Dmitry Suhov. Between Chaos and Form

The Moscow Museum of Modern Art is proud to present solo exhibition by Dmitry Suhov, a brilliant painter and sculptor who works with abstraction as a plastic language, alive and relevant. The exhibition showcases the artist's wide creative range: series of paintings, graphic sheets, sculptures, ceramics, and installations. The artist works with non-objective art, carrying on the tradition of 20th-century abstract expressionism. However, Suhov has a recognisable style that sets him apart from his predecessors and contemporary representatives of this movement. His works also reflect part of the Siberian identity of the artist, who was born and raised in the city of Tara in the Omsk region. The boundless spaces, intense natural colours and river bends from his childhood still show up in the abstract forms of his canvases.

Dmitry Suhov’s style is marked by bright, dynamic, flexible lines that create a complex structure on the surface of his paintings. They bring to mind a range of natural, biological associations: from the patterns of veins in leaves and flowers to the map of the nervous system. The artist describes his paintings as ‘living organisms’ — they seem to breathe, pulse with energy and create an active rhythm. The intense contrasting colours hold attention, enhancing the dynamic effect and emotional impact. The master’s ceramics, with their complex, whimsical forms that branch out and grow, continue the motif of energetic impulses on canvas.

The central mission of the project is to demonstrate the broad spectrum of emotional states experienced by humans. The exhibition space is divided into six zones, each dedicated to a specific emotion: from joy and inner focus to deep melancholy and quiet contemplation. In addition, visitors can experience the exhibition without being tied to the proposed affect, focusing only on their own sensory experience. Colour plays a key role in shaping the mood of each zone, allowing viewers to appreciate the diversity of emotions. The unifying thread of the works is the image of the human life cycle, which includes the predetermination of birth, growth, decline, and transformation into a new quality, testifying to the eternal renewal of the world. This concept is also embodied through the artist's use of clay — a material that, according to the most common definitions in myths, is the primordial matter from which the gods created the world and humankind.

A unique feature of the project will be its performative component. Dmitry Suhov is going to create a new work right in the exhibition space. Thus, viewers get to see the creative process, becoming part of the act of art and the life cycle of the project. A total of about 100 works is on display, some of which created by the artist specifically for exhibiting at MMOMA.

Curated by

Victoria Vasilyeva

Dmitry Suhov, born in 1986 in Tara (Omsk Region), is a member of the Creative Union of Artists of Russia and the International Federation of Artists. He participated in the parallel programme of the Venice Architecture Biennale (2023), the ART Moscow fair and projects in Brussels (2023) and group projects, including exhibitions at the New Tretyakov Gallery and the All-Russian Museum of Decorative Arts. Suhov’s artworks are held in private and corporate collections in many countries, notably Russia, the UK, China, Turkey, Canada, and the US.