Alexander Sokolov at Moscow Museum of Modern Art

Alexander Sokolov «Apofigey»
Moscow Museum of Modern Art
September 21 – October 30, 2011
Alexander Sokolov (1941 — 2009), a renowned Moscow sculptor, belongs to the artistic generation of the 80s. He has had a number of solo and group shows in Russia and abroad.

Sokolov’s favourite materials are wood, stone, and metal. He reveals their natural qualities in conjunction with ‘social’ meanings of ready-made objects he uses. The sculptor often builds his images on the contrast between natural materials and surfaces, on the one hand, and the silent aggression of metal machinery.

Sokolov’s art combines many features of the last quarter of the 20th century: ideological palyndromes of Sots Art, «productive vacuum» of Conceptualism, dynamic transformations of Kinetic Art, and the ironic detachment of Postmodernism. There is a little bit of everything in him, although there is always a solid foundation underneath — the sarcastic personality of the artist who melts all the «-isms» into a new creative alloy.