Krasil Makar

Krasil Makar is the public persona of an Ural-based artist who launched his career in 2017. According to the backstory he devised, Krasil Makar was born in 1889 and worked as a dyer between 1901 and 1939—fitting the job in around his agricultural labor—by decorating household items and village cottages across the Urals; however, none of these early works have survived. As art historian Irina Kudryavtseva notes, this approach sidesteps issues of artistic lineage, quotation, or imitation. This deliberate anonymity and fictional biography grant the artist the freedom to establish an organic affinity with—and move fluidly between—different eras, allowing elements of diverse visual languages ​​to coexist and forge new connections.

Krasil Makar’s aesthetic is dominated by the avant-garde and modernism. He retroactively constructs an imaginary moment of transition between the two—a moment that never actually occurred as a distinct historical event. Consequently, his visual forms appear exceedingly simple and streamlined, yet simultaneously highly effective in an agitational sense. It is, however, entirely unclear exactly what they are advocating for—most likely, the artworks themselves.