Gentle Breathing

Konstantin Zvezdochotov has explored low culture throughout his career. He first joined the art scene in the late 1970s as co‑founder of Mukhomor (Toadstool) Group, which made tomfoolery its creative method, opposing both Soviet official art and the intellectual art of the Moscow Conceptualists. In the 1980s, Zvezdochotov took part in some of the key underground art initiatives, including the APTART movement. In 1986, he founded World Champions, another flamboyant art group and an important part of the Russian underground scene’s “new wave.” Around the same time, Zvezdochotov was developing his individual style, filled with quotes from mass culture, literature, and folklore. It was then that he first became famous internationally, despite his work being deliberately untranslatable since it was based on cultural codes removed from their context.

The installation Gentle Breathing, which was shown at the 3rd Istanbul Biennial in 1992, is an example of Zvezdochotov’s signature synthesis of theatrical expression and postmodernist use of quotes. The central element in the composition is a black dresser that is visually reminiscent of a pedestal, a tombstone or an altar. On the top are two photographs: a portrait of a woman and a family portrait. The installation is surrounded by black chains like a grave in the cemetery. According to the artist, the work is a sentimental and ironic interpretation of male jealousy in world culture. The title refers to a short story by Ivan Bunin that describes the murder of high‑school student Olga Meshcherskaya, shot by a lovelorn Cossack officer at a train station. The pillow in the drawer refers to another classic: Shakespeare’s Othello. Zvezodochotov has created an original monument to male jealousy as a cultural archetype.