Virtual dialogues

2017 marks one hundred years since the last exhibition of the Jack of Diamonds association (although in 1916 the founding fathers I. Mashkov, P. Konchalovsky, A. Lentulov left the association, and the association actually ceased to exist). How relevant are the ideas of this artistic association here and now? Where are the boundaries of the aesthetic influence of the artists from the Jack of Diamonds association on those who came after them? These and many other questions were raised by the exhibition “G. Vyatkin and P. Zverkhovsky in the project Jack of Diamonds. Postscript”, held in 2012 at the Volgograd Mashkov Museum of Fine Arts.

Experimental exposition “Jack of Diamonds. Postscript” was created by the Seven Winds Charitable Art Foundation with the participation of Volgograd Mashkov Museum and this project aroused great interest among viewers and specialists. At the same time, negotiations began between the Radishchev Museum and our foundation on the possibility of holding such an exhibition in Saratov – now with the involvement of works from the collection of the Saratov Museum. A lot of work has been done, but by the time of the public display of the project, we were faced with an insoluble contradiction of the two main museum commandments – to preserve and promote. For technical reasons, we were unable to include the originals of some artworks in our project. Having decided not to abandon the idea, we transferred the main load of the dialogue to another format, creating a video installation that serves as a kind of prologue and epilogue of the exhibition, sets the vector of the viewer’s communication with the works of Volgograd artists Gleb Vyatkin and Peter Zverkhovsky. So the dialogue acquired a virtual dimension and this gave the name to our exhibition.