal, 120x80 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Chriss Guenzati Dubini. Mosaic, 2002. Terracotta, marble mosaic, 40x25x65 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Chriss Guenzati Dubini. Barbara and Franchi, 1990. Acrylic on canvas, 90x110 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Chriss Guenzati Dubini. Two profiles, 2012. Ceramics, glaze, 54x38x11 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Chriss Guenzati Dubini. Girl on an Orange Background, 2008. Acrylic on Canvas, Coal, 60x80 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Chriss Guenzati Dubini. Man with a scarf, 2013. Acrylic on canvas, charcoal, 100x100 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Chriss Guenzati Dubini. Parthenon, 2015. Coal on canvas, 100x100 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Chriss Guenzati Dubini. Francesca, 2014. Acrylic on Canvas, Coal, 80x80 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Chriss Guenzati Dubini. Colored Woman, 2002. Angobe, German Terracotta, 40x25x65 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Moscow artist Ekaterina Rozhkova has a different understanding of the same topic. It seems symbolic not only the name of the new series of her works “City of Women”, but the very fact of her appeal to the genre of the portrait of a man. Different in age and by profession, different in social groups, all the heroines of her series - bright representatives of their time, live in Russia of the XXI century. This is either her close friends or good friends. All of them are united by a careful attitude to their roots, to family traditions, to the past. “I would like in my series of portraits to find a connection between modern heroines and traditional Russian items of interior and clothing. Each of the heroines corresponds to something objective, close to her in everyday life. It can be a Russian scarf from Ivanovo chintz, and a wooden platband, and a spinning wheel, or maybe a red dress or wooden carved box. This objective world, both drawn and real, helps us solve the mystery of the Russian woman - her patience, her industriousness, her wholeness ”(E. Rozhkova).

The Department of Fabrics of VMDPNI on display presents magnificent examples of the industriousness of a Russian woman: two kumach scarves, one of which is branded with the manufacture of A. Baranov from the late XIX - early XX centuries, several festive women’s headdresses from the Vologda, Olonets and Tver provinces, embroidered towels and 20th century supervision of the northern provinces of Russia (Vologda and Arkhangelsk).

The subject line of wooden folk art is provided by the department of wood and bone. The well-preserved platband of the light window and part of the frieze of a peasant’s house (Volga region, the second half of the 19th century), a salt shaker in the form of a rooster and a salt shaker in the form of chicken (Vologda, the 19th century, wood, chiselling, carving) and other household items of Russia are of the 19th century codes and symbols of mythological motifs of ancient Slavic pagan tribes.

Previously, in the artist’s works, a portrait of an object was more often present, which loses its function and becomes a symbol, a sign of time, state, era. And for the symbol, details and multicolor are not so important. Therefore, in the series “Mechanisms”, “Plates”, “Architecture” and others, the pencil technique was chosen, which is usually and mainly used in sketches. But for Katya, this became the main technique, which makes it possible to go in monochrome, to delay the state of “hint”, understatement, and not bring the picture to a ringing state of “done”. (E. Rozhkova).

And here is the portrait. A new genre, a return to large-sized canvas and multicolor.

Everything is new. The artist already foresaw that the moment of a cardinal turn was coming. Now she knows what it is like to look not only at herself and her “looking glass”, but to look at another person.

Ekaterina Rozhkova. Architect Polina, 2017. Mixed media on canvas, 95x120 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Ekaterina Rozhkova. Katya Taguti, artist, 2017. Canvas, mixed media, 180x100 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Ekaterina Rozhkova. Lena Solovieva, architect-designer, 2017. Canvas, mixed media, 120x120 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Ekaterina Rozhkova. Student Sasha, 2017. Mixed media on canvas, 100x120 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Ekaterina Rozhkova. Black Rooster, 2016. Mixed media on canvas, 120x100 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Ekaterina Rozhnova. Katya Lebedeva, master of pedicure, 2017. Canvas, mixed media, 80x80 Courtesy of the East Meets West Gallery

Exhibition curator Tatyana Paleeva

VMDPNI is open daily from 10:00 to 18:00, on Thursday - until 21:00.

The day off is Tuesday.

St. Delegatskaya 3
www.vmdpni.ru