WORKS FROM 1982-1994 – MAXIM KANTOR

PRESS RELEASE (in Finnish)

The exhibition of Russian artist Maxim Kantor at the Pori Art Museum presents his paintings and etchings from 1982 to 1994. The main themes of Kantor’s expressive works are abandoned buildings, decrepit trees, and angular, emaciated human figures. The people depicted in his paintings and etchings inhabit the most tragic roles of life, oscillating between the extremes of ambition and submission. Many of these apathetic, sick, and oppressed figures are placed within a broader framework, portrayed as products of the conditions created by their communities and environments.

Kantor also incorporates biblical characters into his works, depicted as secularized embodiments of human frailty and decay. Another recurring figure in Kantor’s repertoire is the “homo sovieticus,” a product of 20th-century developments—a nameless being frozen in a bleak apartment, an empty cafeteria, or under the pale light of a hospital waiting room. These solitary figures or despairing groups reflect the grim realities of their existence. Kantor’s works serve as images of our imperfect world, engaging in a dialogue between beauty and ugliness, good and evil, and the contradiction between the ideals of life and everyday realism.

Maxim Kantor was born in 1957 in Moscow. He studied at the Moscow Polytechnic Institute from 1975 to 1980. During the 1980s, Kantor was an active participant in Moscow’s underground art scene, notably as a member of the Red Room artist collective, which organized several unofficial, one-day exhibitions. Since 1987, he has lived and worked in Moscow as well as in various parts of Europe and the United States.

Maxim Kantor’s retrospective exhibition will also be shown in Luxembourg, Berlin, Rostock, Herning (Denmark), Lausanne, and London. The exhibition has been organized by the Moscow-based ART-MIF and the Tretyakov Gallery. Its tour has been supported by Deutsche Bank, Inkombank, East-West United Bank, and Lufthansa.

Publication:
ISBN 951-9355-46-4 Maxim Kantor – Alexander Yakimovich: Mysterium Cantori/ A Dialogue with the main Character: Maxim Kantor – Karl Kantor
Translation from English: Matti Velhonoja
1995