Gennadii GogoliukOne of Many WorldsJohn Martin Gallery

Rosa, (2016)oil on canvas, 19¾ x 15¾ inches,

Gennadii GogoliukOne of Many Worlds

15 September – 8 October 2016

John Martin Gallery

With Flowers, (2016)oil on canvas, 19½ x 15¾ inches, 50 x 40 cms

I shouldn’t have to spell any of this out to the viewer: the picture should be able to speak for itself. I’m trying to describe something that can’t be put into words. That’s why I paint.

This exhibition is titled “One of Many Worlds”.

When I hear these words, I think of a mirror standing opposite another mirror. When you look at your own reflection as a child, you see yourself in these gaps between the mirrors, in this endless place. A dialogue with infinity....with one of the worlds in which you lose or find yourself. Most likely, lose yourself, because it’s connected, in any case, with a return to childhood.

For me, a white canvas is like primordial chaos – it has yet to signify anything. It’s a wasteland. Like white smoke, the very worst thing – a voiceless form, a whiteness like a fog which needs to be eliminated by developing some action. At first it’s like a game, playing with the palette, with the paints; you trace out a line, make some marks. Then later in that line, or in some part of the picture, something starts to appear – you try to catch it and you develop it, it moves forward then perhaps disappears, and you begin to play around again. Sometimes you might find that you get an image that is too large for the painting you’re working on, and then you have to set it aside. The thing is that you have a stream of suggestions, or clues, showing you how to let the painting itself to control you, rather than the other way around – though of course, at the same time, you’re always gathering material, which will help to tell you what - or who - an image might become.

One important influence on the large canvas with the winged figure was a trip to Greece. Greece provided a contrast and returning all the accents fell into place. Warmth: it’s very hard to work or anything in a cold place and some of the gold of Greece is in the painting. The gold of the sun: warmth, honey, the feminine. Painting is feminine in essence. I don’t like Futurism – it is commanders’ art: contrived and intellectual, resisting weakness – ambiguity frightens people. The picture gives the impression of of naivety, or weakness if you like, but this is an illusion, a deceit. It’s like in the poem by Arseny Tarkovsky where he talks about how weakness gains strength by virtue of its innocence.

The figure on the left hand side of the large canvas is Athena. She is shown with the wing of an owl, her symbolic creature and companion. Athena could be either going to sleep or waking up, I think probably waking up – she has been an owl, but now she is changing back into human form, and the owl’s wing is about to disappear. Sleeping and waking here are imagined as journeys into other worlds. I didn’t want to have any dramatic sense of somebody waking from the dead, merely a passing into another state. The owl is associated with wisdom – it flies about in the dark, and maybe it takes a wise person to be able to make that journey through the dark – darkness of each day and night or perhaps the dark ages...

Trinity, (2015 –16)oil on canvas, 40 x 60 ins, 101.5 x 152 cms

Soldier of Fortune, (2016)oil on canvas, 24 x 18 ins, 61 x 45 cms

You might ask what is there about this painting that is modern? What have you added to the story? It’s not exactly a depiction of a mythological theme, this painting, it’s more something of my own – my own myth, a story suggested by the picture itself. The process of constructing the picture suggested which way to go. I could have added more detail, but the picture told me there was no need for detail. If you get bogged down in detail, it said, you’ll ruin the left-hand side of the painting, or the right hand side – because there should always be some part of the picture that is a mystery – some part where you’ve said everything that has to be said, and another part where you’ve left something unsaid.

But I shouldn’t even have to spell any of this out to the viewer: the picture should be able speak for itself. I’m trying to describe something that can’ t be put into words. That’s why I paint.

The form in from the left hand corner is the sun; inside the sun is the figure of a wanderer, a traveller. The sun is rolling along some path. The sun could be the artist himself, or perhaps God himself is the sun. I didn’t spell all this out in a precise way, what was important was a more abstract idea - this shape is the sun, but it hasn’t yet emerged; it’s still behind the trees. At the same time the viewer doesn’t have to read it as the sun, it could represent something else, like a laid table – there’s a deliberate contrast between the two shapes, the rectangle of the table laden with food on the right, and this circle.

