between questions of the epoch
who is to blame and what to do
Timeline
1942
Born in Nizhny Tagil, USSR
1949 – 1959
Graduated from secondary school N 58. Zaporozhye, USSR
1954 – 1956
Graduated from the art studio at the district House of Culture. Zaporozhye, USSR
1959 – 1962
Graduated from the metallurgical college. Zaporozhye, USSR
1961
Diploma of participation in the USSR Amateur Art Exhibition
1962 – 1963
Worked at the tractor factory. Volgograd, USSR
1963 – 1966
Served in the Soviet army. Kharkov, Ukrainian SSR
1966
Worked as a graphic designer. Zaporozhye, USSR
1967
Worked as a graphic designer in the Art Fund of the Ukrainian SSR, Zaporozhye
1967 – 1972
Graduated from the Stroganov Moscow State Academy of Arts and Industry, faculty of monumental and decorative-applied art, specialty "Ceramic art"
1972 – 1974
Worked as an artist in the Art Fund of the Ukrainian SSR, Zaporozhye
1975 – 1988
Worked as a muralist in the Moscow regional branch of the Art Fund of the RSFSR, Noginsk
1988 to the present
Freelancer
Solo exhibitions
2016
Solo exhibition "Faces"
Gallery "55Bellechasse". France, Paris
2012
Solo exhibition "Illusion and Things"
Azarnova Gallery. Russia, Moscow
2010 – 2011
Solo exhibition "The brutal romanticism in the office space"
Grant Thornton corporate art gallery. Russia, Moscow
2007
Solo exhibition "Russian soul"
Gallery "Sensenwerk". Austria, Deutschfeistritz
1996
Solo exhibition "Saturday of Souls"
Cultural center "Phoenix". Russia, Moscow
1995
Solo exhibition "Birthday"
Cultural center "Phoenix". Russia, Moscow
1992 – 2012
Solo exhibition "Painting, collage, books"
Gallery "East – West". UK, London
1992
Solo exhibition "Writers under Stalin"
Literary festival. UK, Cheltenham
1992
Solo exhibition "Writers under Stalin"
Museum of Contemporary Art. UK, Oxford
1991
Solo exhibition "Writers under Stalin"
As part of the "Russian Spring" event at the Royal Festival Hall. UK, London
Group exhibitions
2020
Fair of Contemporary Art "Art Russia"
Participation from the gallery "55Bellechasse" (France). Russia, Moscow
2019
Group exhibition "FRAME Art Fair Paris"
Gallery "55Bellechasse". France, Paris
2017
Fair of Contemporary Art "Cosmoscow"
Participation from the gallery "55Bellechasse" (France). Russia, Moscow
2017
Group exhibition "Pancake Clouds"
7th Moscow International Biennale of Contemporary Art, parallel program. Gallery "KINO". Russia, Moscow
2016
Group exhibition “Duet and dialogue of masters. Janosh Kalmar and Vladimir Sulyagin"
Gallery "55Bellechasse". France, Paris
2012
Group exhibition “Dialogues. Mikhail Molochnikov and Vladimir Sulyagin”
Central House of Artists. Russia, Moscow
2012
Group exhibition “The Experimental Art of Russian Children's Books”
BookExpo America. USA, New York
2005
Group exhibition "Latest Arrivals"
The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts. Russia, Moscow
2003
Group exhibition "Collage in Russia"
The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts. Russia, Moscow
1998
Group exhibition "Poetry and Photography"
Gallery "A3". Russia, Moscow
1996
Group exhibition “Artist's book. Russia. 1970-1990"
The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts. Russia, Moscow
1997
Group exhibition "Hero of Our Time"
Cultural center "Phoenix". Russia, Moscow
1995
Group exhibition "Carnival"
Gallery "Nina". Central House of Artists. Russia, Moscow
1995
Group exhibition "Book Garden, contemporary artists of the book"
John Rylands Library. UK, Manchester
1994
Group exhibition "Books are like drugs"
Germany, Hamburg
1994
3rd international exhibition of the artist’s book and engraving
Germany, Leipzig
1993
Group exhibition "Theater of papers – II"
Anna Akhmatova Museum at the Fountain House. Russia, Saint Petersburg
1993
Group exhibition "Adresse Provisoire". Contemporary Art of Russia
Musée de La Poste. France, Paris
1993
Group exhibition "Russian and Soviet artist's book. 1910 – 1993"
France, Uzerche
1992
Group exhibition "Theater of papers"
Anna Akhmatova Museum at the Fountain House. Russia, Saint Petersburg
1989
Group exhibition "Collection '89"
House of Soviet Culture and Science. Finland, Helsinki
1989
Group exhibition "Russian soul"
