The Kabakov exhibition in Tel Aviv: reflections on your place in art in three parts

The museum has provided several interconnected spaces for the exhibition. From the moment visitors enter, they are fully immersed in the exposition, which communicates with them using the visual language of Soviet reality. The distinctive brown walls, familiar images of socialist realism, creaky wooden floors, and red curtains are all recognizable elements of the Kabakovs' art. The Tel Aviv exhibition employs these elements not only to recount the conventional story of life in the Soviet Union and its dispirited citizens but also to explore another theme within the Kabakovs' art - the very role of art, its environment, and the artist's place within it.

There's an opinion that only those who witnessed Soviet everyday life can fully grasp the works of the Kabakovs. However, this exhibition demonstrates that the language and themes to which the artists allude are universal and can be appreciated by viewers with varying experiences and cultural backgrounds.

1. Early painting, connections with world art and reflection on Soviet visual culture

The exhibition is organized as a total installation, reminiscent of a museum within a museum, where halls with paintings are interspersed with the famous installations of the Kabakovs.

The exhibition opens with the painting “In the Studio #1” (2018), in which we see the artist himself. Turning his back to the viewer, Ilya Kabakov is working on a large-scale canvas that references Charles Lebrun’s “Portrait of Chancellor Seguier” (c. 1670). This is not the only reference to the history of world painting. Brought up within the framework of the classical artistic tradition, spending hours in the Pushkin Museum, Ilya Kabakov treated the works of the old masters with reverence. The “memories of the ideal world of paintings” reproduced on the canvases at the exhibition (and in the memory) of the artist coexist with images of “disgusting Soviet photographic products,” socialist realist painting, posters, slogans and other artifacts of Soviet visual culture.

Two other works speak about the special place of painting and images in Soviet culture. This is a copy of the reproduction of I. Alekhin’s painting “Verified!” reproduced together with signatures from the album. (At the Party Purge)" (1981) and "Window to My Past" (2012). In the last work, Alekhin’s painting is depicted on the wall of a government office, and next to it are Soviet citizens working at their desks. This involuntary diptych shows how and where art existed in the Soviet Union and what, often oppressive, didactic role socialist realist painting played.

The example of this pair of works shows how the artist returns to previously created images and works learned in his youth in order to sharpen the meanings and reflect on his creative path.

In the same room is the earliest work presented at the exhibition - “Next Stop - Tarakanovo” (1979). A large-scale painting on hardboard, the material that Kabakov used for his early stand paintings. This work from the golden period of Soviet unofficial art ranks with Beetle (1982), which achieved £2.9 million at Phillips de Pury in 2008, and Answers from an Experimental Group (1970-1971), sold for Kabakov's record 66 thousand pounds at the first Sotheby's auction in the USSR (1988).

On the canvas we see a train schedule with exact arrival times, superimposed on an image of a locomotive.
The pathos of the train moving forward is emphasized by a quotation from a revolutionary song, but the overall heroic tone of the work is offset by the large letters of the destination, hinting that this glorious odyssey will not end well. The Kabakovs made this method of colliding the desired image of the Soviet Union with its unsightly reality their method and used it in other famous works, for example, in the installation “Red Car” (2008).

2. Total installations, reflections on the ways of perceiving painting and hierarchy in the history of art

From the art gallery the visitor finds himself in the total installation “Empty Museum” (1993). Total installations are an artistic genre invented by Ilya Kabakov in the 1980s and which have become the author’s calling card. Within this genre, the artist designs a space from floor to ceiling and populates it with objects. The goal of a total installation is to form a holistic impression on the viewer.
The “Empty Museum” is an art gallery with red walls, curtains at the entrance, a cornice under the ceiling, banquettes in the center and exhibition lighting. The recreated museum space is supplemented with Bach's music, but lacks the painting itself. The deliberately serious and at the same time slightly ironic installation reconstructs the behavior of the viewer in an art gallery. Once in the museum environment, the visitor repeats the usual actions: sits on a banquette and looks at the walls, which, due to the lack of exhibits, is devoid of purpose and meaning. Immersed in the red twilight of the hall and solemn music, he seems to be waiting for the miraculous appearance of the paintings.