The figures at the table came from a dream, and they were not originally very positive. Some atmosphere still clings to them, as if they were shape-shifters or something sinister. But the picture originally looked different and it has changed since then. The female figure at the table could be wearing the type of medieval Russian hat called a kokoshnik, but on the other hand, the shape around her head could be read as a halo, in which case she is a saint, but I didn’t want to make this clear – I wanted to leave it ambiguous.

Some people have said that my work reminds them of early (late medieval) Russian portraits (parsuny in Russian from the word persona): here there was the beginning of a move away from icons into portraiture – they have the quality of being professional and naive at same time. Physically, this picture, the look of it, is like an old wall painting, a fresco. The appearance of age brings a particular quality: something brittle, crumbling, earthy, it plays on that relationship with the material of the painting – the limited palette – red, white, black – the red of blood, white of bone – the time when paints were ground from earth and stone. In medieval art there is a great deal of texture and painterly qualities, but there is no depth of perspective – in the sense of an illusion of three dimensions. In general, the art of this period is less about the picture itself and more about the world the picture tries to describe – this painting is like part of a fresco designed to tell a story. At the same time, there is a wider dialogue going on here with art in general, for instance, with Malevich’s black square. Malevich’s black square is like something concrete, carved out of granite, it’s the picture as an object, something constructed – no impressionism– everything concrete, the form clearly delineated, everything held in this flat space.

— Gennadii Gogoliuk, 2016

Summer Garden, (2013 –16)oil on canvas, 24 x 20 ins, 61 x 51 cms

Flight of Heavens, (2016)oil on canvas, 15½ x 19¾ ins, 39.5 x 50 cms

The Sound of Light, (2012 –16)oil on canvas, 35½ x 27½ ins, 90 x 70 cms

The White Rabbit, (2013 –16)oil on canvas, 29½ x 23½ inches, 75 x 60 cms

Green Eyes, (2016)oil on canvas, 20 x 16 inches, 51 x 40.5 cms

Elizaveta, (2016)oil on canvas, 27½ x 19¾ inches, 70 x 50 cms

Shepherd Boy, (2016)oil on canvas, 27¾ x 23½ ins, 71 x 60 cms

Still Life with Flowers, (2016)oil on canvas, 19½ x 15½ ins, 50 x 39 cms

Late Spring Flowers, (2016)oil on canvas, 19¾ x 15¾ inches, 50 x 40 cm

When he took his students for the first lesson at the Academy of Arts in Petersburg, Professor Pavel Chistyakov (the teacher of Vrubel and Serov) took a blank sheet of paper, screwed it up and threw it onto the podium. “If you can draw this crumpled ball of paper” he told them, “then you can draw anything. This isn’t drawing from nature when it’s easy to fool yourself; this requires a real love – a real passion – for drawing. No matter what it is, you have to be able to draw it with love, to invest an object with your own soul, even when it might seem trivial. Just you try; you’ll soon find out where you stand. “Nature is a fool,” here he lowered his head and muttered sadly to himself, “... but the artist, the artist is the clever one.”

Eliza and Light, (2016)oil on canvas, 23¾ x 23¾ inches, 60 x 60 cms

Mark of Another Beauty, (2016)oil on canvas, 20 x 16 ins, 51 x 41 cms

Secret, (2013) oil on canvas, 27 x 19 inches, 68.5 x 48 cms

Girl with Ribbons, (2013) oil on canvas, 28 x 20 inches, 71 x 51 cms

Schoolboy, (2011) oil on canvas, 23¾ x 23¾ inches, 60 x 60 cms

Sorceress, (2011)oil on canvas, 27¾ x 23¾ inches, 70.5 x 60 cms

Sirin, (2011)oil on canvas, 24 x 20 inches, 61 x 51 cms

Tsaritsa, (2011)oil on canvas, 30 x 24 inches, 76 x 61 cms

Self Portrait, (2001)oil on canvas, 24 x 18½ ins, 61 x 47 cms

GENNADII GOGOLIUK

1960 Born Rostov Oblast, Russia 1980-83 Lugansk School of Art, Ukraine1983-90 Leningrad Academy of Arts

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2015 Heavenly Flowers and Creatures John Martin Chelsea

