Bartenev Andrey. Andrei Bartenev: Isn't it too “fashionable” for a verdict? Andrey Bartenev images

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Seems like a daily artist Andrey Bartenev manages to do about a million things: he creates costumes for theatrical productions, puts on performances and supervises festivals, teaches at the course, where he helps those who wish to understand the basics of contemporary art. This spring, he also tried on the role of the host of "Fashionable Sentence", where he made a splash, urging the program participants, in general, not to be shy about being whoever they want - and he himself shone in unusual, complex and funny costumes. We talked with Andrey Bartenev, who turns almost every exit into an act of art, about the freedom to be himself, beauty and selfishness.

If we talk about experiments with appearance, then all my costumes are, of course, spacesuits. When we go out into an airless space - we take out one spacesuit, we get into aquatic environment- we get another one, put on a third one in the desert, in a city oversaturated different people, - fourth. That's what I'm doing. Moreover, the task of my spacesuits is to either protect my weak human body or detect it strengths or change its structure. I have always done it and will always do it.

The percentage of people who

have rare performances

about the beautiful

does not change

I don't follow what's going on in fashion. If I follow, it's only a small group of European designers, and these are just five names that I'm curious about. But what I see they practice outside of any trends, what they create is designed for a very limited audience. And then I can do it myself.

I think that it is easiest for big egoists to perceive clothing and image as a way of self-expression. To manifest the power of egoism, one needs to oppose oneself environment, getting into a situation where you are different and alienated from the general mass.

But getting rid of stereotypes depends solely on your free will - take it and get rid of it. Be different, it's much easier than you think, and much easier than being attached to the fears that hold you back.

I think that there is no movement towards "ugliness" - it's more of a journalistic cliché. In fact, all these alien, clownish, strange images have always been around. It's just that the media either picks them up at the cutting edge of the news, or abandons them. Accordingly, this culture either returns or disappears. I think that the percentage of people who have such rare ideas about beauty does not change. Just curiosity and the degree of marketability of information is changing. Now, probably, it has again become possible to sell, and everyone began to talk about it. Of course, the industry of our tricks, "self-mutilation", is also developing. But before there were other freaks, after all, the percentage of eccentricity is constant.

The standards of beauty are changing because our world is changing, and we are a human civilization: songs about beauty are in new words and new thoughts. If we did not find new ways to talk about beauty, then intellectual evolution would stop. The poetic, fantasy world of our thinking all the time gives us new versions of the understanding of beauty. New sounds, words, numbers. Why are all musicians, artists, writers needed? Because they have to write their own beauty stories that are appropriate for the era in which they live.

With me, everything is very simple: the dictate of my thinking is much stronger than the dictate of opinions. And I trust my inner voice much more than the chorus of external authorities. In the end, this voice is given to you by heaven - and it sounds, but you cannot do anything. And it is he who is the measure of all your actions. I didn't want to do what the people around me did, deliberately followed the path of denial and heard what I needed. I immediately realized that what was left is mine, and this is not so little, it will be enough for my whole long life.

I trust my inner voice much more

than a chorus of external authorities

For certain people, fashion is a visual language that signals: "I'm yours, take me to your team." Look at least at the artists who are engaged in street art: they look similar, because they are all from the same cultural cell. This is how it works, fashion exists in order to use appearance a person could find friends, comrades who would understand him. Clothing, of course, is a language in the same way that graffiti is on city walls. This is normal, and this is knowledge that needs to be used. If you do not want to fall into some category, invent yourself. I can play anything and I love it. I can be outside the categories - and I can be in any of them.

Andrey Bartenev is a well-known Russian designer, fashion designer, sculptor, artist and TV presenter.

Andrei was born in 1965 in Norilsk. His mother and father were simple workers. Long time he and his family lived in a communal apartment in a small room. As a child, Bartenev was fond of music, he dreamed of learning to play the piano, but he was not allowed to buy musical instrument, which, due to its size, had nowhere to put it. However, the desire for creative activity Andrew didn't miss it. He was constantly sculpting, drawing, cutting and gluing something.

After Andrei graduated from the 10th grade of school, he moved to the south of Russia - to Krasnodar region, where he entered the Institute of Culture at the Faculty of Directing. Later, he admitted that for a long time he could not wean himself from the polar night, the eternal snow cover and the northern lights.

In the new place of residence, Bartenev continued to create. Already at the age of 20, he went to Moscow, where he was invited by Zhanna Aguzarova and her director. There Andrei began active work with young teams. He was engaged in staging various performances, which immediately began to be discussed by critics and ordinary people.

