Monday, April 11, 2011

Vladimir Kush's Metaphorical Realism

It’s difficult to find information about Vladimir Kush except on his website: www.vladimirkush.com. According to Wikepedia, Kush opened his first gallery in Lahaina, Maui in 2001, and his type of art is called metaphorical realism. The book featured here, “Metaphorical Journey”, can be viewed on Kush’s website and is priced new at $100. Used copies sell online at that amount or more. We acquired a copy of “Metaphorical Journey,” signed by the artist in bright red ink on the first blank page. It is the only available signed copy we could find (unless the artist sells signed books through his website). According to Wikepedia, “Metaphorical Journey,” is 171 pages of images and writings pertaining to the artist’s work from 1997-2002. Kush was born in Russia in 1965 near Moscow and the forest-park Sokolniki. His biography set out on his website states that his career as an artist began when he was a child of 3 or 4. In the evenings, Kush would sit on his father’s lap and finish drawings and dream of wide-open spaces. His father, a mathematician, remained a great influence on his work. He began art school at age 7, attending regular school in the mornings and art classes in the afternoons until 9 p.m. At 17, he took and passed the examination to study at the Moscow Art Institute, but at 18 he entered the Russian mandatory two-year stint of military service where he eventually painted murals and big canvases depicting fantastic landscapes with military elements. His website indicates that in 1987 he began selling his paintings and exhibiting with the Union of Artists. He had a successful show in Germany in 1990 with two other Russian Artists, then flew to Los Angeles where he had sent 20 of his recent works for a showing. He eventually came to Maui and continues to sell his paintings in a gallery on that Hawaiian island. Large, gorgeous, and fantastical—the artwork in this book is impossible to adequately describe, and well worth a visit to his website to view.

No comments:

Post a Comment