ANDREI MOLODKIN | 'OIL EVOLUTION'

February 26th - April 11th, 2009

Daneyal Mahmood Gallery is very pleased to present Oil Evolution by Andrei Molodkin - commemorating the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birth. While Molodkin’s work is known for questioning the role of oil in Western democracies; and exploring the troubling intersection between art and money – Oil Evolution uses oil as a liquid record of the earth’s fossil history to reconstruct the descent of man.

Charles Darwin’s model of evolution comes together in a three-part installation featuring Primate, Australopithecine and Homo sapien skulls negatively cast in acrylic and joined by a series of interconnected tubes circulating crude oil. Here it is not DNA that is the great signifier, that which transmits the virtues of one generation to the next, but oil – the new symbol of a universalized identity.

“Man may be excused for feeling some pride at having risen, though not through his own exertions, to the very summit of the organic scale; and the fact of his having thus risen, instead of having been aboriginally placed there, may give him hope for a still higher destiny in the distant future…We must, however, acknowledge, as it seems to me, that man with all his noble qualities, with sympathy which feels for the most debased, with benevolence which extends not only to other men but to the humblest living creature, with his god-like intellect which has penetrated into the movements and constitution of the solar system - with all these exalted powers - Man still bears in his bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin.”

(Charles Darwin)

The Indepedent, "Till death do us sculpt: Russian to render human bodies into art materials"

Artdaily.org, Jan 2009, Exhibition at Bass Museum Features Works by Today's Leading Russian Artists

Miami New Times, Jan 2009, Art Basel to the Future

Financial Times, 2008, "Bittersweet modern Russian art" (Jackie Wullschlager)

Coral Gables Gazette, Dec 2008, Art Basel Reveals New Trends

Ivy Paris News, Nov 2008, Traumaturgical Trendencies on Parade at Showoff

Artforum, September 2007, "Black Square" (Margarita Tupitsyn)

Bon International, no.12, Fall 2007,"Sex,Drugs and Oil" (Anna Sansom)

Harper's Bazar, August 2007 (Maria Sidelnikova)

National Geographic, August 2007 (Kiril Samursky)

Kunst 21, no.20,June-July 2007 (René G. Siemer)

Light, no.29, July 2007 (Mina Ignatova)

Terminal, no.31, April-May 2007, "The Persian Gulf Emirates" (Rachel Sukman)

Menu, April 2007,"Oil exchanged to Eternity" (Azamat Tseboev)

Art Actuel, no.49, March-April 2007, "Art autour de l'or noir" (Jean Pierre Frimbois)

Art Actuel, no.48, January-February 2007, "Cold War II" (Jean Pierre Frimbois and Marc Héneau)

The Village Voice, 30 November 2006, "Graphic Marvels" (R.C. Baker)

The Village Voice, 22-28 November 2006, "Art Imitates Death" (Ken Switzer)

Chelsea Now, Volume Number 1 Issue Number 7 / November 10 - 16, 2006

Monster Children, no.13 Nov. 2006 "Cold War II" (Campbell Milligan)

C Magazine, Autumn 2006, "Oil for Art's Sake" (Victor Tupitsyn)

Mixte, no.42, October-November 2006, "Aux Pays de l'or Noir" (Anna Sansom)

Guardian Unlimited, Feb.23 , 2006 "Crude Art" (Paul Arendt)

BBC News, February 17, 2006, Artmargins, February 2006, "Erotics of Crude Oil" (Yulia Tikhonova)

Spoon, January-February 2006, "Black Christmas" (Anna Sansom)

The Village Voice, no.52, 28 December 2005-3 January 2006, "Andrei Molodkin" (R.C. Baker)

It's Rouge, no.3, July 2004, "Free Russian Radicals" (Patrice Fuma Courtis)

The New York Times, 5 September 2003, "Art Listings" (Ken Johnson)

Artforum, September 2003, "Critic's Picks" (Nicole Rudick) Art Actuel, "Andrei Molodkin, Rough Art", Issue #49 March/April 2007

Moscow biennale attracts new generation of Russian collectors, BBJ.hu, Mar. 9, 2007

"Best in Show", Village Voice, Nov. 30, 2006

Chelsea Now, Volume Number 1 Issue Number 7 / November 10 - 16, 2006

Sculpture Magazine, September, 2006

C Magazine, Oct. 2006 (Victor Tupitsyn)

Monster Children, Oct. 2006 (Campbell Milligan)

Tracks, Arte Television , September 21, 2006

Guardian Unlimited, Feb.23 , 2006 (Paul Arendt)

The Ticket , BBC World Service , Feb.18, 2006 (Mark Coles)

BBC News, February 17, 2006

Artmargins, 2006 (Yulia Tikhonova)