Andrey managed to work in the Mars Gallery, where his works The Great Koryak Seagull, Rampage on Ana-Dyr Mountain to the Singing of Nikitin Fish, and others were presented. Some time later, he visited Riga with a performance "Botanical Garden", which was awarded prizes.

In the 90s, the foreign press wrote about Bartenev mainly. Andrey's style appealed to foreign critics, who noted similarities with Russian avant-garde and futurism. The performances of the young designer were called "as if figures come to life from the paintings of artists of the early 20th century, who moved in space to the music of modern classics, repeating the interaction of the planets."

In the mid-90s, Andrei was accepted into the Union of Moscow Artists. In the early 00s, he went to work at the Watermill Center in the Hamptons, USA. One of his most famous works, presented in the United States, is called "Red Staircase". It was a whole performance with opera singers, orchestra members. At the same time, the musicians used empty iron cans instead of conventional instruments. The audience also remembered the pasta dishes that were thrown from the balcony directly onto the stage during the performance.

Now Andrey is actively engaged in teaching. His lectures on art in Moscow gather full audiences of young creative people. One of the most famous students of Bartenev was Sasha Frolova, who became famous for her Aqua Aerobics project.

The designer also often works in Europe, where he lectures at the Norwegian Academy. He is well acquainted with such representatives of the Western creative elite as Calvin Klein, Jean-Paul Gaultier, Andrew Logan, Robert Wilson and many others.

The general public knows Bartenev thanks to his unusual costumes, in which he attends a variety of social events. As a rule, most of his costumes are fantastic outfits, reminiscent of aliens and some mythical creatures.

As for Andrei's personal life, little is known about it. Despite being 51 years old, he is still unmarried. Bartenev likes to jokingly answer questions about his personal life that he has a large family in a parallel universe.

In the spring of 2017, Andrey began hosting the Fashion Sentence program on Channel One instead of Alexander Vasilyev.

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The famous contemporary artist Andrei Bartenev was born in the northern city of Norilsk in early October 1965. His parents were ordinary workers, the family lived in a communal apartment in a small room. The boy became interested in music early, he wanted to learn how to play the piano, but there was nowhere to put the bulky instrument at home. The craving for creativity remained, and Andrei began to sculpt, draw, cut and glue something out of paper.

Artist Andrey Bartenev

After graduating from the 10th grade, the young man decided to change the situation and from the Arctic went to the south of Russia to the Krasnodar Territory, where he entered the Institute of Culture at the faculty of directing. The riot of southern colors struck young man who is accustomed to the polar night, the eternal snow cover and northern lights.

The emotional experience of color resulted in the artist's work into something more than just painting. Movement, not static - that's what became the main focus for him. This coincided with the trend of the era, in which Bartenev organically fit in.

Creation

At the age of 20, a young man leaves for Moscow at the invitation of its director. In the capital, Andrey begins to work actively with young teams. He puts on the first performances, which both critics and ordinary onlookers begin to go to with pleasure. There are no indifferent people.

Together with Petlyura, Bartenev created his first works in the Mars Gallery: “Rampage on Mount Ana-Dyr to the singing of Nikitinsky fish” and “The Great Koryak Seagull”. Soon with the performance "Botanical Ballet" he goes to the festival in Riga, where he receives the Grand Prix.

The foreign press of the 90s, watching the work of an unusual Russian, was delighted with the style of his actions, which resembled the era of Russian avant-garde and futurism. Bartenev's performances are like animated figures from the paintings of artists of the early 20th century, who, to the music of modern classics, moved through space with the precision of the interaction of planets.

The artist himself notices that the circle, rotation are the main keys to understanding his work. At home in the mid-90s, Bartenev was accepted into the ranks of the Union of Moscow Artists.

In the early 2000s, Andrei Bartenev worked at the invitation of Robert Wilson at his Watermill center in the Hamptons. The Russian designer has staged one of his most memorable works, Red Staircase, in the USA. The performance was attended by real opera singers and orchestra players, who used empty iron cans instead of symphonic instruments to create a sound background. Pasta dishes, which the performers threw from the balcony directly onto the stage, had a special effect on the audience.

Outrageous fashion designer Andrey Bartenev

Andrei Bartenev considers himself a born teacher. He began to acquire students early, almost from the very beginning of his creative biography. He contributed to this youth experience work as a pioneer leader in Soviet children's camps.

