Within the small 20-year-old gallery Masharbia Gallery, curator Marta Boeri skillfully used the space to showcase the four different styles of four Russian photographers with all the complications that entails.
Titled Russian Contemporary Photography , the show features the work of Sergey Borisov, Vadim Gushchin, Francisco Infante Arana and Alexander Slyusarev.
Instead of focusing on one photographer, Boeri told Daily News Egypt she wanted to do a real panoramic.
“Each photographer has his own distinctive style. I wanted to open a window into Russian contemporary art, instead of just one artist, Boeri said.
This is particularly what the exhibit accomplishes, for better or worse, a taste of four very different Russian photographers representative of a very good quality of Russian photography. Each one is the master of his own style.
Starting with Alexander Slyusarev, represented by his Slavic black and white still-life style, his photographs are characterized by their formalist nature, emphasizing light and dark, perspective, and composition rather than content.
Moving to the next wall, pieces from Francisco Infante Arana s Artefact series hang in complete contrast to Slyusarev s. Infante s color prints use painted objects placed within the composition to explore how construction interacts with nature. By placing man-made artefacts in natural surroundings, Infante seems to be contemplating technology s implications on nature: enhancement or destruction?
Squinting at the images, viewers will wonder if the artefacts are photoshopped in or actually part of the actual composition. Infante s work is instantly mystifying and eye-catching, a fact illustrated by the viewers who gaze the longest at her photos.
Pieces by Vadim Gurshchin s series: Universal Library, Fruits of Earth, and Still Life on the Shelf have also beckoned the exhibition visitors, particularly myself, to admire his simple yet thought-provoking compositions
In the back room, the displayed selection of Sergey Borisov s glamorous, stylized photography are the most notably Russian photographs in the exhibition. Juxtaposing man and machine through the combination of human forms with the abstract, Borisov portrays the tension of the Soviet legacy in Russian culture. His photographs have been featured in Vogue magazine and Harper s Bazaar.
Targeting both Egyptians and foreigners, the exhibit hopes to introduce more international art to the Egyptian gallery scene, something Boeri thought was lacking There are many businessmen and diplomats, and yet, there are few international art shows, so this [exhibit] would be certainly interesting, she said.
Gallery owner Stefania Angarano said, Russia is very new, this quality and this view, and at the same time, I thought why not? We will try something different, particularly in the month of Ramadan, it s very spiritual now and it s difficult to see something of very high quality during this period.
Russian photography has only recently entered the international art scene.
From the museums of New York to Paris, Russian photographers are joining the ranks of world-renowned artists and it seems quite fitting now that Egypt, one of the most budding art centers in the Arab world, became the next stop.
The gallery makes the most of its spatial constraints in creating a diverse, exciting exhibit. The only drawback is there aren’t enough works for each artist to explore further. For instance, I wanted to see more Gushchin, whose exhibited works are mere samples of a larger, absent picture. The lack of coherence between the themes of each of the photographers was mildly disappointing.
Nevertheless, the primary objective of the exhibition is to expose the audience to four different themes and styles in one night, and if judged only on this goal, then the exhibition is definitely a success.
“Russian Contemporary Photography will run until October 16, daily 11 am-8 pm (except Friday).
