POSTFOLIO

i g o r ka r a s h

POSTFOLIO p r e s e n t s

P

O

S

T

F

F

O

L

I

O

the Folio Society

The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories

by Angela Carter Folio Society, 2012

War & Peace by Leo Tolstoy Folio Society, 2014

recent work

The book Sir Drakon is a personal project. The story is loosely based on a play called “The Dragon” written

by Eugene Schwartz, (1896–1958), a Soviet children’s writer and playwright.

In my version of the narrative, a secret agent named Cat, a character that I have created, serves many rulers: He served the three-headed Sir Drakon, a democratically elected Head of the City and the headless National Council of Justice.

This picture book introduces young readers to the concept of totalitarianism and corruption in a non-didactic, playful way.

But I digress...

When I was young and fluffy, and our city was dominated by peace and prosperity given to us

by Sir Drakon, a wandering knight had suddenly arrived.

When I was young they called me Marichen... yes, Marichen. Oh, people are so naive! My owners, the archivist Charlemagne and his daughter Elsa, thought I was a pussycat and always asked me when I would finally have kittens.

“Come here, boy” said Sir Drakon. “He’s joking” shouted Elsa.

But our beauty was not heard.

Lancelot stepped closer.

“We will destroy this boy now,” said our leader.

Sir Drakon checked all the power buttons and said that everyone in Hangar No. 1 will recieve a Drakonian State Employment Benefit equal to an entire day’s pay!

“Look, Mom!” cried the little girl “The Dragon’s Head fell from the heavens” “Oh no, my daughter...Where are kids getting such fantasies?” whispered a woman looking at the other customers.

A

D A Y O F A D I C T A T O R

Cock-The-Roach The Great is my attempt to introduce children in the US to children’s classic poem written by the Soviet writer Korney Chukovsky in 1923.

My interpretation of the narrative takes reader into a madeup city of the period of the New Economic Policies in the USSR (NÆP) and where city inhabitants experiencing wave of terror from new dictator, Cock - the - Roach the Great.

IN RED AND BLACK is my tribute to commemorate Red October, The 100 years anniversary of the Bolshevik coup that went into history as The Great October Revolution.

What triggered this series was a visit to the expansive exhibit at The Art Institute in Chicago entitled REVOLUTSIA DEMONSTRATSIA. As an illustrator and designer, I have always been inspired by the masters of the Russian Avant Garde but my series about monsters of the revolution is an attempt to reveal the real face of Bolshevism.

NOSE in St. PETERSBURG 1917

N. K. V. D. raid into your thoughts

N. K. V. D. smokE break

s o

c

e t i

v i

s o

v i e t i c o n s o v i e t i c o n

o n

o n c e t i v i s o o n c e t i v i s o

o s i v

i t e c

n o

c

e t i

v i

s o n o

c

i t e

i v

o s

n o

c

i t e

o n i v

o s

o n

c

e t i

v i

s o

o n

c

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v i

s o

s o v i

e t i c

o n

The real law underlying the arrests of those years was the assignment of quotas, the norms set, they planned Allocations.

Every city, every district, every military unit was assigned a spcific quota of arests to be caried out by a stipulated time.

From then on everything else depended on the ingenuity of the Security operations personnel.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Archipelago Gulag

N. K. V. D. smoKe break

How can one visualize it?

You know nothing.

The door of your cell opens, and they shoot you.

You cry out in your death agony, and there is no one to hear your cries or tell of them except the prison stones.

They say however, that there were some who weren’t successfully finished off, and we may someday read a book about that too.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Archipelago Gulag

RED CAVIAR Bolshevicks in moscow 1918

stormy life of lazik roitsHWantz

metamorphosis of Professor Metamorfozov

down with love for neighbor, we have to learn to hate.

Anatoly Lunacharsky People’s Commissar of Education

death of kazimir MAlevich victory over the sun

PETROUCHKA is a series of illustrations that explore the theme of state control over the creative process.

This concept is loosely based on Igor Stravinsky’s ballet Petrouchka.

In my version, an opressive, totalitarian regime aims to create a new proletarian theater and send its commissars to implement the directive by turning beautifully crafted Victorian era puppets into look-a-like farm boys and girls.

This series of posters was done in protest of the Presidential elections in Russia in the Spring of 2018.

The posters are based on plays that deal with themes of dictatorship, the Soviet past, political opression, etc. and entitled The Kremlin Theatre of Absurd.

This series of posters was done to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the first edition of ‘Archipelago Gulag’

by Alexander Solzhenitsyn.

This treatment could be successfully used for an illustrated version of the book, in addition to my work from the ‘In Red & Black’ series.

...Thousands

of

forms

and

methods

of

prac-

tical accounting and control over the rich, rogues and parasites must be worked out and tested in practice by the communes themselves, small cells in the village and in the city.

Variety

here

is

a

guarantee

of

vitality,

a guarantee of success in achieving a common goal: cleaning the land of Russia from all harmful insects, from flea crooks, from bedbugs-rich people. In one place, a dozen rich men will be put in prison, a dozen crooks, half a dozen workers shirking their work (as hooligans as many type-setters in St.Petersburg, espEcialy in party printing houses). In another — they will put them to clean the lavatories.

In

the

yellow

third,

they

tickets,

punishment

will

upon

cell,

so

be

the that

provided

departure all

the

to

with the

people,

before correcting them, would supervise them as if they were harmful. in

the

guilty tions

fourth of

of

-

shot

parasitism. different

in In

place the

means

one

fifth,

will

be

in

ten

combinainvented,

vladimir lenin’s classification of harmful insects

Gulag country

G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry

G u la g c o u n t ryg u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g

c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u la g c o u n t ry G u l a g .

Every

industry,

every

factory,

and

every

handicraft artel had to find wreckers in its ranks, and no sooner had they begun to look than they found them (with the help of the GPU).

If

any

yet

pre-revolutionary

exposed

as

a

engineer

traitor,

then

was he

not

could

certainly be suspected of being one. Lazar Kogan, one of the bosses of the White Sea Canal construction, would, in fact, soon say: “I

believe

that

you

personally

were

not

guilty of anything. But, as an educated person, you have to understand that social prophylaxis was being widely applied!�

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Archipelago Gulag

stalin’s economy

G U L A G

a c t i o n

f i g u r

r e s \ M A D E

I N

R U S S I A

RHINOCEROS inspired by Ejen Ionescu

OTHER PROJECTS

O oprah magazine book review

O oprah magazine book review

Reinventing Classics: Hoffman & Hauff

This illustration series for The Legend of the Flying Dutchman was created in 1995 and digitally remastered for the 2017 reprint by one of the leading Russian publishing houses Detskaya Literatura.

Toward the end of 2016 publishers approached me with the idea of reprinting the book. Unfortunately my original art work has been lost, so I proposed to digitally retouch a set of prints from the original production. This project is very memorable for me — it was my last work done in Russia before moving to the United States

THANK YOU

i g o r ka r a s h Igor Karash is an illustrator based in St. Louis, Missouri—originally from Baku, Azerbaijan.

Igor’s illustration work is diverse and includes picture books, classic literature, novels, and concept art for theater and film.

Igor develops a visual language unique to each project and transforms the reading experience with his novel visual contributions.

Igor’s work has been recognized by numerous prestigious illustration competitions including the Book International Biennale in Slovakia, and House of Illustration, Folio Society and AOI Awards in London.

Igor’s work has also been featured in Lürzer Archive’s 200 Best Illustrators Worldwide, American Illustration 32 & 34, Creative Quarterly, Graphis, 3x3 Magazine and Golden Bee International Poster Biennial.