At the moment the artist teaches not only in the West. He gathers young creative guys in Moscow for his lectures on art, and also attracts especially gifted people to his performances. The most famous Russian student of the master was Sasha Frolova, who has already become famous for her Aqua Aerobics project.

Former students Barteneva receive high marks from the masters of our time, and work as set designers and artists in famous groups in Europe and the USA.

One of the latest actions of the designer "I love you" is a modern sculptural composition, represented by many speakers and microphones. It was created for the first Moscow Biennale and is now exhibited at the Museum of Modernity in Moscow. Its essence is to say the phrase “I love you” into the microphone, which will immediately respond with a five-fold echo with special effects, and after this, the response of the previous participant in the action will be recorded on tape.

Paintings

As an artist, Bartenev creates paintings made in mixed media: decoupage, pastel painting, graphics, collage. The most famous works of Bartenev are "Girl with two fireworks", "Self-portrait in a wedding dress bird of paradise”, “Portrait in boots”, “Calmness of two clowns”, “I am a fairy, I am a beautiful fairy”, “Self-portrait in the role of Arnold Nijinsky”.

Stylistically, his paintings are an extreme degree of abstraction. In addition to artistic works, Andrey recreates spectacular performances. These are such actions as "Sleeping Beauties", "The Snow Queen", "Faust", "Underwear for Africa", the festival of illustration "Institute of Smile", the exhibition "Love haute couture!".

Theatre of Drama

The indefatigable Andrey Bartenev tried himself as a theater actor. In the early 2000s, he took part in the production of "Shlem.com" based on the work. The experimental performance, in which the authors tried to combine performance, video projection and communication of viewers in the Internet space, took part in the NET Festival of Contemporary Art, but this action did not impress the critics. But this experience characterizes Bartenev as an artist who is in search of new forms.

Now Andrei works a lot in Europe. He teaches at the Norwegian Academy of Theater Arts. In the West, the holding of performances is highlighted in independent view arts, and such a discipline is taught separately. Russian designer communicates with many representatives of the Western artistic elite: Andrew Logan, Paco Rabanne, Calvin Klein, Jean-Paul Gaultier, Robert Wilson, Zandra Rose.

fashion designer

Andrei Bartenev is a regular participant in social events. At various meetings, the shocking masters can be seen in the most unusual costumes.

tall(184 cm) the slender artist, who looks much younger than his years, is an excellent model for his own experiments. Pictured in Instagram Andrey Bartenev can be seen in fantastic outfits reminiscent of aliens and mysterious space creatures. But the fashion designer in a raspberry costume was especially remembered by the public.

Scandals

Many scandals are associated with the name of Bartenev, although in essence he is a harmless pacifist artist. So, for example, at one private party for a wealthy client, Bartenev was ordered to host the evening. Imagine the surprise of representatives of high society when they were presented with a show of several dozen cats and dogs that were engaged in the breeding process as entertainment. That evening for Andrey and his friends everything ended badly.

Personal life

Little is known about Bartenev's personal life. In his interviews, the artist jokingly or seriously says that in a parallel reality he has a friendly family, which consists of three husbands and one wife. But the eccentric has no children even there. It is known that not so long ago Andrei lost his mother, who was the closest person to him.

Andrey Bartenev now

Contemporary art actions by Bartenev are held in Moscow, and increasingly in entertainment centers. The artist uses a lot of color balloons, lighting effects. Suits recent works are distinguished by their simplicity, which helps the free movement of actors.

The new host of the show “Fashion Sentence” Andrey Bartenev

In 2016, several Bartenev actions were successfully held: “Give love!”, “Feet in the water, head in the clouds” and “Portraits happy people". And at the beginning of 2017, it was announced that from March 1, the modern designer will begin hosting the Fashion Sentence Channel One program, in which he will temporarily replace the previous presenter.

Fans of the fashion historian were perplexed - what could be associated with so many drastic changes in a programme? Vasiliev hastened to reassure the public, saying that Bartenev would become the host of Fashion Sentence for several issues, while Alexander was busy with his side projects.

exhibition curator

“What we see in this exhibition is a fantastic expression of the time, and that is why Bartenev will remain in the history of both Russian and world art. The 1990s is a time of colossal energy, and in these works we feel it very keenly. In those years, everything was mixed up, the whirlwind of time carried us all somewhere: someone lost in the battle with this hurricane, and someone became stronger and laid the foundations of the world in which we live today. The 1990s is a celebration of freedom, which shows how easy it is in personal and public creation everything mixed with everything. Then Moscow was covered with scary stalls where you could buy a Bible, and sneakers, and yellow press, which was not there - a real symbol of the 1990s. Bartenev wonderfully expressed this time in crazy collages, which he wove into the fabric of his sculptures. He showed an incredible, exciting energy, for which there is nostalgia today: then it seemed that everything was possible.

