Things and Visions. 25th anniversary collection exhibition of the Moscow Museum of Modern Art

About the exhibition

The Moscow Museum of Modern Art (MMOMA) is celebrating its 25th anniversary with an exhibition of works from the permanent collection titled Things and Visions. For a quarter of a century, the museum has consistently collected works in a wide range of techniques created from the early 20th century to the present day. Most of the pieces are by Russian artists that represent diverse movements and traditions, schools and creative contexts, both avant-garde and academic. To date, the MMOMA collection has more than ten thousand items. Since 2009, the collection has been presented through a series of rotating exhibitions, each featuring a unique thematic arrangement of selected objects and a particular perspective.

The current 12th exhibition shifts the focus from a commentary to the objects themselves: this time, the spotlight is not on themes or narratives, but on the artworks — these meaningful items, snatched from everyday life, from the context in which they existed, as they reveal to the audience new dimensions of imagination, or the image of mystery. The ontological duality of museum exhibits comes to the fore: on the one hand, they are tangible material objects, on the other, they are strong poetic images, artworks metaphysical in nature, full of visionary spirit, which guide our senses beyond the usual spatial and temporal boundaries.

Any collection (contemporary art is no exception) is made up of fragments. The objects are artefacts that were once part of something bigger: of a series, a large project, a public space, or private interior design. Ultimately, they belong to their author’s creative biography and the historical and artistic canon. By preserving and researching the exhibits, seeing them both in physical and symbolic dimensions, the museum literally and speculatively restores lost connections, tries to resist the inevitable entropy the world of things is subject to, updates meanings and images that transcend the boundaries of historical time, and thereby ensures the continuity of culture. The archaeology of modernity thus creates images of the future.

The exhibition will include works by Russian artists of different generations, from the last third of the 20th to early 21st century, including Yuri Avvakumov, Nikolai Alekseev, Viktor Alimpiev, Andrey Bartenev, Konstantin Batynkov, Evgenia Buravleva, Alexey Belyaev-Gintovt, Kirill Garshin, Alexey Grigoriev, Alexander Dashevsky, Oleg Vasiliev, Vyacheslav Koleychuk, Irina Korina, Nikolai Nasedkin, Alexander Pankin, Alexandra Paperno, Timofey Parshchikov, Pavel Pepperstein, Dmitry Prigov, Aidan Salakhova, Albert Soldatov, Leonid Tskhe, Evgeny Chubarov, Eduard Steinberg, Sergey Shutov, as well as selected works from earlier periods.

The exhibition will be mediated by Kazimir Malevich and Velimir Khlebnikov, two historical and symbolic figures whose legacy goes far beyond the Russian avant-garde and the beginning of the last century. Their invisible presence, echo of their visionary projects and sparks of their poetic worldview can be discerned and felt in all the exhibits. The project will feature both familiar, iconic works and new acquisitions, some of them donated by artists and collectors. Besides items from the museum collection, the exhibition will include commissioned works. Two sections will explore storage and restoration of museum pieces.