Dmitry A. Prigov

In one of his recent performances, Dmitry A. Prigov attempted to teach a cat some patriotism: “Say, ‘Russia’!” he insisted over and over, until eventually the cat responded with a meow. Prigov is famous for his performances, in which he usually chants his own texts or those he has appropriated, from Pushkin to Pravda. This long-overdue exhibition, the artist’s first solo show in Russia, is organized by Ekaterina Degot and surveys Prigov’s career as a poet, performer, and visual artist.

A seminal figure of Russian Conceptualism, Prigov could be said to willfully (if ironically) embody the idea of Gesamtkunstwerk. Some poetic texts used in his performances were produced on an old Soviet typewriter and are here seen as art objects in themselves; likewise, drawings do triple duty as sketches for installations and as possible stage designs for performances. Prigov’s take on theatricality—he was a priest-cum-secretary always present in Russian artistic consciousness—is convincingly presented as a rejoinder to dominant trends in today’s art world. While much art today seduces viewers into unthinking participation, merely reproducing the performativity that characterizes contemporary life and labor, Prigov explicitly refused his spectators any illusion of participation. His stagelike phantom installations, which often feature curtains and screens, purposefully exclude the spectator, circumscribing clear limits to access. The thousands of works on paper in this show serve to reinforce the point. The viewer cannot forget he or she is a spectator: Scattered throughout are Prigov’s wonderfully absurd “public service announcements,” seeming to shout at viewers from the walls: CITIZENS! THE SECOND WE APPEAR EVERYTHING STARTS TO SING AND GLOW! CITIZENS! PLEASE MIND YOURSELVES!