"Three Sisters" (2012)

“The work gave me great pleasure: I have always explored a person as a kind of biomorphic mass, capable of creating a huge number of sculptural variations. I look at dancing actors as a sculptural form that, due to its biomechanics, transforms before my eyes. The combination of characters in space created an endless series of compositions - the project fully satisfied my passion for sculpture and for shifting accents in space.

"Mogul-mogul, or the Adventures of invisible worms in Russia" (2000)

Photo: Ksenia Kolesnikova

Bartenev:“I also love this performance very much, and it has survived only in the form of documentation. Here I have summed up my ten years of work with moving sculptures, and main value"Gogol-mogul" is associated with the discovery of a falling sculpture. For the performance, we prepared four tons of garbage and six thousand eggs. Seventy actors went on stage, took off everything they were wearing and threw it at the viewer, at this time thousands of eggs fell from the third level, and garbage from the second. Fragments of flying masses formed the feeling of a falling sculpture.

Then I began to investigate who is engaged in falling sculpture in the world: first of all, this is the British artist Cornelia Parker and Jean Tinguely, the Swiss artist who made the Stravinsky Fountain at the Georges Pompidou Center with his wife Nika. He was engaged in similar experiments: he built mechanical sculptures, put dynamite in them, blew them up and filmed the moment of the explosion. And Cornelia Parker not only arranged explosions, but also then collected fragments - she made a reconstruction of the explosion. She also cast the words of Shakespeare's sonnet in metal, went out to the cliff and threw these words into the sea in the order they were supposed to sound line by line. And I made "Mogul-mogul".

"Smoking Lips on the Asphalt" (1998)

Photo: Ksenia Kolesnikova

Bartenev:“I am a regular participant in Andrew Logan's British project Alternative Miss World. This is an endless performance in which everyone participates - from animals to people and robots. In 1998, he performed at the Smoking Lips on Asphalt facility. That year Pani Bronya, legendary in the Moscow art environment, won. I knew that she should win, and the British were sure that I definitely should have won: they knew my performances well. I advised them not to rush to conclusions - they still did not know who Pani Bronya was! I am happy that everything turned out this way: the gentle combination of advanced age and Panya Broni's acting stunned everyone. I was also happy for myself, it gave me great pleasure to perform in the “Smoking Lips on Asphalt” facility. And here it is in the museum. And the video next to it shows me standing in it - at Richmond Holographic Studios.

"Snow Queen" (1993)

Photo: Ksenia Kolesnikova

Bartenev:“This project was about how Russia opened its territory to the invasion of European and American goods. I took as a basis the fairy tale " The Snow Queen because she stole hearts in return for her logistics talent. The same thing happened here: we were so naive, so joyful and traded all the joy for the possession of the unreal world of the supermarket. We showed this project in London at the Royal Festival Hall and the Victoria and Albert Museum, in Russia at the Tretyakov Gallery.”

Sviblova:"Tumblers, of which one of his major works, - in some way a symbol of Russia. I still have such a toy, I periodically shake it and I think that no matter how we lean from side to side, we still come to the vertical.

"Botanical Ballet" (1992)

Photo: Ksenia Kolesnikova

Bartenev:“The pearl of my work is the Botanical Ballet of 1992. It included the developments of both 1990 and 1991, which I made as part of the Fruit Poker project, there was such an association of Moscow artists. Then I already made the Botanical Ballet, with which we traveled all over Europe, showed both as a performance and an exhibition - at the Victoria and Albert Museum, Baden-Baden, the church in Basel at Art Basel.

From the "Botanical Ballet" - from the tension of color - my new sculpture of this year has grown ("Sea buckthorn". - Note. ed.). And "Botanical Ballet" grew out of children's games with snow in the city of Norilsk, where snow was a more accessible material than toys.

"Sea Buckthorn" (2015)

Photo: Ksenia Kolesnikova

Bartenev:“About the conflict between strict form and sucked balls: some aesthetic embellishment of time - and any time. We love ancient ruins, they were magnificent when they were created, but the beauty of destruction is hard to deny. These balls destroy the dynamic tension of the metal, but create the peculiar beauty of the dependents on the strings of the sculpture's metal."

