Gor Chakhal

Graduated from the Moscow Engineering and Physics Institute with a degree in applied mathematics. Working with the poet Arkady Semyonov and the rock group Vezhlivy Otkaz (Polite Refusal), organized the Parallel Actions group (1985). Recipient of fellowships from the Berlin Academy of Arts (1995-1996), and Museums Quartier in Vienna (2004).

Earth, Bread and Wine and The Architectonics of Grace are works that Gor Chakhal included in his creative program to reassert the primacy of the image in art. The artist revealed in a statement that he is interested in that which is constant in the world, rather than how the world changes. Throughout his career, Chakhal has pushed through myriad visual disturbances to construct sacred space in art. In the case of Earth, Bread and Wine the artist puts inanimate nature (still life, as it were) to the test of art. Using an electron microscope to magnify three substances 4000 times, he transforms them into the semblance of a primary, animate element, the source of vital energy in the world. In the tradition of the cosmist philosopher Nikolai Fyodorov, Chakhal believes the path to the transfiguration of the universe can be found in the laws of truth and love in a blessed union of the exact sciences and art. His diptych The Architectonics of Grace directly addresses the search for ideal, visual expressions of faith. Tondos forming a horizontal figure eight — the symbol of infinity — show the arm of a benevolent God establishing eternal contact between the singular and the universal, the phenomenal and the nominal, the earthly and the celestial.
Sergei Khachaturov