18 september – 17 february
VRUBEL. THE BIRTH OF NEW ART
September 18 – February 17
“Vrubel. The Birth of New Art” is a large-scale project of the All-Russian Decorative Art Museum. It marks the 170th anniversary of Mikhail Vrubel’s birth. The exhibition is a part of the museum’s research-driven shows dedicated to great artists, and reveals Mikhail Vrubel’s genius not only as a painter and graphic artist, but also as an experimenter who relentlessly sought new forms and methods in art. Vrubel emerges as a revisioner who, by the force of his talent, forecasted the art of the future. His visionary gift enabled him to perceive the way artistic art would develop in the 20th and even the 21st century.
Special attention in the exposition is paid to ceramics – a no less significant part of Vrubel’s oeuvre. The artist consciously turned to the decorative arts, seeing in them not merely applied creativity, but a field for substantial artistic statements. For the first time, the exhibition allows us to view Vrubel within the broader context of the global evolution of ceramics: from antiquity to medieval majolica, from the experiments of the Silver Age to contemporary practices.
The exhibition features around 400 works from the Decorative Art Museum, the Russian Museum (General Partner of the project), the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, the Abramtsevo Museum-Reserve, and other state and private collections. Visitors will see works by Mikhail Vrubel himself, as well as by his predecessors, contemporaries, and followers.
The Historicism Epoch and the Art Nouveau Style
The first section introduces the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. The exposition shows paintings, ceramics, and objects made of porcelain, metal, and glass, which vividly illustrate the main features of the Art Nouveau style in comparison with the preceding period of eclecticism. The selected works also highlight another characteristic of the Art Nouveau era – one particularly inherent in Vrubel – namely, its theatricality.
Majolica. The Alchemist’s Laboratory
The central section reveals the secret of Vrubel’s pioneering experiments with ceramics. Together with the master craftsman Petr Vaulin, the artist discovered astonishing glaze effects: during reduction firing, ceramics began to acquire a metallic appearance. This technique enabled even small majolica sculptures to achieve a quality of monumental form.
The Chapel
The architecture of the third hall, “The Chapel,” evokes the interiors of ancient churches in Pskov and Novgorod – precisely those monuments that served as creative landmarks for artists and architects of the Art Nouveau period. The turn of the century was marked by an intense search for new modes of expressing religious feeling. The themes of “new piety” and “nostalgia for Byzantium” resonated with particular force. In religious life, there was a discernible return to the idea of a passionate, mystical experience of biblical history. This section presents works that embody fresh conceptions of form, colour, and light, and of their mystical power. These quests were also close to Mikhail Vrubel.
The Visioner
The final section is devoted to Vrubel's discoveries which reverberated in the art of the 20th and 21st centuries. It stages a dialogue between the artist and Symbolist masters – Pavel Kuznetsov, Viktor Borisov-Musatov, and Alexandra Shchekatikhina-Pototskaya – as well as with the avant-garde artists Pavel Filonov, Kliment Redko, and Olga Rozanova. Vrubel’s crystalline system of form-creation anticipates the “reassembly of the world” in the works of Filonov and Chelishchev, while his abstract majolica tiles and drawings on the pearl find itself in the works of contemporary artists – Irina Korina, Ulyana Podkorytova, Artem Filatov, Leonid Tskhe, Vasily Ivanov, Mika Zohn, Dmitry Filimonov, and others.
The project’s curator is Sergey Khachaturov, art historian, Ph.D. Arts, Associate Professor at Moscow State University, lecturer at the Rodchenko Moscow School of Photography.
The exhibition architect is Stepan Lukyanov, artist, scenographer, Art Director of the Stanislavsky Electrotheatre, and one of the founders of the Moscow Museum of Design.
“For our museum, the exposition “Vrubel. The Birth of New Art” is of great importance because we open a new form of art for a broad audience,” says Tatiana Rybkina, Director of the All-Russian Decorative Art Museum. “We are not rediscovering Vrubel, we propose a new look at his genius. This is an exhibition as research, as statement, as reflection – and I invite everyone to join this conversation.”