Sviblova: « New job Barteneva is absolutely fantastic, it can be installed in any public space, it shows that we have the most powerful sculptural powers. It is no weaker than the monumental works of Koons and other great artists. Let's not be afraid to call what we see by their proper names, let's not be afraid to confess our love to Bartenev, because many in our the art world associate Andryusha only with performance”.

"Electric Aliens" (2004)

Photo: Ksenia Kolesnikova

Bartenev:“At first I showed this project as a performance: I moved on stage in a suit. The first time was at the Hippodrome nightclub on Leicester Square, which Andrew Logan turned into a venue for Alternative Miss World - then I was an alien (in complete darkness, the assistants carried Bartenev out in a luminous alien suit. - Note. ed.). Then I showed it in the “Etazhi” loft in St. Petersburg, and then in Berlin in a huge gallery space. In the form of an independent installation, I presented aliens in the Tretyakov Gallery, and the MMSI decided to purchase the installation for the collection. I wanted to show the project at Burning Man, but the museum said they don't lend their work to any "burning men". As for the technology, this is a 2004 development by NASA for luminous fabrics. And the installation itself is a prototype of my sculpture "Field of Lonely Hearts".

"Blow Kiss of the Trees" (2012)

Photo: Ksenia Kolesnikova

Bartenev:“My favorite performance was made for Archstoyanie in 2012. He talks about the fact that trees are absolutely fantastic creatures on our planet: they give us a reason to live, they give us oxygen. A kiss is just the oxygen they send us, but the trees don't have legs to run away from us, from our cruelty. We have shown various thoughts that trees broadcast into space. The most successful performance took place at one in the morning on a hill and under a spotlight. Everything that was captured by the spotlight seemed bright green and bright white, and everything in the shadows became terribly black. It was a completely biblical contrast between good and evil."

"Say: I love you" (2005)

Photo: Ksenia Kolesnikova

Bartenev:“The sound sculpture consists of an open spiral and 200 speakers that form eight cycles. There is a microphone in the center, a person comes up to him and says: “I love you”, and the phrase begins to fly through these speakers. This is primarily a psychological experience: I saw that many people are generally afraid to utter this phrase in their lives. To which I reply: practice! It helps: many lovers come here and confess their love to each other. The work was created for the First Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art, and then became part of the MMSI (MMOMA) collection"

Sviblova:“This is an amazing job: it makes us do the most difficult thing, to say “I love you” - the most difficult existential gesture. These words each of us wants to hear, but they are so difficult to pronounce! There is an incredible contrast between words and the aggressive form of the installation: it looks like a roller coaster or hills in a mountainous area, and the speakers look like octopus suckers. When we say these very words, we hear that our voice rolls in space, like an echo in the mountains. The form of the installation is amazing: it proves that we have before us the most delicate plastic sculptor. Many of Bartenev's performances have taken the form of sculptures, and I'm not afraid to say that he does not lose the competition with Louise Bourgeois, which is exhibited in the Garage. Somewhere they even express themselves plastically, referring to an aggressive form to reflect the world in which we live.

"Connection Lost. Field of Lonely Hearts" (2007)

Photo: Ksenia Kolesnikova

Bartenev:“This is a project capable of change, the mechanisms in it each time behave in a new way, which changes the original meaning. When you look into the endless space of hearts that are not connected to each other in any way, you can see that at some point they begin to turn into an abstract glow-impulse. When I realized this in Venice (the work was exhibited at the Venice Biennale curated by Olga Sviblova. - Note. ed.), then said that the artist is the programmer of a certain sculpture, which is engaged in self-reproduction and self-change. And thus the program scheme of the sculpture changes the final image and the context of what is happening. It was 2007 and so much has happened in the art of software in those nine years. And then it was just the first experience of what we could emotionally face. Only one thing depends on the artists - to direct the discovery to creation and love or destruction. I choose creation and love.”

Sviblova:“This is a model of our human community, which goes into the virtual space. Then it was not obvious - we only raised the question of what virtual space is. Today it already seems to us that as soon as we forget our phone, fall out of this space, then trouble happens. Thanks to this virtual communication, we get the feeling that we are together, although this is the same illusion as the relationship of a thousand people crowding into a disco. At some point, we still understand that everyone is dancing alone, that the more we are together, the more alone we are. Bartenev is a man who is incredibly sensitive to these moments of existential abandonment, and each time he overcomes them with his performances - just like a knight.