Austria, Graz
1987
Group exhibition "Etudes about the books"
Central House of Artists. USSR, Moscow
Auctions
2006
Charity auction of the fund "Children of Russia"
British Embassy. Russia, Moscow
1990
Auction "Dorotheum"
Austria, Vienna
Collections
The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts
Russia, Moscow
The State Hermitage Museum
Russia, Saint Petersburg
J. Paul Getty Museum
USA, Los Angeles
Gallery "East – West"
UK, London
Lyrik Kabinett Foundation
Germany, Munich
Gallery "KINO"
Russia, Moscow
Competitions
1996
2nd place for the work "Saturday of Souls" of the United Nations competition among Russian artists. Russia, Moscow
Influence
Kazimir Malevich
beyond the event horizon with the simplest tool
Vladimir Favorsky
between content and form
Henri Matisse and Pierre Bonnard
as a value of rest
Pablo Picasso
to constructive clarity and euryke expectations
Alberto Giacometti
in acute concentration of the image
Henri Rousseau, Paul Cezanne, Vincent van Gogh
what is between a symbol – archetypal meaning and passion – everything is here
Giorgio Morandi
among the little things and simplicity – plunging
David Hockney and the English School
epic pattern of daily life
Dionisius, Andrei Rublev and the Old Russian School
the era of "smart doing"
Xieyi and Chinese School
as an idea and pressure
Monographs in manuscript
ART EPICA
The fabric of time in the context of time
1998–2016
about time and its possible forms of presence – ways to image places and analysis of twelve perspectives – total version of time in Grigory Perelman modulations – new sign of the time – in three books: tools, practices, comments
500 pages
Color As Form
2001–2010
how to understand color in quantitative and qualitative definitions – examples evidence paradoxes of the mechanism – world experience of painting practices
160 pages
Books
Paper spirits: collage portraits by Vladimir Sulyagin
Introduced by Hilary Spurling
1992
96 pages, hardcover
Publisher: Chatto & Windus
ISBN-10: 0701140003, ISBN-13: 978-0701140007
In 1992 became the best book of the year about the art in the UK
Reviews
Hilary Spurling writer, journalist and biographer
"Sulyagin's collage portraits are often as witty as they are elegant, economical and surprising ... His pictures owe most of all, perhaps, to Japanese artists' techniques of reducing the formal means almost to vanishing point so as to catch the spirit of what they paint"
The Daily Telegraph 1991, UK, London
Reviews
Colin Franklin bibliographer, writer, book-collector
"I was impressed by the book arts of Vladimir Sulyagin, an artist whose collage portraits are now being exhibited and have been successful in England"
"Zhurnal dekora" 1991, Russia, Moscow
Reviews
John Spurling writer
"Just as the portraits derive in equal parts from Sulyagin's passionate interest in traditional icon-painting and form innovative 20th-century sources such as Mattise, Léger and Rodchenko, so he himself has old Russian manners and uncompromisingly experimental aims"
The European 1991, UK, London
Reviews
Michal Boncza journalist
"The inherent poetry of life, as well as philosophy as an instrument of human development, seem to be the twin axes of his approach"
Soviet weekly 1991, UK, London
Reviews
Paul Vaughan journalist, radio presenter
"Absolutely astonishing... succeeds brilliantly... an exhibition that must be visited"
"Kaleidoscope" on BBC Radio 4 about the exhibition at the Royal Festival Hall, 1991, UK, London
Reviews
Margaret Drabble writer, biographer, and critic
"Materials, of a heroic, almost childlike simplicity ... he has created something eloquent and new and full of individual expression ... Marina Tsvetayeva is transformed into a glittering silver icon of power and immortality, a silver image for a poet of the great Silver Age ... Here is wit, style, energy. The splendid large grey-green nose and quizzical half-spectacles of Nabokov, the golden eyes of Symbolist Fyodor Sologub, the orange ear of bad-tempered Ivan Bunin and the large pipe and merrily shining silver teeth of Nobel-prize-winning, chess-playing nuclear physicist Piotr Kapitza add humor and even gaiety to this memorable sequence."
