‘The Invisible Indivisible’ Artworks by Sergey Alferov, Dec 8th 2021

‘The Invisible Indivisible’ A Retrospective Exhibition of Artworks by
Russian Post-Expressionist Sergey Alferov

Opening Night: December 8, 2021 6-9PM

NEW YORK, NY – December 2021 – Leonard Tourné Gallery, in partnership with Salomon Arts, is pleased to present “Sergey Alferov: The Invisible Indivisible,” a special exhibition of works on paper from the Nikolay Shchukin Collection.

Sergei Alferov (1951-2004) was born In Tashkent, Uzbekistan where he attended art school, graduating in 1971. Two years later Alferov moved to Moscow and was immediately taken in by the Nonconformist Art Movement of the time. Alferov’s participation in the so-called “bulldozer” exhibition on September 15, 1974 played an important role in his recognition and his works quickly gained popularity among art connoisseurs and collectors.

The artists’s interests and influences were diverse, reflecting the traditions of Asian art, the acute expressiveness typical of African art, and art of the early twentieth century, especially Dadaism with its spontaneity and orientation towards “childishness.” Alferov was also a student of philosophy and metaphysics, which could not but affect his work. Alferov’s work — mostly executed as oil on paper — is a combination of high aestheticism and folk, modernistic extravaganza and Dadaist fragility, artistic refinement and graphic roughness. His work has been said to transmit “a giant spiritual experience.”

It is no coincidence that V. Turchin, drawing a parallel between the creative pursuits of the artist and other representatives of the Nonconformist Art Movement, titled his article, “Another experience of Sergei Alferov.” Almost all Nonconformists were united by the spirit of experimentation, free handling of a wide range of styles and traditions, the presence, along with individual mythology, of a clearly expressed stylistic and imaginative community. A significant role in the formation of Sergei Alferov — both personally and artistically — was played by his friendship with one of the movement’s most prominent members at the time, Anatoly Zverev. By the will of fate, both artists often lived under the same roof and worked side by side, exchanging creative ideas.

Alferov’s life was tragically cut short in 2004 at the age of 53. Curators Lyusine Petrosyan and Anna Moreva preserved and popularized the creative heritage of Alferov with the project, “Preface to the Inevitable,” and Alferov’s works are in the collections of the Moscow Museum of Modern Art, the US Underground Museum, as well as in other domestic and foreign museums, galleries, private and corporate collections.

Our current retrospective, “Sergey Alferov: The Invisible Indivisible,” is currently on view at Solomon Arts in Tribeca.