Andrey Bartenev is celebrating his 50th birthday today. We did not find a better way to congratulate the artist than to talk to him about everything: about childhood in Norilsk, about Tarkovsky, dreams, cottage cheese, the Universe, clouds, fears and, of course, about art too

Andrey Bartenev is celebrating his jubilee. It is difficult to believe in the proposed figure, and why, when the artist himself does not notice age and generally considers it a very distant concept. Behind recent months he managed to prepare several solo exhibitions at once, including a retrospective at the Moscow Museum of Modern Art, which entangled the entire mansion on Gogolevsky Boulevard, and an exposition at the RuArts Gallery. In the latter, just today, the project “And the color-maned whirlwind rang”, the name of which very aptly describes the phenomenon named Andrei Bartenev. We decided to save the artist from another routine interview and sent Olga Darfi, a director, a regular author of Buro 24/7 and part-time Andrey's old friend, to talk to him. The conversation was long and personal.

Andrey Bartenev: And what did Buro 24/7 come up with to talk on Skype?

Olga Darfi: Yes, this is because I am in the Crimea, in the village, and you are in Moscow. And they decided that it was I who should interview you, since we have known each other for twenty years.

AB: Oh, how I would also like to run away to the sea, the sun and the wind, to sit in the meadow...

OD: There is homemade cheese...

AB: Oh, cottage cheese is my favorite food.

OD: And what is holding you back?

AB: So what... Love for creative experiments. Right now, for four days I was sitting in Suzdal at the Dymov ceramics factory, without straightening my back, working hard and thoughtfully ... Minus three vertebrae, plus one exhibition. Opening today at the Rosa Azora Gallery ( Andrey is referring to the opening of the Elephant in the China Shop exhibition, which runs from 7 to 22 October. — Approx. Buro 24/7).

OD: Well, I won’t ask you too much about the opening of your huge retrospective exhibition, only the lazy one hasn’t written about it.

AB: You're doing me a big favor. Indeed, everything is on the Internet, let them read it to anyone who is interested.

OD: I'll just ask... So you came to your retrospective exhibition, looked at your objects, paintings and thought: “How good! This is my creative result! Or: “What a brilliant start I have!”. Or what?

AB: Yeah ... solemnly licked his lips and froze with pleasure. Of course not! This is not the end and not the beginning, the usual working moment. I looked and thought, there are many ideas that need to be developed. That's all. We must move on.

OD: And how did the title of the retrospective “Say: I love you!” come about? Who invented it?

AB: There is no special legend here especially for journalists. It was invented by Olga Sviblova after the name of the sound sculpture of the same name. Come in, you will understand what and why.

OD: Okay, this is where my art criticism questions will probably end.

AB: God bless! And then about the meaning of contemporary art, the performances of the nineties and the difference between one from the other, and something else - from my objects have already been asked so many times that I just want to yawn. After all, there are art historians for this.

OD: No, we will only talk about life and the soul. For example, your work is permeated with irony. Is it a way to reflect the world or is it some kind of hide-and-seek game?

AB: Yes, irony is a form of pleasure, a formula for happiness, if you like. I think everything rests on this ability of a person to self-irony. Otherwise, the world would have been swollen with importance and pride long ago, it would have burst. So everything and everyone is saved by irony. I constantly reflect and laugh at myself. It's wild for me to look at artists who take their work seriously.

OD: Well, there is an opinion that artists who have nothing to say, who do not have a serious statement to the world, here they are ironic. All the giggles and hahanki they have.

AB: Yeah, these are just serious statements to the world and there is the most incredible boredom and the road to nowhere, I think. This makes me want to sleep. In my opinion, as soon as you understand that you have something to say to the great world, then that's it, this is already stagnation. This is how you need to treat yourself in order to really believe that you can tell something that will turn the Universe upside down. I must say thank you if the Universe allows a drop to touch itself. It will open a millimeter of its essence, which you will interpret or reflect. Ironic, of course.

“Everything rests on this ability of a person to self-irony. Otherwise, the world would have long been inflated with importance and pride, it would have burst.OD: Do you dream of sculptures? Does it happen?

AB: Of course it does! For example, the sculpture "Eight-legged dog" is the result of dreams. Also, for example, I dreamed about the name. Now a book of memoirs about Vadik Mamyshev-Monroe is being published, I have a story there, I dreamed of the title: “I recognized you by the color of unshaven hair on my legs.”

OD: Cool. Can you tell me the whole dream?

