Legendary director Roman Balayan is shooting a film about the artist Oleksandr Zhivotkov. PHOTO
[ad_1]
Legendary director Roman Balayan has started filming a portrait documentary about the contemporary Ukrainian artist Oleksandr Zhivotkov. The world premiere of the film is planned for the beginning of 2024. Read UP.Kultura in Telegram Balayan and Zhivotkov met at the artist’s exhibition “Vivtar”, which was held at the Ukrainian House in Kyiv and consisted of works created by the author in moments of the highest emotional tension – in the period from 2014 to 2022. The director admits that it was after viewing the works that he decided to shoot a video portrait of Zhivotkov. “Life will always find a way, like a tree will make its way to the sun on any land, even through asphalt! Because this is an eternal, invincible desire to live free! So is art, if it is genuine and talented – as in the performance of Oleksandr Zhivotkov, a tree which sprouts as a sacred sign in the soul of each of us – should become a component of the formula of our Victory!” Balayan says. Roman Balayan, Oleg Kokhan, Oleksandr Zaporozhchenko. Photo: Sota Cinema Group In the upcoming film, not only Oleksandr Zhivotkov’s works from wood and stone will be shown, but his words about art and the ongoing war will be quoted. In addition, you will be able to see the artist’s icons in the frame – they look more like memorials than images for prayer. Filming of the film “Altar”. Photo: Sota Cinema Group The director of the documentary film “Altar” is Oleksandr Zaporozhchenko. So far, the team has already presented the first teaser of the tape. The world premiere of the film about Zhivotkov will take place at a foreign film festival in early 2024. After that, the Ukrainian audience will be able to watch the tape. Filming of the film “Altar”. Photo: Sota Cinema Group About Roman Balayan Roman Balayan is a Ukrainian film director, screenwriter and film producer of Armenian origin. He studied at the directing faculty of the Yerevan Theater Institute, and in 1969 graduated from the directing faculty of the Kyiv State Institute of Theater Arts named after I. Karpenko-Kary. He began his career as a film director in 1970 at the Kyiv Film Studio. His debut film was the musical comedy “The Romashkin Effect” (1973). Balayan’s next film “Biriuk” (1977) already claimed the “Golden Bear” at the Berlin Film Festival. And “Flight in a Dream and Awake” (1982), which was filmed after him, became a cult classic almost immediately after its release in the Soviet box office. In December 2020, the Dovzhenko Center organized a large-scale exhibition based on this film by Balayan, which explored both the extremely popular film and, at the same time, the era in which it was created. Balayan on the set of “Flights”. Photo: day.kyiv.ua Although Balayan did not direct many films, most of them received good reviews from critics and audience interest. Among them, in addition to “Flights…”, “Two months, three suns”, “Paradise birds”, “Filer”. In the summer of 2021, the director released his first film after an almost 12-year creative break. It was his first Ukrainian-language tape “We are We are near”. Akhtem Seitablaev and Kateryna Molchanova played the main roles in it. About Oleksandr Zhivotkov Oleksandr Zhivotkov is a Ukrainian artist, a representative of the New Wave in Ukrainian art. He was born in Kyiv in a creative family, his father and older brother are artists. Together they created a special “family school”, the characteristic features of which are monochrome and minimalism. He studied at the scenography faculty of the Kyiv State Art Institute. While still studying, he began to engage in creativity, working in a corner of his father’s workshop in Syrka. In the late 1980s, he joined the community of artists led by artist Tiberius Silvashi and art critic Oleksandr Solovyov, and later joined the group “Painting Reserve”, which explored the possibilities of pictorial language. In 1992, he exhibited his paintings abroad for the first time at the “Ukrainian Art” exhibition in Helsinki. To date, his works have been shown at 34 personal exhibitions in Ukraine, Zhivotkov has participated in 60 group projects in Ukraine, Russia, Poland, Slovakia, Great Britain, France, Finland, Germany, Austria. His paintings are in museums and private collections in different countries of the world, and are also sold at international auctions. Oleksandr Zhivotkov at the opening of the “Altar” exhibition. Photo: press service of the Ukrainian House Since 2003, the artist began to complicate his own technique and experiment with different materials: introducing additional materials into the canvas, such as fabric, paper, mesh or wood. Over time, cardboard, sand, earth, soot and stones are added to them. And in the colors of his works, the colors formed after mixing these additional materials with paint began to dominate. Photo: zhyvotkov.alexander / Instagram One of Zhyvotkov’s most expensive paintings was “Work No. 1” from the “Roads” series (2013). In November 2013, it was sold at a Sotheby’s auction for $22,270. In 2015, after a number of sales at the Phillips auction house, he entered the top five Ukrainian artists by the value of sold paintings. In 2019, his work “From the Nativity” (2016) was donated to the Vatican. Photo: zhyvotkov.alexander / Instagram Read also: The director of the prophetic film about Ukrainian victory shoots a film about Ukrainian corruption
[ad_2]
Original Source Link
