02 June 2004 03:41
Kirill Sokolov: Modernist painter who fooled the Soviet authorities with orthodox art and came to
Britain
The Russian-born artist Kirill Sokolov, who has died aged 73, enjoyed popular and critical acclaim in the Soviet
Union during the Khrushchev-Brezhnev years. In the secrecy of his Moscow home, however, he studied the work of modern
American and European painters, and was one of the first of his generation to practise as an underground artist. In
1974, he settled in Britain and forged an international reputation as a modernist painter and sculptor, and an
innovative printmaker and stage designer.
Sokolov was born in Moscow, as his homeland was being transformed by Stalin into a totalitarian dictatorship; indeed,
his own father, an architect, spent years in one of Stalin's labour camps. Sokolov himself regarded life as
essentially tragic, but celebrated anything that could be rescued from the nightmare - love, humour (especially the
down-to-earth kind) and, above all, creativity. Perhaps this is why he never stopped painting: he regarded it as a kind
of salvation, a reaffirmation of an innate Russian faith that Stalinism had never managed to erase.
He became an artist almost by chance when, at the age of 12, he joined a special art school in Moscow because it
offered student ration cards. From 1950 to 1957, he studied in the graphics faculty of the prestigious Surikov
Institute, working alongside the conceptual artist Ilya Kabakov.
But Stalinism infected every aspect of life, even at the institute, which was geared to propagating Soviet socialist
realism in the visual arts. A culture of peer informants soon brought Sokolov to the attention of the authorities for
his interest in Picasso and artistic formalism, and he was marked as a subversive influence.
The artist, however, was undeterred. By 1960, he had explored Picasso's work, was studying abstract
expressionism and had begun to discover the early 20th-century Russian avant-garde, whose example had been so
successfully elided by Soviet authority.
Sokolov's first public work was in linocut. His diploma folio on the subject of Elsa Triolet's novel
L'Etranger won him immediate acclaim and a Laureate prize. Thus began his lifelong love for interpreting tragic
literature -illustrations of Hamlet, Faust and Blok's Puppet Booth not only obsessed him, but won him a place in
all the notable literary museums. During the 1960s, he worked as a professional graphic artist, excelling in wood
engraving.
In 1963, Sokolov married Avril Pyman, a British specialist in the work of the Russian poet Alexander Blok. It was the
first foreign marriage in the Soviet Union since the repeal of Stalin's marriage laws, and had to be sanctioned by
Khrushchev himself.
In private, Sokolov continued to paint profusely. From this period, there are dozens of cubist and primitive-style
landscapes, portraits and still-lifes, and also daring works, such as Iron Mother and Thanks To The Great Stalin, which
were critical of Soviet authority.
In July 1974, five months after Alexander Solzhenitsyn went into exile, Sokolov was allowed to emigrate from the
Soviet Union with his wife and daughter, Ira. He made for the north-east of England, where his wife's family came
from, and the area became his adopted home.
It was there that he developed his own innovative method of printmaking, which he called silkscreen collage. Using
this highly expressive technique, he created remarkable results. His folios on the theme of Venice, London 1984 (a
tribute to Orwell) and Greece and Athos are the best known, and have been widely exhibited.
While admiring Matisse, Sokolov never had any sympathy with the Frenchman's view that art should be like a
relaxing armchair. Always to the point, and banging his fist on the table, Sokolov told me repeatedly: "Art is more
than chairs." His ability was to express and transcend the sense of tragedy that underpins life.
He is survived by his wife, his daughter and his grandchildren.
Anthony Parton
Kirill Konstantinovich Sokolov, artist, born September 27 1930; died May 22 2004
The artist as rebel . . . Sokolov (left) and his acrylic and collage Musicians (2000) Photo: Sergei Tartakovsky
[The Guardian] |
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