The next room is dedicated to the total installation “Where do we belong?” (2002). It was first shown at the 20th Venice Biennale in 2003. The installation is dedicated to reflection on the place of contemporary art in the history of art and the hierarchy of the art world. In the room we see the legs of gigantic people, dressed in the fashion of the century before last. These characters tower over the modern little viewer and look at masterpieces of painting, enclosed in thick gilded frames. A person today cannot reach them, so he does not see either these people or the paintings in their entirety, but he physically feels their superiority. At the same time, for the modern viewers in this space there are works of art commensurate with them — these are small photographs and texts. Along the edges of the hall, on the floor, you can see the third level of the installation with a tiny landscape, seen as if from a flying height. This is a hint that the art that came after us will take its place in the artistic hierarchy in accordance with the order. These two installations work well together and highlight the reverence that both the artist and we feel before the paintings of the Old Masters. Often incomprehensible to the modern viewer, they bear the stamp of sacredness and unshakable superiority.

3. Painting of recent years, summing up

The penultimate room contains paintings from the series “In the Museum” and “In the Workshop,” and the central place is occupied by the huge horizontal canvas “In Flight” (2022) - one of the last paintings by Ilya Kabakov. It refers to the album “Flying Komarov” (1973–1974) from the “10 Characters” series (1970s). This is a story in which not only Komarov, but also other residents of the city, as if trying to break away from everyday life, take off, soar over the metropolis, and then completely disappear. The scene of mass escape from reality presented in the album, divided into separate fragments, is brought together on a pictorial canvas. The composition of people circling in the sky is reminiscent of classical art, religious subjects, and can even be compared to scenes of the Last Judgment.

All the more dramatic is the installation that concludes the exhibition “Not everyone will be taken into the future” (2001), which visited the 49th Venice Biennale (2001) and was shown at the largest exhibition of the same name by the Kabakovs in the Hermitage, the Tretyakov Gallery, and the Tate Gallery. The departing train and Kabakov’s early paintings from the “Kitchen Series” (1970–1980s) left on the platform should raise the question of who will remain in the history of art and which bosses will choose these lucky ones. But after the death of Ilya Kabakov, the installation seemed to acquire a previously unrelated feeling of loss. We remained on the platform with a few exhibits in our hands, and the artist left for eternity.

The Kabakovs' exhibition at the Tel Aviv Museum is a reflection on the development of an artist through acquaintance with classical art, the search for his own artistic language and a return to his roots. This is also a story about the viewer, whose perception is determined by the history of art, government policy, museum exhibitions and the internal hierarchy of the art world. The exhibition allows you to learn not only about the artist, his idols and fears, but also to think about your own relationship with art.

The exhibition is relatively small and inferior to other exhibitions of the Kabakovs, for example, the sensational project “Not everyone will be taken into the future.” But by relying on universal themes that reference the world of art, the artists and curator were able to create a holistic project in which all works are organically connected with each other. The chronological scope of the exhibition is impressive - the exhibition includes works from the 1970s to the 2020s. Although the Tel Aviv Museum features iconic paintings and acclaimed installations, it is sorely lacking in graphics. Ilya Kabakov’s drawings and albums are a serious part of the artist’s legacy; moreover, images of graphic characters live on in later paintings. A visitor uninitiated in this aspect of creativity will be deprived of the opportunity to make their way deeper into the works of the Kabakovs.

The exhibition Tomorrow We Fly is a story about a viewer whose perception is determined by the history of art, public policy, museum exhibitions and the internal hierarchy of the art world. At the same time, this is a very personal project about the development of an artist through acquaintance with classical art, the search for one’s own artistic language, idols, fears and a return to origins.