Good Upbringing. Exhibition of the Still Art Foundation grant programme

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION

The Moscow Museum of Modern Art and Still Art Foundation are proud to present Good Upbringing, a fashion photography exhibition project, that is to become a first event in the new collaboration programme. The exhibition features artworks by young Russian authors, winners of the special grant started by the Foundation 3 years ago, Dmitri Bulin, Nikolai Efimtsev, Egor Shabanov, Alexey Dunaev, Sergei Klychikhin and Bulat Arslanov.

The works and series presented in the exhibition are the most representative both for the artists and for the whole young Russian fashion photography. Bulat Arslanov who shoots on a film camera shifts the focus of the genre towards socially engaged projects. In the photographs of Dmitri Bulin, pictorial and cinematic traditions intertwine, and the medium itself becomes a reason for reflection on the creative self. In Alexey Dunaev's project TUNA, the process of searching for and finding oneself acquires a fairy-tale, mythological, psychedelic dimension close to Austrian Expressionism. The works of Nikolai Efimtsev possess an atmosphere of profound sensuality, created by a wide palette of characters, moods, expressed in the plasticity of poses and gestures of the heroes. The imagery of Sergei Klychikhin's works is based on a surrealistic perception of the world and theatricalization, and the plots approach fairy tales, epics and legends. In the work of Egor Shabanov, a special place is occupied by an extraterrestrial female image, constantly transforming, both in the photographs and in the large-scale installation, symbolically revealing the psychological traits of a modern person.

All the exhibited artists emphasise in their work that they consider fashion photography not only as a tool for demonstrating things and models and working with a commercial component, but also as a photographic genre's response to trends in contemporary art, as a symbolic and mythological system with its own canons and values. Their methods, language, aesthetics are perceived as trend-forming, symptomatic, iconic factors of visual culture. It is precisely such artists who become laureates of the grant programme of the Still Art Foundation. Fashion photography is based on the principle of transforming the ordinary into the perfect, the embodiment of the ideal and dream. So, the idea of the grant itself becomes an impulse to the development of photographers' dreams. The projects awarded by the jury of the grant programme during the 3 years of its existence have a ‘dream-like’ nature for the artists. Some of them are connected with ideas and intentions that for some reason were not realised. The exhibition in the museum space becomes a logical continuation of the ideas of the founders of the grant who have been promoting young talents in Russian fashion photography.

Good Upbringing is the starting point, the prologue that marks the large-scale programme. On the one hand, it hints at the expert evaluation by the jury and the high quality of the exhibited works. On the other hand, it points to the important role of young authors' participation in the overall project within the museum walls, where each series and individual shots are perceived from a completely new and unexpected perspective and meet a different independent viewer and critic. The aim of the exhibition is to tell in what directions and along what routes the institutions will move in their research in order to formulate and further clarify what contemporary Russian fashion photography is. The dissimilarity of the exhibitors – in their working methods, visual media, artistic languages, subjects and themes – makes it possible to demonstrate the multifaceted and multidimensional representations of this part of visual culture.

This retrospective marks a long-term collaboration between the museum and the Foundation, which plans an extensive public programme consisting of discussions, lectures and guided tours, and will later be presented in other cities as part of a special programme tour. Furthermore, as of the new grant year, Vasily Tsereteli, Executive Director of the MMOMA, will join the expert jury.

The expanded partner educational programme of the museum and the Foundation will later include a biennale at the MMOMA Educational Centre with the exhibition of pieces by authors working in the genre of fashion photography and winners of the Still Art Foundation grant. The long-term partnership between the two institutions is aimed at supporting young art and, in particular, Russian fashion photography. Alongside the biennial exhibition of the grant winners, the cooperation includes a partnership residency for young photographers, as well as a regional exhibition programme.

Still Art Foundation

Still Art Foundation is a foundation, established by Elena Karisalova in 2018. It manages the largest collection of Western fashion photography of the XX-XXI centuries in Russia. Currently, the collection includes more than 300 works by 60 authors. Since 2019, the foundation has been engaged in educational, publishing and exhibition activities in the field of photographic art and actively promotes Russian fashion-photography authors. Supporting young fashion photographers is the Foundation’s contribution to the development of bright talented authors in our country, an opportunity for creative realization in projects worthy of their talent level, a way to build a dialogue between a young photographer and publishers, galleries, museums and the professional community.

Realising this mission, in 2021 Still Art Foundation launched an annual grant programme aimed at supporting and developing contemporary fashion photography in Russia for young photographers. The winner of the grant, under the mentorship of recognised experts from the world of photography, gets the opportunity to present their work at a solo exhibition and publish an author's album.

Exhibitions of works from the Foundation’s collection have been held at the State Hermitage Museum, the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, the Moscow Multimedia Art Museum, the Lumiere Brothers Centre for Photography, museum and exhibition venues in Kazan, Yekaterinburg, Krasnoyarsk and other cities across Russia.