Why the famous socialist realist Geliy Korzhev began to paint Turkic mutants and paintings on biblical motives

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

In recent years, interest in the work of Soviet artists has been reviving in the art world. And there was a time when their works were written off to a landfill, and their names were denigrated by newfangled critics and art critics of the new formation. From the Soviet period, the legacy of only a few artists remained intact, including the name Helia Korzheva, possessed an amazing gift of vision and knew how to masterfully convey in one gesture, in facial expression, what a whole generation was thinking about.

A little about the artist

Helium is translated as the God of the Sun. His parents wanted to name their son Traktor, but since he was born in a sultry summer, he was named Helios. And if more officially, then Geliy Mikhailovich Korzhev is a Soviet painter, teacher, professor, a bright representative of the "severe style". And also Academician of the Academy of Arts of the USSR, People's Artist, Laureate of several State Prizes.

For his creative services to the Soviet state he was awarded the Order of Lenin, although he was never a member of the Communist Party. At one time he was the head of the Union of Artists. And what is very curious, Helium refused the salary of the chairman of the creative union, he did not use his official car, and did not arrange personal exhibitions for himself. Because I never chased after fame and glory. Unmercenary from art … you can’t say otherwise. He was so self-sufficient that almost all his life he was closed from the outside world and wrote, tirelessly with his brushes, until his last breath only that which excited his soul.

Many contemporaries and fellow artists were greatly annoyed by his originality and isolation, which overwhelmed his unbending nature. He never looked back at others, and most of all treasured inner freedom. Apparently, the name given to him from birth and to which he involuntarily tried to correspond all his life played an important role here.

On his canvases there were never scenes of battles, and there was no ordinary and pettiness. His heroes are ordinary people, but with a strong inner core, capable of heroic deeds, people are extraordinary, strong in spirit. It is these images that the artist depicted on his canvases, and at the same time, almost always in close-up, full-length.

Throughout his creative career, Korzhev has shown both the ideals and shortcomings of his time. The most amazing and catchy viewer is the master's ability to never embellish life, not polish it, as almost all socialist realists of that period did. After all, it was believed that the present, and even more so the future of the socialist system by the standards of that time, certainly had to be bright, with which Korzhev had big problems: there was not a trace of a bright future on his canvases.

And all his life his main postulate was a common truth: "The essence of the method of realism is the artist's continuous struggle with lies." And with this very lie Helium constantly fought around himself and within himself. Only the real truth fell on his canvases, however, such as he imagined it to himself.

Turliks from the series "Mutants"

In the late 80s and early 90s, Korzhev unexpectedly and radically changes the direction of his work, he begins to write acutely social pictures in the caricature genre. On his canvases, mythical creatures suddenly come to life, ugly, scary and funny at the same time. Turliki, this is how the artist named his characters living their own lives on his canvases. This cycle was preceded by a number of realistic paintings depicting the unrestrained drunkenness and degradation of Soviet society, which with terrible force aroused protest in Geliy Mikhailovich's soul.

An unexpected grotesque cycle of creations dedicated to the Turki appeared as a diagnosis of the then perestroika reality and acquired the significance of pamphlets. In a critical historical time, people mutated and, having turned into Turliks, became harbingers of the collapse of a huge country.

But the plot of this picture is both fascinating and frightening. We see a man grappling with either his shadow or the demonic spawn, and it is difficult to imagine who will win this battle. The painting "Fight" was painted by Korzhev during the "perestroika" time and undoubtedly reflected the artist's view of the processes that were taking place then in the country, society and the inner world of each individual.

The Turliks of Korzhev, striving with all their might to be like people, have reached the last line of internal grinding, when intellectual and spiritual poverty begins to leave a very noticeable imprint on their appearance. Chicken brains and rat insides cannot be hidden either by plastic surgeries or by cosmetics, as we see in the painting "The Old Coquette".

The people who miraculously survived among the mutants, of course, try to talk to them in the hope of enlightening them, or at least finding some kind of common language for mutual understanding. However, everything is useless, the world is gradually changing and not for the better.

Korzhev's series "Mutants" is little familiar to the Russian audience, since most of it has settled abroad. And the history of its creation is also shrouded in mystery. It is still not known what prompted the artist to work on it.

And at the same time it is worth noting that the international audience has been admiring the "Mutants" for more than a decade, in contrast to the domestic public, in which Korzhev's turliks often cause a negative reaction.

But, be that as it may, the accuracy of observations and the level of philosophical expression in this series is truly amazing. With her, the artist, as it were, makes an unmistakable diagnosis of our sick society, afflicted with vile and shameful ailments.

Biblical stories of the socialist realist Geliy Korzhev

However, the artist soon put an end to the grotesque series and switched to an eternal theme, namely, biblical subjects. Apparently in this way the master decided to show that sooner or later we all come to the realization of true values.

This fact very much strained critics at one time: "The Socialist Realist is drawing Christ!" And you will also say nonsense, and on the one hand you will be right. On the other hand, this is not the case with Geliy Korzhev. Just remember the fact that he was not a communist in his leadership position. This was really out of the ordinary. Nevertheless … the fact remains.

Speaking on the eternal theme through painting, Korzhev reproduces biblical stories in the form of modern events and plots. So, for example, Adam and Eve are depicted as characters of the modern world with their vices and weaknesses. And what is interesting, he writes of Christ himself as he pleases - going to execution, crucified, dead, but not resurrected. Apparently the artist did not have faith in this. And there, who knows …

One of the best creations of the biblical cycle is "Deprived of Paradise" (1998), in which we see Adam carefully carrying Eve across the desert land. Everything seems to be the same as many centuries ago. However, it sounds different now. Looking at this canvas, an idea suddenly comes to mind … Now Adam and Eve are not the first, but the last people on Earth. To be more precise, the last ones did not give up.

Bonus The last canvas from the master's masterpieces

And, as it were, summing up his career, Geliy Mikhailovich, at the age of 80, writes an amazing canvas "Hostages (Living Screen)". According to the plot of which, he returns us to the years of the Great Patriotic War. A terrible sight unfolds before our eyes: the Nazis drove away the surviving townspeople in order to expose these unfortunates as a human shield in front of the advancing units of the Soviet Army, which, most likely, will still be forced to shoot at their fellow citizens. After all, in a war … as in a war.

The dramatic nature of the situation, the deep and complex symbolic meaning of this canvas in the spirit of Geliy Korzhev contains the artist's understanding of the current state of the Russian people, their defenselessness and hopelessness. No sentimentality, just the terrible truth of life, executed in a harsh realistic manner, in the best traditions of the "harsh style". This is how he is - Heliy Korzhev.

And finally, I would like to note that the first personal exhibition of the painter's works in Russia took place after his death in the Tretyakov Gallery just three years ago. The retrospective display of the artist's works included one hundred and twenty paintings and thirty graphic creations of the master. And, as it turned out, unfortunately, the largest collection of works by Geliy Mikhailovich ended up in America in the collection of Raymond Johnson in Minneapolis at the Museum of Russian Art. Most of the Turliks of the great Russian painter also ended up there.

Read also: Geliy Korzhev: The artist of the Russian trouble and his unique free realism with the prefix "SOTS".