1964
Pressed wood panel (orgalit), chalk ground (leukos), polyvinylacetate tempera, lacquer
125 x 90

The artist has depicted himself and members of his family – Nina Ivanovna Zhilinskaya (sculptor), his children Dmitry and Olga. The artist was drawn not so much to the subject as to a task of plastic nature that went beyond the bounds of Socialist Realist doctrine – from a complex compositional construction to the forgotten technique of tempera painting. The figures in the foreground have been drawn from below while the middle ground behind them has been drawn from above. Such a complex use of perspective and the adjustments made for the composition place the artist on a par with the best representatives of the Classical Academic school. One may see tribute paid to the painting of the 1960s in the local harshness of contrasting open tones in the composition, which is not devoid of a certain poster-like characterization. In this work Zhilinsky still has not used the metaphor which will in future be typical of him, though in the composition we do see a certain special feature that is not characteristic of Soviet genre scenes. The artist looks straight at nature, gazing intently and objectively; moreover, he avoids immodest analysis of the inner world of what he is depicting. Despite the fact that the compositional structure of this family group is built as a circle, where each member is turned facing the others, we sense separateness, a localization of the personages, which are seemingly locked in on themselves. In this Zhilinsky reveals his personal signature. This type of artistic solution not only underlines the importance of each separate personality but also reveals a drama characteristic for the 20th century – the dissociation even of people close to one another, the way contacts are torn apart and the torturous loneliness of modern man.

at 10, Krymsky Val, Hall 36