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14/3/2003

Alexey Morozov

D137 Gallery, St. Petersburg

Baltic Renaissance
(painting, drawing)

Flourishing of the Greek civilization was the event of exclusive importance in the history of mankind. At the beginning of the VII century B.C. in Greece unprecedented political forms emerged that later formed the basis of European democracy. Closely linked with these was the rise of science and philosophy as specific forms of systemized knowledge. Fine literature different from folklore and pre-literature forms of written verbal activity, as well as revolutionary changes in the field of fine arts appeared also at the times concerned. All these almost simultaneous manifestations can be called 'Great Greek Prodigy'.
Formation of the Hellenistic culture took three or four centuries. Beginning from Renaissance the appreciation of significance of the Hellenic culture for both the New Times and nowadays is practically a commonplace for historians and philosophers, scientists and publicists. The 'Greek Prodigy' was a cultural upheaval that served as a basis for the modern civilization. The Hellenistic culture proved to be enormously influential, and as early as at the time of the Empire of Alexander the Great it had its aesthetic effect on Buddhist and Hinduism cultures of ancient India.
Use of the classic Hellenistic aesthetic by the Europeans at the time of Renaissance together with great geographic discoveries brought about the widest distribution of the aesthetic to cover the most remote regions of the World. Looking back at the culture in Europe, we see that Greek features are definitively manifested in spite of certain local differences. Beginning from the time of development of the ancient culture in Greece its influence began to be more and more widespread in the whole continent of Europe. As early as in the epoch of Renaissance the interest to antiquity was fragmentarily spread also in the North of Europe. On the other hand, interest to the North sprang up in ancient Greece and was expressed in the Mythos of Hyperboreas. During the last three hundred years the Mythos of Hyperboreas used to be actively realized in the region of the Baltic Sea. At the end of the XVIII - beginning of the XIX centuries the Baltic region presented to the world such titans of the Northern Renaissance as Dane Bertel Torwaldsen, German Schinkel, Russians Carl Brullow and Alexander Pushkin, Koenigsbergians Emmanuel Kant and Ernest Theodore Amadeus Hoffmann, Norwegian Heinrich Ibsen. These northern people used to travel much, came to the southern seas to find inspiration in the Kastal Springs, to follow Winkelmann and Schliemann.
At the middle of the XIX century great Estonian painter Johan Koeller lit the fire of classicism in Estonia. But soon after that time the 'new winds', the ideas of socialism by Karl Marx, began to blow. These ideas at the second half of the XIX century made the wave of the social realism to come, the fact that weakened the culture of the north of Europe. And Koeller encountered the opposition from the Peredvizhniks in the Academy of Arts in Petersburg.

The social revolution in arts was followed by the modernism revolution. After that, in the 20-30ths of the XX century neo-classicism embraced Europe. But after the Second World War was over, the followers of the modernism revolution won the West, and those of the socialist revolution won the East of Europe.
The rest of the pre-war classicism underwent quite a rapid rooting out. And at the end of the 80ths, when the ideology of communism in the USSR crushed, the all-Europe cultural landscape began to renew. Following the weakening of the opposition caused by the 'cold war', the aesthetic pressure exerted upon artists weakened as well. In different regions of the Northern Europe, as opposite to major global trends, local tendencies arose. In St.-Petersburg the artists belonging to 'the New Fine Arts Academy' began to identify themselves with the historically formed classicism in S.-Petersburg. Born in S.-Petersburg, by the beginning of the XXI century Neoacademism strengthened the principles of classical arts on the entire territory of Europe, having attracted new creative forces in the persons of many famous masters of the fine arts.
Painter and sculptor Alexey Morozov studied in the Academy of Arts in St.-Petersburg where he soaked in the basics of classical European arts, and finalized his education in the Moscow Academy of Fine Arts. He belongs to the new generation of artists in whose works a tendency of 'new seriousness' is depicted. This new trend sprang up among Moscow and S.-Petersburg neoclassicists at the second half of the 90ths.

The creative concept of Morozov is based on his deliberate, serious and deeply realized striving for creation of traditionally monumental works that usually need a customer of the highest social position. Previously the State played the role of such customer. When we look at the masterpieces created by sculptors, painters and architects in the course of the XIX century, it becomes evident that the best works were created by orders of the persons belonging to the imperial family or by Maecenas, patrons of arts.
The works by A. Morozov are distinguished by seriousness full of inspiration and enthusiasm. They feature fundamental knowledge in arts history, human being's anatomy, culturology, and this helps him inherit the best painting traditions characteristic to the epoch of European classicism. Masterly drawing skills, as well as knowledge of oil painting secrets of classicism masters, excellent educational background, traditions of 'aristocratic naturalness' that he follows in his sculpture works, - all these features allow him to create perfect works of arts in the Neoclassicism style. Perfect technique, consistency of composition, nuanced coloring - these are the skills that are forgotten in the nowadays painting. And in Morozov's works they predominate and allow him to create a painting as a sample of the Fine Arts in the sense inherent in the arts of the XVIII-XIX centuries.
The title work of the exposition [kra:ft] Deco Classic named 'MITRA SUPER 2000', full of heroic enthusiasm, is an example of a classical painting that in the current arts is closely connected to Neoclassicism.
An ideal human being with faultless, perfect, classically proportioned body is the major subject of Morozov's works. Thus, the ancient Iran God who was very popular among legionnaires in ancient Rome and identified with the Sun, kills a bull. And this action symbolizes the triumph of spirit over material universe. The painting has a very distinct and strict composition that demands form interpretation typical for sculpture, laconism of action reading, emotions concentration. 'To paint like it was spoken in Sparta' - Jacque-Luis David said speaking of classicism.

Sculpture is another side of Morozov's creative work. His works have soaked in the traditions of the Golden times of Russian sculpture represented by Hugo Zaleiman and his pupil Mathvey Manizer. The masters' understanding of lightning presupposes that sculpture forms play with light, interact and catch it and so create a really live sculpture with its varied light-and-shadow gradation. A.Morozov graduated from the workshop of Manizer's pupil, Academician Leo Kerbel in the State Academy of Fine Arts named after Surikov in Moscow.
Creation of neoclassicism works places extremely exacting demands upon an artist in such fields as academic drawing, anatomy, history of arts, culturology and, of course, artistic taste. And this turns the artist's works into the rare samples of really up-to-date and truly aristocratic works of arts.
Alexey Morozov's works are the concentrated idea of beauty that is based on strict aesthetic principles and keep with unshakeable ideals of classical arts.
And it is only but natural that the Exhibitions DECO CLASSIC and DECO ACADEMIC are held in St.-Petersburg, the city built with the aim to ensure the march to the North. The march started by the culture born on the Mediterranean seashore.
Timur NOVIKOV
Maria SAVELYEVA

Gallery D137
Nevsky pr., 90-92
Saint-Petersburg

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