AB: Of course not! This is erotic dream. If you tell this, everyone will immediately decide that this is not a dream, but it really happened. People always confuse fiction and reality, dream and reality. Moreover, they themselves then come up with the details in the course of the presentation, compose the unsaid - and this begins. The main thing here is to talk less.

OD: Exactly. Once Maxim Shostakovich told me that he answers all the questions of journalists: “I don’t know. I do not remember. Forgot". OK then. As you know, journalists often ask pretty stupid questions...

AB: Yeah. In twenty-five years of questions, all the answers bounce off my teeth. They send a list of questions, I read, I say: “Girl, take my previous interviews and write yourself, okay?”.

OD: So, is there a question you would like to answer?

AB: Darfi, that was also asked. Want to be original? Did not work out! No, it's always interesting to talk to a person, no matter what kind of questions, talking about nothing is the most interesting.

OD: So let's write an interview between questions.

AB: Yes, we read between the lines. You, most importantly, do not write that I am a fashion designer, I have only one requirement.

OD: Oh-oh-oh, but you can write: “And then the artist Barteneva drew herself in the doorway ...”?

AB: Ha ha ha... that's great! This has never happened before, no one asked me: “What is your gender?”. That's a good question!

OD: Is there anything you'd rather never talk about?

AB: There is.

OD: And what is it?

AB: Well, I don't want to talk about it.

OD: Good. Let's continue our blitz. Can you say in three words what you broadcast to the world?

AB: I can't at three. I can at seven. "To the sun, light and moon we fly in one tube." Here.

OD: Ah, perpetual motion.

AB: Yes, we all travel, inward or outward. And our Galaxy also travels: we rush, creating Beauty along the way. Well, ideally, of course.

OD: Exactly. And who was your teacher?

AB: I have many teachers.

OD: But what if there is one and the main one?

AB: Tarkovsky. In the city of Norilsk, like many Soviet children across the country, I skipped school and went to the movies. There were two films in the cinema at that time: "Stalker" and " Love affair at work". The sessions ran at the same time. I bought a ticket for ten kopecks and stood in front of the posters, making a choice. It was written about one film, something like dramatic story love, but about the other - science fiction. I went to watch Stalker and it changed my life. I was nine years old, and I realized that all sorts of variations are possible. Of course, I could not then clearly articulate the concept of variability, but I firmly understood that there is no one way for everyone. You have to do what you only want to do. And I no longer denied myself anything, it became impossible to re-educate me. Since then, I have only done what I thought was interesting to me.

OD: What, for example?

AB: Well, I sculpted what I wanted, not bunnies and planes or whatever they told us at art school. Behaved so independently, all the time I was "unsatisfactory" in behavior. He did not change himself, in a word.

OD: I understand this. Tell me, please, on October 9 you turn - this is something incredible - 50 years old. What is age for you?

AB: Don't even know. Nothing. I don't see it, I don't feel it. I'm so emotional rich life that there is no time to notice the time. I think these are people who have nothing to do, counting their years. I don’t get bored or dreary, or have a pain in my lower back - I work all the time. As for health, I solve current problems: go to the dentist on time, treat the ears or, for example, the spine. I always eat right, do not drink alcohol. On the other hand, life around you is changing, you are developing, moving forward. We can say that age is a movement forward. Oh wait, here's my nephew calling, haven't heard from him in five years.

Conversation with nephew: Yeah, yeah, my most intimate exhibition at the Rosa Azora Gallery. Why are you bringing me presents ahead of time? ... Let's. ... I will be in the form of an elephant, I have never been in the form of an elephant. First time today. Debut, so to speak. "Elephant in a china shop" is the title of the exhibition. Yes, admission is free.

AB: Yes, I'm sorry, I'm coming back to you.

OD: Have you been a bear yet?

AB: Oh, who hasn't been a bear? Petliura made a calendar. I imagined him for a month in the form of a bear. It was necessary to put on a smelly, tight, dirty skin. I couldn’t even look at her without disgust, I almost died, I wanted to give up everything and run home, but you can’t let a comrade down. I then thought: if I can endure it now, then I can do everything. So I stood in this skin. And then it turned out that it was not even visible that it was me, any person could stand there. Such nonsense.

OD: That's right, I experienced about the same feelings when I participated in your performance in the form of a rocket-fireman. The suit, however, did not stink, but I could not see where I should go along the catwalk and where it ends. She walked, obeying the vibrations of light and music. Okay, this lyrical digression. Are you afraid of something?

