It has been nearly five years since the last new project in Russia by Pavel Pepperstein. Since then his reputation and standing has been steadily on the rise. This year begins with a much-anticipated and notable event for Regina Gallery – the solo exhibition of a 'living classic', whose creative endeavours extend beyond purely artistic activities, as it follows from the name of the exhibition – Holy Politics.
The exhibition will feature 10 paintings and several watercolours. Pepperstein projects a childlike and almost naive, beatific view of today's political reality. The hottest topical issues are immortalised by a cast of sympathetic characters, the mythological 'allies' of the author, who through his work profess their anger and aggravation at what is happening in the world. The artist uses his characteristic wit to connect different cultural codes with cartoon characters, bright colours and graphic images drawn in a distinctive visual clarity. Pepperstein's main character is a generic person, devoid of references to any particular figure or country.
The author speaks about the spontaneously playful consciousness of politicians all over the world, unworthy of criticism and impossible to subdue. To adequately perceive it, it helps to simply be aware of what is going on, one can conclude. The tense atmosphere and social unrest such as can be found at the moment is, according to Pepperstein, represented through the antiquated and non–functional forms in his work.
The author, in the spirit of a "general investigation", as in the past proclaimed by the group Medical Hermeneutics (of which he was a founding member), depicts an entire panoply of causes, from political credos to urban policy and the difficulty of protecting the natural environment from a so-called "Civilisation of predators".
Inspired by the works of Oskar Kokoschka and Soviet political caricaturists, the artist paints characters, who, like reanimated metaphors, intertwine with texts and are an extension of one another. "In our time, no political solution is possible without extraterrestrial control", "We shall set forth on this path", "The political dimension is part of the aesthetic space" – these slogans are applicable to both the political course that is gaining momentum in our country, and what is happening in the world at large.