September 18 – February 17
“Vrubel. The Birth of New Art” is a large-scale project of the All-Russian Decorative Art Museum. It marks the 170th anniversary of Mikhail Vrubel’s birth. The exhibition is a part of the museum’s research-driven shows dedicated to great artists, and reveals Mikhail Vrubel’s genius not only as a painter and graphic artist, but also as an experimenter who relentlessly sought new forms and methods in art. Vrubel emerges as a revisioner who, by the force of his talent, forecasted the art of the future. His visionary gift enabled him to perceive the way artistic art would develop in the 20th and even the 21st century.
Special attention in the exposition is paid to ceramics – a no less significant part of Vrubel’s oeuvre. The artist consciously turned to the decorative arts, seeing in them not merely applied creativity, but a field for substantial artistic statements. For the first time, the exhibition allows us to view Vrubel within the broader context of the global evolution of ceramics: from antiquity to medieval majolica, from the experiments of the Silver Age to contemporary practices.
The exhibition features around 400 works from the Decorative Art Museum, the Russian Museum (General Partner of the project), the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, the Abramtsevo Museum-Reserve, and other state and private collections. Visitors will see works by Mikhail Vrubel himself, as well as by his predecessors, contemporaries, and followers.
The Historicism Epoch and the Art Nouveau Style
The first section introduces the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. The exposition shows paintings, ceramics, and objects made of porcelain, metal, and glass, which vividly illustrate the main features of the Art Nouveau style in comparison with the preceding period of eclecticism. The selected works also highlight another characteristic of the Art Nouveau era – one particularly inherent in Vrubel – namely, its theatricality.
Majolica. The Alchemist’s Laboratory
The central section reveals the secret of Vrubel’s pioneering experiments with ceramics. Together with the master craftsman Petr Vaulin, the artist discovered astonishing glaze effects: during reduction firing, ceramics began to acquire a metallic appearance. This technique enabled even small majolica sculptures to achieve a quality of monumental form.
The Chapel
The architecture of the third hall, “The Chapel,” evokes the interiors of ancient churches in Pskov and Novgorod – precisely those monuments that served as creative landmarks for artists and architects of the Art Nouveau period. The turn of the century was marked by an intense search for new modes of expressing religious feeling. The themes of “new piety” and “nostalgia for Byzantium” resonated with particular force. In religious life, there was a discernible return to the idea of a passionate, mystical experience of biblical history. This section presents works that embody fresh conceptions of form, colour, and light, and of their mystical power. These quests were also close to Mikhail Vrubel.
The Visioner
The final section is devoted to Vrubel's discoveries which reverberated in the art of the 20th and 21st centuries. It stages a dialogue between the artist and Symbolist masters – Pavel Kuznetsov, Viktor Borisov-Musatov, and Alexandra Shchekatikhina-Pototskaya – as well as with the avant-garde artists Pavel Filonov, Kliment Redko, and Olga Rozanova. Vrubel’s crystalline system of form-creation anticipates the “reassembly of the world” in the works of Filonov and Chelishchev, while his abstract majolica tiles and drawings on the pearl find itself in the works of contemporary artists – Irina Korina, Ulyana Podkorytova, Artem Filatov, Leonid Tskhe, Vasily Ivanov, Mika Zohn, Dmitry Filimonov, and others.
The project’s curator is Sergey Khachaturov, art historian, Ph.D. Arts, Associate Professor at Moscow State University, lecturer at the Rodchenko Moscow School of Photography.
The exhibition architect is Stepan Lukyanov, artist, scenographer, Art Director of the Stanislavsky Electrotheatre, and one of the founders of the Moscow Museum of Design.
“For our museum, the exposition “Vrubel. The Birth of New Art” is of great importance because we open a new form of art for a broad audience,” says Tatiana Rybkina, Director of the All-Russian Decorative Art Museum. “We are not rediscovering Vrubel, we propose a new look at his genius. This is an exhibition as research, as statement, as reflection – and I invite everyone to join this conversation.”