The talk by theater historian Nadezhda Tarshis will focus on the family history of artist, writer, and performer Ry Nikonova (Anna Tarshis) in the context of her path as an artist.
No member of her family quite fit within the standards of the Soviet system. Both parents—Aleksandr Tarshis ang Olga Kvasha (Kalintsheva)—and later their children Anna, Nadezhda and Mikhail organically blended artistic practices with daily routines. Almost every day they played musical instruments at home and sang in various languages. Olga enjoyed weaving and made samizdat publications, encouraging her children to make books from an early age.
As we trace the life of this nonconformist artist from Yeysk and try to understand how a small seaside town—a former Cossack settlement—became a place for a revival of Russian avant-garde art and a center of the international mail art movement, we are inevitably led to Tarshis’ roots. They, in turn, take us back to the soil and the rich and tragic history of her immediate and extended family and her homeland.
Artist, poet, and novelist Boris Konstriktor will take part in the talk.
