Oleg Vassiliev

Phyllis Kind Gallery, New York
Phillips de Pury & Company London, Contemporary Russian Art, 28 February 2008, lot 22

New York, Phyllis Kind Gallery, 1995

Original canvas. There is a minor area of loss to the middle of the upper edge. There are two vertical cracks to the upper left corner.There is a layer of surface dirt. Inspection under UV light does not reveal any obvious signs of restoration. The work is sold unframed.
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NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Where Are You? is both a playful and sublime work about love and loss. Memory is a recurring theme in Vassiliev’s art, a thread that winds through most of his figurative works. The subject of the offered lot is his beloved wife Kira, to whom a large number of works is devoted since he first paints her in the 60s. Pictures of Kira are among the most important and yet most intimate of his entire oeuvre.

Like many post-modern late 20^th century painters, Vassiliev was both an abstract and figurative artist and many of his works bring together both styles as in the offered lot. We can only see the upper part of Kira’s body emerging from the white rectangle which forms the centre of the painting, and she seems almost unattainable, partially hidden in the abstract composition she inhabits. For Vassiliev white took on a special, almost spiritual meaning. As his contemporary Ilya Kabakov wrote when remembering his discussions with Vassiliev and Bulatov in the 70s: ‘We were interested in white as the holy light and emptiness – not as emptiness in death or nothingness, but as absolutely positive’.

Leaves are seen throughout Vassiliev’s oeuvre as a recurring symbol. In Memory Speaks, Themes and Variations the exhibition catalogue published to coincide with the artist’s retrospective shows at the Tretyakov Gallery, and the Russian Museum, he writes about their meaning to him: ‘Leaves naturally reappear each Spring. But before their appearance there is a brief flurry of withered leaves from the previous year – a metaphor for personal memory. Life continues as long as memory exists’.