Igor Mukhin

Forward to the past.
On the work of Igor Mukhin

Igor Mukhin - among the artists who are lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time - with a camera in the hands. His first solo exhibition he held in 1987, in the midst of restructuring. Perestroika era can be compared to digging a trench - the watershed, encircling the former socialist life of the current wild-capitalist existence. The smoothness of the historical process has been violated - as if we were jumped by three step-up. Society has become the other - and the old household trifles, prose, the daily flow, are understood as 'other' - as an aesthetic value and artistic problem. Not Originating This sudden change in the public consciousness, Igor Mukhin, obviously, would deal with other things. But she accomplished - and he became a singer outgoing USSR. Similarly, in the 1920 Pavel Korin depicted (however, in painting, brushes and paints) done away with pre-revolutionary Russia. stories are always not only the gravediggers, but its archivists. Mukhina was lucky to be in the first appeal. His work is valuable and as artistic works, and as the most honest news. He was born in 1961 in Moscow, graduated from a technical profession 'fitter vodoprovochik', worked as a technician for heating, night watchman. Photography fascinated with sixteen years, but realized this occupation as a vocation in the twenty-four. Since 1987 the first Mukhin regularly exhibited in galleries in Moscow and travels abroad as a brilliant representative of the contemporary Russian photography. He removes the ruins - in the literal and figurative sense of the word. The skeleton of the old benches, the crumbling monuments of the epoch of socialism - all of these hammers and sickles, the peasant with ears, and pigs, the figures of the leaders with a cap or a raised hand. Even when Mukhin photographing people - street passers-by, lovers, rockers - they are obtained as the twilight shadows were already non-existent life. This is marginal, their world - on the roadside on the outskirts of the city, sleeping areas, or - even better - in the province. It is remarkable that the turbulent social life, which is enough now in Moscow (presentations, clubs, casinos, etc. ..)-Mukhina not inspire. He sees not a facade, a backyard, and finds not only the eternal dirt and dump - but the characters, boiling passions, such persons and temperaments, what would be the envy of any theater.

Of course, as any professional artist, he is looking for something more than just an exotic nature. He catches the paradoxes of this nature, and sometimes even get very funny - an absurd monument weightlifters in the overgrown park. Sometimes - sad to tears, for example, when you look at the naive, pure and stupid faces of adolescents (series 'urban youth').

Sots artovsky flavor is strong in works Mukhina, but not only he determines the final impression. Light slanting rays, beautifully lit smoke, dramatic shadows - the whole arsenal of methods formalist photographer has mastered completely and easily (perhaps - only apparent) manipulated.

Comparing Igor Mukhin with someone of the closest colleagues, then, of course, with Harry Pinhasovym. They are united by a weakness for finicky atmospheric phenomena. Both can shoot the entrance to the subway as if it's the gateway to the underworld, where the right to turnstiles are seething cauldrons. Keen sensitivity to the social paradoxes Mukhina compares with other luminaries of domestic photos - Boris Mikhailov. However, Mukhin similar only to itself. His style involves the second and third plans, and semantic, and formal, his subtle irony is quite distinctive. The ability to joke, especially in photography, it is impossible to learn. We Mukhina is obtained.

Ludmila Lunin
MOSCOW.

Igor Mukhin
Born on 19 November 1961,. Moscow. Lives and works in Moscow.

Biography:

1977-1981 Study in the Construction College.
1981-1987 worked as a technician in the design organization.
1985 acquaintance with Alexander Lapin and Alexei Shulgin.
1986 collaboration with various artists for samizdat journals, participation in the first group exhibition at the Little Georgian Street, 28. Introducing Piganovym, Efimov and Alexander Slyusareva.
1987 First solo exhibition, 120 works in MSU.
1988 trip to Finland at the invitation of the University of Applied Arts in Helsinki, started work with clippings RAPHO, Paris.
1989 began working as a freelance photographer, a trip to Paris and London (in Paris met with Garik Pinhasovym. Becomes a group member 'Immediate picture', Moscow.
1990 Getting Started with Tatiana Liberman
. 1991 Series of 32 photographs of Moscow to the book 'Bulgakov place in Moscow' for Biblioteca del Vestello in Rome, the birth of his daughter Masha, teaches at the Free Ukrainian Fotoakademii in Kiev, . Organized by Alexander Levitsky; trip to Switzerland during the photo-project "Moscow-Zurich '; work over 30 portraits of contemporary Soviet artists for the exhibition catalog' Art Books',
.
1992 Work on the anthology 'Baltic Waves' for publication 'Bra Bocker AB', Sweden
1994 State Prize of Russia 'man of art'.
1999 Award Mayor of Paris and work on the project 'Lovers in Paris' commissioned by FNAC, with the participation of the Committee for the celebration of 2000, France.
2000 Birth of son, Maxim.

