Soviet Nonconformist Art - The Petersburg Group

The Petersburg Group

Mikhail Chemiakin's Petersburg Non-conformist Group developed out of a 1964 exhibition at the Hermitage Museum, where Chemiakin worked as gallery assistant. The official name of the exhibition was Exhibition of the artist-workers of the economic part of the Hermitage: Towards the 200th anniversary of Hermitage and it included the work of Chemiakin, V. Kravchenko, V. Uflyand, V. Ovchinnikov and O. Liagatchev. Opening on March 30–31, it was closed by the authorities on April 1. The Hermitage director, Mikhail Artamonov, was removed from his post.

In 1967 the Petersburg Group Manifesto was written and signed by Chemiakin, O.Liagatchev, E. Yesaulenko and V. Ivanov. Ivanov and Chemiakin had previously developed the idea of Metaphysical Synthesism, which proposed creating a new form of icon painting through the study of religious art across the ages, The essay, Métaphysique Synthétisme included illustrations to the works of E.T.A. Hoffman and Crime and Punishment by Fyodor M. Dostoevsky.

A. Vasiliev and the miniature painter V. Makarenko joined the group later.

Four years after the founding of the group, in 1971, Chemiakin emigrated to France, and later the United States.

Liagatchev, until his emigration to Paris in 1975, and Vasiliev continued to participate in exhibitions of non-conformist artists in Leningrad at the Gaza Cultural Center (1974) and the Nevsky Cultural Center (1975). Liagatchev's work in this period includes: Kafka, Intimeniy XX (1973) and Composition - Canon (1975). The group finally became defunct in 1979, ceasing to have joint exhibitions.