Art
Russian Avant-Garde Theatre at the V&A
N
ext year the Victoria & Albert museum in London will present a major exhibition focusing on Russian avant-garde theatre. Theodora Clarke caught up with co-curator Vitaly Patsukov at the National Center for Contemporary Arts (NCCA) in Moscow to discuss this important show. RM: Can you tell me about your planned Russian exhibition next year? VP: There are many links between Russian and British culture. The exhibition which I am curating with the V&A, alongside one of their British curators Kate Bailey, will open in
Alexander Rodchenko Costume design for the Policeman For the play «We» by Alexey Gan (To unrealized staging of 1919-1920 directed by Sergei Eisenstein) Moscow. Central Proletkult studio. 1920 www.RussianMind.com
October 2014. It focuses on Russian theatre at the beginning of the twentieth century. Just before and after the October Revolution of 1917 Russian culture underwent profound and permanent transformations. RM: Where are most of the exhibition loans from? VP: The Victoria and Albert Museum has a large collection of theatrical costumes and other materials. But the main loans and stage designs are from the State Bakhrushin Theatre Museum in Moscow. The museum contains works by numerous Russian artists who worked for the major ballet, opera and drama theatres in the 18th to 20th centuries with a special emphasis on the period around 1900 to 1930. The era witnessed an unprecedented cultural symbiosis of artists, musicians, performers and directors. RM: What kind of objects will be on display? Will you exhibit different forms of media? VP: Yes. There will be models, costumes, objects, photos, videos and documents. The major idea is to present the exhibition as an installation so that it reminds us both of the interior of a theatre and the repressive style of time which was life in the Soviet Union. The objects we want to display should be like jewels in this rusty environment. They are like precious things coming from the future – precious memories. We have a problem with cultural memory. Russia has a special history and there is a great disconnect between our cultural past and the current situation. We wanted this exhibition 13
Varvara Stepanova Costume design for Tarelkin For the play «Tarelkin's Death» by Alexander Sukhovo-Kobylin Moscow, State Meyerhold Theatre. 1922
to be educational especially to the next generation about their history. RM: How many works are in the exhibition? VP: About 200 objects. Key productions by Sergei Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes, Aleksander Tairov’s Chamber Theatre and Vsevold Meyerhold’s Theatre of the Revolution, for example, are represented in works by various Russian artists. RM: So which famous artists of the Russian avant-garde will you showcase in the exhibition? VP: The collection from the Bakhrushin Museum contains examples of practically all the artistic styles identifiable with 20th Russian and European art - from Symbolism to Futurism, from Constructivism to Socialist Realism. Kazimir Malevich is probably the most famous. We will have the curtain with his black square on from Victory over the Sun, along with original sketches for RM Special issue 2014