Reconstruction of Myth

"Reconstruction No. 1" is a unique project by Oleg Shobin, a mastermind of the creative Concept/Art/ Confession group. The artworks of "Reconstruction No. 1" series were already presented in the Decorative Arts Museum (Moscow) and showrooms of Shenzhen and Guangzhou (China).

The exhibition "Reconstruction No. 1" assisted by the photographer Alexey Shlyk includes over 20 artworks performed in an exclusive technique of hand printing on solid wood. The process of image transfer onto solid oak or cedar blocks makes each artwork unique, with its one-of-a-kind varying tones and wood grain texture. The author chose this archaic material in our high tech century on purpose: the primitive wood nature allows to put minor particulars off and to emphasize the authenticity of imprinted characters.

Authenticity is a feature that is almost lost in the modern art. The new eco wave of cоntemporary art searches namely for such an authenticity that fts to the artworks of "Reconstruction No. 1" series by Oleg Shobin. Particular Russian avant-garde artists, "Mystic" artists of 1960−80s, as well as a short but powerful Ritual Arts Movement in the 1990s searched for a prototype in the image. Authentic means a pattern, an archetype. The artworks by Oleg Shobin reconstruct two prevalent myths of human culture: a linear Christian and a cyclic Dionysian. The inner confict of the exhibition evolves in confrontation of these fundamentals and antagonism of the male and female myth.

The project designer Oleg Shobin and the photographer Alexey Shlyk cut off insignifcant details easily; they alter the composition calculated by Renaissance mathematicians in order to bare the image core that is hidden under the form cover. This is an imprinting of imperceptible akin séance, when hectic reality loses its colors and egregore comes literally out of the air. The "Reconstruction" project restores the archetype from under millennial myth layers.

Human fgures are enclosed into the natural wood texture. The artists uncover them piecewise such as an ancient sculpture from a cultural layer letting the viewer interpret on his own. We can see Ananke holding a spindle or the breaking bread; we also have to remember of the Jungian dualism "anima and animus", psychic archetypes of a feminine and masculine personality. They break through our unconscious from the other side of the substance. Are we able to read their mysterious signs? The eternal antagonism of two origins is concentrated in a bronze sculpture (by Oleg Shobin and Anton Nichiporuk). The male group represents war and confict as a symbol of will to live, the female one stands for an entrance into new life. Their polished surface refects the external world. A matte sculpture with a bunch of keys combines the fgures; stone and metal, manmade and natural are rolled into one. It is a key to decipher the allegoric row of the whole "Reconstruction" series.

An archetype is always surrounded by canons. Uniformity of tonal characteristics, predetermined composition that is limited by the body part only, allow speaking about the visual art of "Reconstruction". This dependence on canons as well as corporeity of wood remind the viewer of icon-painting. The image on an ancient panel and images of the "Reconstruction No. 1" series that come out solid wood, have a defnite Reconstruction of Myth Arseny Steiner Art critic Member of Association of Fine Art Experts Moscow similarity: these are signs that lead beyond the subject world.

The authors themselves emphasize Christian symbols: the artworks have the themes of placing the fngers, Crucifxion and fshes, a symbol of eternal life. However, nearby are unvarnished images of fertility; the natural structure of wood fbres that intertwists with the image, is directly connected with Akanthus leaves from Dionysus’s grave. The transparent symbols of death and revival show that we deal not with the Apollonian rational origin, which proves the art with logics, but with an ecstatic Dionysus or Zagreus cult that dies and revives again.

The synthesis of two genetically related mythologies with different symbolic vocabularies and the reconstruction of a hypothetical prototype based on them; combination of antiquity and high tech; return of unshakable irrational origins into avantgarde of modern visual language — that is what Oleg Shobin’s "Reconstruction No. 1" project all about in ARTPORT Gallery.
Arseny Steiner
Art critic Member of Association of Fine Art Experts Moscow

“BrainFashion”
Photo: hand printing, machine printing
Sculpture: bronze

2012 — ShanghaiDuolunMoMA 2012 (PRC)


“Déjà vu Kino. The Giant Movie Affiches”
Painting: canvas, oil

26.08.13 — 20.09.13 — The Venice Film Festival (the island of San Servolo)

14.11.2013 — 08.12.13 — The Rome Film Festival (Radisson Blu es. Hotel)

09.02.14 — 15.02.14 — The Berlin Film Festival (“Russian House”, Berlin)

12.02.14 — 19.02.14 — Freies Museum (Berlin)

2014 — Mikhail Savitskiy Museum “Listopad 2014” (Minsk)


“Reconstruction”
Photo: silver gelatine hand printing on solid wood
Sculpture: bronze, plaster, wood, stone

2015 — The All-Russian Museum of Decorative, Applied and Folk Art (Moscow), Shenzhen (PRC), Guangzhou (PRC)

2016 — The ArtPort Gallery (Minsk) 2016