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| Russian master works |
The artist Alexander Kliot made his reputation
with heroic portraits of miners, before settling in Hampstead. Dan
Carrier talks to his widow
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Family (Oil on canvas)
Kliot in his studio copying a Gainsborough from Kenwood
House
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THE first major retrospective exhibition of one of Russia’s
most feted artists starts this week at the Chambers Gallery in Smithfield
and the tragic story of how he died for his art can be revealed.
The Soviet miner, in a land that glorified the working man, was
perhaps the most heroic of them all. Stakhavnov, who hewed 102 tons
of coal in just five hours from his own seam underground, had been
made into a hero of the Soviet Union.
There was not a schoolchild in the land who didn’t recognise
his face or know of his super human feats bringing up the fuel that
powered the world’s first workers state – and so when
Kliot, an artist, wanted to find a subject that the government-employed
tutors at his college would relate to, he turned to the miners from
his home city.
Alexander Kliot donned a hard hat, picked up his miner’s lamp
and heard a clang as the cage door slammed shut.
He was apprehensive, and the people around him made him feel worse.
He had no one turn to and explain he wasn’t used to cramped
spaces, that he suffered from claustrophobia and the pit head machinery
he was trusting his life to looked antiquated.
The men in the mining lift were used to the trip below, having dropped
a mile below the earth on a daily basis to hack away at the coal
seams.
Kliot had reason to worry: although he returned safely from the
many trips he made underground as he studied the miners of the Ukrainian
city of Donetsk on the banks of the Kalmius river, his time there
left a deadly legacy.
Kliot used the pictures of the miners to complete his master’s
degree at the St Petersburg Academy of Art.
Kliot died in London in 1998, aged just 45. The polluted atmosphere
of the Donetsk mining community had ruined his lungs. Within three
months of being diagnosed with cancer he was dead.
The exhibition features his works of the Donetsk miners – and
also has a number of pictures of Hampstead Heath that he battled
to complete before he died.
When Kliot moved to London from Russia, he was asked to make reproductions
of a number of Gainsborough’s – so he went to visit Kenwood
House. He was so enthralled by the views from Heath he decided to
produce a number of studies.
His widow, Maria Kliot – another artist who met him while studying
at the St Petersburg Academy of Art – explained that Alexander’s
eye had been trained from a young age.
Mrs kliot, now living in Westminster, says: “His art career
started early – in the USSR, there were a number of specialist
colleges that children who were particularly skilled in the arts
were sent to. Alexander went to one.”
And from the age of 14, he trained at another arts college in the
Odessa.
After completing his National Service, he was accepted into the
prestigious Academy of Art.
Mrs Kliot continues: “After graduating, he became a member
of the Sotvorchestovo Group – a clique of six artists based
in the studio of artist Sergei Aslanov on Vasilievsky Island. They
were renowned for their draughtsmanship, and how they pushed back
the boundaries of what subjects artists could cover.”
In 1992 Alexander and the Sotvorchestovo Group were invited to take
part in an exhibition at the Aberdeen Art Gallery. This led to other
British galleries wanting to find out about the artist. His skill
as a painter led to commissions – including projects to copy
English masterpieces, including works by Gainsborough.
Mrs Kliot explains: “He used to walk on the Heath every day.
He loved Hampstead and he was inspired by the Heath.”
The Chambers Gallery exhibition shows more than just his slant on
Soviet realism, his pictures of grimy faced miners emerging into
the daylight – which was what the government commissioned him
to produce.
They also include what art critics, including Russian art expert
Annela Twitchin, describe as being similar to the great English
landscape artists Turner and Constable.
“He exhibited all the time,” says Mrs Kliot.
“But individuals did not collect. The government gave out commissions
for public buildings. They liked portraits of political figures
– but Alexander never painted Lenin. Instead, he concentrated
on landscapes, or portraits of working people.
“He was very English in his approach to painting. That is why
he was able to produce such copies of Gainsborough’s works
– and why he was inspired when he saw Hampstead in terms of
paint and canvases.”
And Mrs Kliot believes her husband’s character comes through
his paintings.
She says: “He uses subtle colours – he was a subtle person.
He was a kind and gentle person and this comes through the way he
uses his art work.”
• The Art of Alexander Kliot, The Chambers Gallery, 23 Long
Lane EC1A 9HL 020 7778 1600. 15 September to 21 October. |
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