8 June 2016 Russian Art and Photography Auctions
8 June 2016
237. SVESHNIKOV, BORIS (1927-1998)
By the Fence, signed with a monogram.
Oil on canvas, 89.5 by 74.5 cm.
20,000-30,000 GBP
Provenance:Acquired directly from the artist by the present owner in Moscow in 1975.
Important private collection, Italy.
On offer for auction is a collection of works by Nonconformist artists,
amassed over many years by an Italian businessman ‒ a connoisseur
of Russian art and culture. The assembled paintings were purchased
directly from the artists themselves, with whom this collector enjoyed
a long-standing friendship. The principal works from this selection
are ten paintings by Boris Sveshnikov ‒ canvasses from the 1960s and
1970s, one-of-a-kind in their perfection.
Due to the nature of his business, the collector spent much time in the
Soviet Union. His first visited the country in 1963 when, owing to his fascination
with Russian culture, he travelled to Moscow to study philology at
the Moscow State University. At the end of that decade, the gentleman returned
to the city as a representative of a major international company,
whose office was located in the renowned Hotel Ukraina. It was then when
he became acquainted with Soviet Nonconformist art; the Italian
Russophile was impressed by the artists’ freedom of thought and passion
for experimentation.
The collector personally knew virtually all the “stars” of the unofficial
Russian art, whose names had long become legendary ‒ Dmitry
Krasnopevtsev, Oscar Rabin, Vladimir Nemukhin, Vasily Sitnikov, Eliy
Belutin, Dmitry Plavinsky, Vyacheslav Kalinin, Evgeny Rukhin and many
others. In 1970, the artist Otari Kandaurov introduced the collector
to Boris Sveshnikov and his wife, a meeting he would remember for the
rest of the life: “I was welcomed by a very pleasant, lean man with
a gentle, sad smile, and a plump woman with an open face, someone
who reminded me of female protagonists in Ostrovsky’s plays. When I
took my leave, I felt that I had made new friends. I thank my lucky stars
for giving me a great privilege to be friends with this wonderful man for
twenty-eight years."
The artworks here presented are therefore not only outstanding in terms
of artistry but boast impeccable provenance, insofar as they were acquired
by the collector directly from the artists themselves.
Notes on symbols:
* Indicates 5% Import Duty Charge applies.
Ω Indicates 20% Import Duty Charge applies.
§ Indicates Artist's Resale Right applies.
† Indicates Standard VAT scheme applies, and the rate of 20% VAT will be charged on both hammer price and premium.