AB: I recently recruited students here, and it turned out to be some kind of suicide club: they were all Goths and thought that modern Art- This beautiful way get out of life. I had to work with them for a whole year, explain what joy, goodness, light is, and do some basic things with them. Their parents owe me a big thank you. Well, seriously, I'm afraid of the same thing that all people are: death, murder, rudeness, unpleasant random people. I recently flew to Nice with a friend, sat arguing about what contemporary art is, could not agree on anything. They quarreled to death, and suddenly the plane begins to fall. This real horror. But I instantly felt, remembered that you can’t swear on airplanes. Yes, in general, you can’t swear with anyone in life. Now, when I am flying in an airplane, I talk to the clouds, mentally I ask their forgiveness. The microsystems that form the clouds are intelligent. They are harmless, bright and beautiful, they fly themselves, soar in the air, and then some hellish iron monster begins to cut them. They also hurt, but they patiently endure the intervention of people. Sometimes they get bored, and now - mysterious plane crashes. I now always ask for forgiveness from these lovely substances. Yes, in general, the so-called material world is not so insensitive and wordless, as a person thinks in his pride. We must live more carefully.

OD: What do you lack money for?

AB: Yes, nothing is enough!

OD: How? So, is there enough food? Are you not hungry? Do you eat at least twice a day?

AB: For me, food is not the most important thing. But the most important thing is missing. My imagination always goes ahead of my financial possibilities, I cannot make the volume of sculptures, the quality and quantity that I want. I dream of some alien creature that would collect my objects. And paid with me some cobblestones of gold.

OD: Do you want to make sculptures out of gold?

AB: Of course not! Painted aluminum is my favorite material.

OD: Well, fly a golden cobblestone to you, what would you do with it?

AB: I would make sculptures for my favorite cities. I would give them to New York, Venice, Paris. I would build fountains. I love fountains. This is a sight when water, splashed like powder, like a jellyfish, got into the mixer, great! Beautiful. I like these new technologies, where there are sprinklers in cities and we see glowing drops of water. Here I would work with this material. I proposed to the Moscow government to install a fountain on the Lubyanka, its sketch is on YouTube. Everyone liked everything, but somehow to no avail. By the way, I didn’t even know then that in the nineteenth century there was already a fountain in this place.

OD: Look, you can commercialize your art. Make a clothing line, for example, underpants from Bartenev or dragonfly lamps in the form of an elephant, no?

AB: Oh, No! A commercial clothing line is something else, outside of my competence, you have to be a businessman, and I am an artist. And then, so many wonderful talented people are doing this. And to be honest, it's boring, uninteresting.

OD: Here you are talking like a typical egoist. "I'm bored, I won't do it." What if people dream of wearing underpants from Bartenev, is it difficult for humanity to do this?

AB: Yes, you rightly said, I am a real egoist and I think that the main thing in an artist is to follow your artistic vision and instinct. To commercialize your creativity is sheer boredom and a waste of your own vital energy.

OD: Okay, I agree, that's how I am. Who are your heroes today?

AB: Yes, all the same. People who are true to themselves. Vadik Monroe, Danila Polyakov, Pasha Pepperstein, Alexander Sokurov, Kira Muratova, Oleg Karavaychuk - in a word, all those who are about heart and soul. Luckily, there are actually quite a few of them. Olya, let's have the last question, otherwise I have five more meetings and I want to drink. While we were talking, a cooler was stolen from our office.

“To commercialize your creativity is sheer boredom and wasting your own life energy for nothing”
OD: Although your hometown and Norilsk, where everything is in ruins, as you told me, but still there is Moscow. What merged and echoed in this sound for your heart?

AB: Moscow. Moscow for me is an experimental base and heavy production. This is where I plan, sharpen blanks. Where concrete is always laid, where everything rumbles and rumbles, and you keep jumping so as not to step on the poop - both literally and figuratively. Trees in Moscow do not stand straight: they are repairing something here - they tilted the tree there, then they fix it there - the tree went here; sorry for them, they always bow and bend down. And we are the same: always have to bend. All the time they have to jump through some trenches and go around some fences. The style of the city is a minefield. It's tiring and makes it hard to concentrate. It is impossible to think about the eternal and create beauty in Moscow, it is impossible to come up with something worthwhile, I always leave somewhere. Well done, you ran away from here. Art in Moscow is twitchy, like an electric shock. And we are all very nervous. Okay, come on, eat some homemade curd for me...