The Guardian 1991, UK, London
Reviews
Kseniya Bezmenova art historian, employee of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts
"Henri Matisse had a strong influence on the works of Sulyagin, whose collages are mostly devoted to portraiture. The artist created a series of sharply expressive and memorable images – such are the portraits of Daniil Kharms, Vincent Van Gogh, Henri Matisse. An important place in his work occupy the faces of the Saviour, and the Mother of God, made in collage."
Catalog of the exhibition “Collage in Russia” 2003, Moscow, Russia
Reviews
Anna Chudetskaya art historian, employee of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts
"Since the late 1980s, Vladimir Sulyagin makes abstract folding books. The text is present in them at the level of the sign and letter. There is no border between the text and the image, all visual signs are involved in an endless game in which reference to reality becomes almost impossible"
Catalog of the exhibition “Artist's Book. Russia. 1970-1990 years“ 1999, Russia, Moscow
Reviews
Elena Sadykova art expert
"The art of Sulyagin is an art for sophisticated intellectuals, researchers and collectors."
For the exhibition “Illusions and Things” in Azarnova Gallery, 2012
Reviews
Alexei Parshchikov Russian poet, critic, and translator
"I can’t watch any Moscow artists, except for Sulyagin and two or three more (late Bulatov, something from Shvartsman). Don't take it for my arrogance – I'm very friendly, but almost everyone I knew went for money into oblivion. Gogol wrote about this without malicious intent, and I am for curiosity"
From letters to Alexander Davydov, 01/25/2007
Press
Collage in Russia. XX Century. Collage – Appliqué – Assemblage
Kseniya Bezmenova. Catalog of the exhibition "Collage in Russia" 2003, Moscow, Russia
Relationship of Heterogeneous Elements
Anna Chudetskaya. Catalog of the exhibition "Collage in Russia". 2003, Russia, Moscow
Catalog of Books Intended Not Only for Reading
Anna Chudetskaya. Catalog of the exhibition "Artist's Book. Russia. 1970-1990 years" 1999, Russia, Moscow
Impressions That Destroy Us. Collages by Vladimir Sulyagin
Vitim Kruglikov. The book "Produced and Named", philosophical readings dedicated to M.K. Mamardashvili. Publisher: Ad Marginem. 1998, Russia, Moscow
The Artist's Book: The Problem of Genre
Gleb Yershov. Catalog of the exhibition "Theater of Papers – II". 1994, Russia, Saint Petersburg
Workshop. Paper Homeland
Natalya Semenova. Magazine "Ogonyok" N 39. 1993, Russia, Moscow
Rock Paper Scissors
Mikhail Pozdnyaev. Magazine "Stolitsa" N 27 (137). 1993, Russia, Moscow
The Artist Who Jumps Mountains
Sergei Drozhin. Newspaper "The Moscow Tribune" May 5, 1993
Paper Spirits
Magazine "Angliya" N 126, February 1993, UK, London
Christmas Books
Michael Ignatieff; Craig Raine. Newspaper "The Observer" November 29, 1992, UK, London
Gallery of Heroes
Hilary Spurling. "Telegraph Magazine" October 3, 1992. UK, London
The Artist's Book: Controversial Definitions and Undisputed Samples
Colin Franklin. "Zhurnal dekora" N 9–10. 1991, Russia, Moscow
Kelmscott to Moscow
Colin Franklin. "ABMR" (The Antiquarian and Book Monthly Review), July 1991, UK, London
Icons of the Modern Martyrs
John Spurling. Magazine "The European", April 5-7, 1991. UK, London
Writers Profiled in Paper and Paste
Hilary Spurling. Newspaper "The Daily Telegraph" April 5, 1991. UK, London
Suliagin and the Spiritual Life of Books
Michal Boncza. Newspaper "Soviet weekly" April 25, 1991. UK, London
The Masks of Stalin
Margaret Drabble. Newspaper "The Guardian" April 13-14, 1991. UK, London
Home Pleasures
Ilya Tsentsiper. Magazine "Ogonyok" N 40. 1991, Russia, Moscow
Russian Artists. The Great Collector
Magazine "The Economist" January 27 – February 2, 1990, UK, London
Portrait
