Artist – Mezhirov
In post -war Soviet times, the family was called to public service with a “big picture”. In the late 1959-early 1960s, the artists of the “harsh style” and the currents close to it intended to break through the wall of the official-oriented viewer-state, and reach the person. Thematically their work corresponded to the state order: revolution, war, workdays of contemporaries. But the presentation of these events in the mirror of private, family stories should have awakened personal memory, personal experiences of the viewer. So, the Great Patriotic War in Soviet art is a long series of wires, expectations, meetings and mourning; Great remote construction sites – the place of origin of relationships, the formation of young families and their testing for strength. The ritual moments of family life become metaphors of something more, refer to being. Rural family meals – dialogue between generations, involvement in the past and plans for the future, harvesting in the family garden – the memory of ancestors, the continuity of generations, a transparently veiled connection to a long row of biblical archetypes. Lyubov Shakirova. Family album of the Russian Museum // Portrait of Family. SPb, 2014. WITH. 14.