2013 Waiting For You, John Martin Gallery2011 Shooting Peacocks is Easy, John Martin Gallery2009 Gennadii Gogoliuk, Scotland-Russia Institute Edinburgh2009 One Thousand & One Mornings, John Martin Gallery2007 Silver Threads, John Martin Gallery2006 Pursuing the Ideal, John Martin Gallery2005 Waves of Time, John Martin Gallery2003 On the Edge of Things, John Martin Gallery1993 Heimatmuseum, Burgeln, Germany

PERFORMANCES AND GROUP SHOWS

2010 Theatre Performance “Winged Man” Volkov International Theatre Festival, Yaroslavl2010 Theatre Performance “Winged Man” directed by Attila Vedniansky, Csokonai Theatre, Hungary2009 Performance “New Mythology” with Tatiana khabarova and Teatro della Comunitá directed by Marco di Stefano, as part of 40th National Theatre Festival, Lauro Rossi Theatre, Macerata, Italy2009 Street Performance “Dancing Man”, Edinburgh2008 Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh2000 RSA Annual exhbition, Edinburgh. 1999 Society of Scottish Artists Annual 1998 Joint exhibition, Bellevue Gallery1996 GAM - performance by three artists,

Baltic Theatre, St Petersburg Performance, The First Exhibition of the Cow (named in honour of the artist K Korovin) Central Park of Culture, St Petersburg Third Biennial Exhibition of St Petersburg Artists, Manege Exhibition Halls, St Petersburg1995 Joint exhibition of Russian artists, Modern Art Section, Russian Museum, St Petersburg1994 Frozen Pictures - installation, Ship of Arts Project, Stubnitz, Rostok, Germany1993 Frog - performance as part of Three Nights Event, Slava Polunin’s Academy of Fools Theatre Centre, St Petersburg1992 Ascent into Mindlessness, performance as part of 15 St Petersburg Artists, Kunstforum, Bonn, Germany Reflexio, Tut I Tam group, St Petersburg Beating Rembrandt - performance as part of Garderop, Manege Exhibition Hall, St Petersburg1991 Festival of Arts, Aarhus, Denmark1990 Joint exhibition of international artists, Turku, Finland1989 Joint exhibition of St Petersburg Artists, Union of Artists, St Petersburg1988 White Nights in Leningrad, Union of Artists, Leningrad1987 All-Union, Manege Exhibition Hall, Moscow1986 Exhibition of ‘unofficial’ artists, Baltic Theatre, Leningrad

PUBLIC COLLECTIONS

Scottish National Gallery of Modern ArtScottish National Portrait Gallery

John Martin Gallery

38 Albemarle StreetLondon, W1S 4JG

T +44 (0)20 7499 1314Mon-Fri 10 - 6, Sat 10- 1:30

info@jmlondon.comwww.jmlondon.com

Published by John Martin Gallery in an edition of 250 copiesfor the exhibition Gennadii Gogoliuk, One of Many Worlds15 September – 8 October 2016 at John Martin Gallery,First Floor, 38 Albemarle Street, London W1S 4JG Opening hours: Monday to Friday 10am to 6pm and Saturdays, 10am to 1:30pm

Images © Gennadii GogoliukCatalogue © John Martin Gallery, 2016For all enquiries call Laura Campbell020 7499 1314 tara@jmlondon.comAll paintings can be seen at www.jmlondon.com