Oranienbaum Experiment. Paragone or Debate About Arts: Sculptures by Alexander Taratynov
The exhibition of the sculptor Alexander Taratynov “Oranienbaum Experiment. Paragone or Debate About Arts” is the first project of the Oranienbaum Museum-Preserve where in the space of a historical landscape will be presented a conceptual exposition of contemporary sculpture. The opening of the show will take place in the Upper Park of Oranienbaum at the Japanese Pavilion of the Grand Menshikov Palace on June 16, 2011 at 3 pm.
The idea of 3D interpretations of famous canvases has resulted from the intent of two noted Russian sculptors Alexander Taratynov and Michael Dronov to be involved in the debate about the superiority of one art over another initiated by Leonardo da Vinci and written by him in the “Paragone” section of his treatise “On Painting”. Polemicizing with his rival Michelangelo Buonarroti, Leonardo da Vinci gave the preference to painting. Leonardo has seen the imperfection of sculpture in the fact, that it is the most mechanical of all the work. The painting is “more noble” because it is less “mechanical”. Michelangelo proving the merits of sculpture believed, that the sculpture is a “light for painting” as a picture is the better, the more identical it is to the relief. For artists of the Renaissance the antique sculpture served as a model for creating canvases and the fine arts developed from sculpture to painting.
Almost 500 years since the “Paragone”, Alexander Taratynov in his project “3D Interpretations of Masterpieces of Painting” supports Michelangelo and suggests a gaming variation of the creation of a piece of art from painting to sculpture.
A three-dimensional visualization of paintings provides a viewer with a possibility to see canvases in the space and volume, to go around and inside the pieces of art and be involved into the action. From the object of study and aesthetic delight these works of art turn into an interactive element of the city environment. The characters of famous paintings leave the flatness of the canvas and find themselves in an actual context, thus the artist broadens the limits of our perception.
The sculpture “Night Watch 3D” has been the first 3D interpretation of Rembrandt’s canvas of the same name executed by sculptors Michael Dronov and Alexander Taratynov. Inspired by its success Alexander Taratynov has produced in bronze several other sculptural realizations of masterpieces of painting:
Albrecht Durer’s “Knight, Death and Devil”;
Pieter Bruegel’s “Blind Men”;
Gustav Klimt’s “The Kiss”;
Henry Matisses’s “The Dance”;
Ivan Kramskoy’s “The Unknown Woman”
Boris Kustodiev’s “The Merchant’s Wife Drinking Tea”
Piero della Frencesca’s “Federico da Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino and His Spouse
Battista Sforza, Duchess of Urbino”.
The exhibition in Oranienbaum is a good opportunity to take part in the artistic experiment and think over the advantages of various types of fine arts.
print version