Lectures

1990 Free Academy in Moscow.
1991 Free Ukrainian Fotoakademiya in Kiev, Ukraine.
1991 Kanzlei, Zurich.
1993 Photofestival-93, ship Moscow-St Petersburg.
1996 IV International Conference on 'Image - a phenomenon of everyday culture', Riga, Latvia.
1997 Moscow International Photofestival 'Interphoto-97', Moscow, Russia.

Personal exhibitions:

1987 'for young for young' club of the Moscow State University.
1988 'Igor Mukhin' Uralmash, Sverdlovsk.
1989 'Igor Mukhin' Gallery, Kuibyshev.
1989 'Igor Mukhin' club photographer, Ukhta.
1990 'Igor Mukhin' gallery 'Interphoto', Leningrad.
1993 'Study of Soviet monumental art' photos, Yoshkar-Ola, Russia (booklet).
1994 'Benches: Transformation for the Future' XL Gallery, Moscow (catalog).
. 1995 '40 photos' Museum of the Revolution, Moscow (catalog);
. 'Vision of Russia' Grote Kerk, Naarden Fotofestival, Netherlands (catalog)
. 1996 'Life in the city' The Latvian Museum of Photography, Riga, Latvia;
. 'Landscape changes' Gallery in Moscow (Photobiennale-96), Moscow (catalog)
.
1997 'Moscow Moscow' club 'Slepenais experementa', Riga, Latvia;
'The Soviet era: Benches and Monuments' photodiode, Riga, Latvia;
'Crossing' Goethe Institute, Moscow;
'Culture Park. Memory 'KUKART-III International Festival, Tsarskoe Selo;
. 'B. Semin and Mukhin: Contemporary Russian Photography' The Camera Obscura Gallery, Denver, USA;
. 'Moscow: the city and the people' LEK, Ljubljana, Slovenia (catalog);
. 'Igor Mukhin' Galeria Gerulta, Month of Photography in Bratislava, Slovakia (catalog)
.
1998 'Youth and the City' Manege, Photobiennale-1998, Moscow (catalog)
'Moscou la Jenne' Bibliotheque Elsa-Triolet, Pantin, France (catalog);
'Moscou', MJC du Lau, Pau, France.
1999 'Nonstop' Gallery XL, Moscow (catalog);
'Igor Mukhin', Gallery Carre Noir, Paris;
'Playground' M. Gelman Gallery, Moscow;
Girls', Gallery XL, Moscow (catalog).
2000 'Paris as it is', a concert hall foyer of Russia, Moscow;
'Between the Lines' INVOGUE, Moscow;
'Paris' Month of Photography in Paris. Gallery Carre Noir, Paris.
2001 'Moscow Light', Museum of Architecture named Schuseva, Moscow.
2002 'Moscow-Paris ", MDF, Moscow;
'Relations', Nizhny Novgorod - Samara - Novosibirsk - Ekaterinburg;
Moscow. International photography festival, Pingyao, China (catalog);
'Nizhny Novgorod', Summer 2001. Photofestival Pro-Vision. N. Novgorod (Catalog).

COLLECTIONS
The Museum of Modern Art, New York;
The Jane Voorhees. Zimmerli Art Museum, New Jersey;
. Maison Europeenne de la Photographie, Paris;
. Fonds National d'Art Contemporain, (FNAC) Paris;
. Moscow House of Photography, Moscow;
. The Ministry of Culture of Russia, Moscow;
. State Historical Museum, Moscow;
. Museum of Contemporary Art 'Tsarina', Moscow;
. Museum photo collection, Moscow;
. Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, The University of Texas at Austin;
. The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington DC;
. Denver Art Museum, Denver;
. Southeast Museum of Photography, Daytona Beach;
. Latvian Museum of Photography, Riga;
. Victor Barsokevitch Photographic Center, Kuopio;
. The Navigator Foundation, Boston;
. Arabella Hopewell Collection, London;
. Museum of Architecture named Schuseva;
. Museum of Fine Arts, Santa Fe;
. And private collections