Spoon, Jan.-Feb. 2006 (Anna Sansom)

The Village Voice, Vol.52 , Dec.28, 2005 - Jan.3, 2006 (Baker)

Village Voice, January 3rd, 2006

Spoon, January, 2006

Umbigo, Summer 2006

NY Times, Sept. 5 2003 (Ken Johnson)

Artforum.com. Sept. 2003 (Nicole Rudick)

It’s Rouge, #3

About Andrei Molodkin:

Former Russian soldier & conceptual artist, Andrei Molodkin critically addresses contemporary cultural and geological issues through his work. Criticism of the symbolic order is the main themeas Andrei uses his art to rework popular ideas of culture. He is a master draftsman and sculptor working with two untraditional and non-artistic materials; the ballpoint pen and crude oil.

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2009

Liquid Modernity, Orel Art UK, London

Oil evolution, Daneyal Mahmood Gallery, New York

2008

Liquid Black After Liquid Sky, Pack Gallery, Milan

Guts à la russe, Orel Art Gallery, Paris

Touchy art (Tachi's art), Nina Lumer Gallery, Milan

2007

G8, Kashya Hildebrand Gallery, Zurich

Sweet Crude American Dream, Daneyal Mahmood Gallery, New York

2006

Cold War II, Orel Art Gallery, Paris

Empire at War, Daneyal Mahmood Gallery, New York

Sweet Crude Eternity, Kashya Hildebrand Gallery, Zurich

2005

Sweet Crude Eternity, Kashya Hildebrand Gallery, New York

2004

Notre Patrimoine, European Parliament, Brussels

2003

Love Copyright, Orel Art Presenta Gallery, Paris

Love Copyright, Kashya Hildebrand Gallery, New York

2002

Polius, Chapelle Saint-Louis de la Salpêtrière, Orel Art Presenta Gallery, Paris

Carré Noir Gallery, Paris

2001

Novonovosibirsk, The Marble Palace, The State Russian Museum, St Petersburg

Blue Dream, Freud’s Dream Museum, St Petersburg

1999

Novonovosibirsk, Chapelle Saint-Louis de la Salpêtrière, Paris

GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2009

Venice Biennial, Russian Pavilion, Venice, Italy

2008

Russian Dream, Bass Museum, Miami

2007

East/West, Orel Art Gallery, Paris

Moscow World Fine Art Fair, Orel Art Gallery, Moscow

Art Moscow, Orel Art Gallery, Moscow

Paper Trails- New Adventures in Drawing, VI Gallery, Denmark.

DIFC Gulf Art Fair, Kashya Hildebrand Gallery, Dubai

Art Paris Abu Dhabi, Orel Art Gallery, Abu Dhabi, EAU

Art Paris, Orel Art Gallery, Paris

Bushels, Bundles and Barrels, Superfund, New York

2006

Petrodollar, Pierogi and Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, Miami

The Kiss, Daneyal Mahmood Gallery, Scope, Miami

Modus R, Art Basel Miami Beach, Miami

Madame Butterfly, Priska Pasquer Gallery, Paris Photo, Paris

God is Great, Guelman Gallery, Art Moscow, Moscow

Life After Death, Orel Art Gallery, Art Moscow, Moscow

Art Attack! (Russian contemporary art), Orel Art Gallery, Paris

2005

Black Heart, Orel Art Gallery, Paris

Liquid Madonna, Orel Art Gallery, FIAC, Paris

Scope, Orel Art Gallery, London

Art Moscow, Orel Art Gallery, Moscow

2004

Trash Resources, Kashya Hildebrand Gallery, New York

Notre Patrimoine, European Parliament, Brussels

Playing For Oil, Flash Art Milan, Orel Art Gallery, Milan

Art Brussels, Orel Art Gallery, Brussels

Art Moscow, Orel Art Gallery, Moscow

2003

Love Copyright, Art Moscow, Orel Art Gallery, Moscow

Underground City, Labin, Croatia

New Beginning of Contemporary Art of Moscow, Düsseldorf, Germany

2002

Polus, Photobiennale 2002, Moscow House of Photography, Moscow

Body as Sculpture, Carré Noir Gallery, Paris Photo, Paris

Biesterfeld Art Management, St. Moritz, Switzerland

2001

Novonovosibirsk, The State Russian Museum, St Petersburg

New Academy, Saint Petersburg

Private Art Gallery, Saint Petersburg

Freud's Dream Museum, St Petersburg

Novonovosibirsk, Schusev State Museum of Architecture, Moscow

Paris Photo Fair 2001, Carrousel du Louvre, Carré Noir Gallery, Paris

Moscow House of Photography, Moscow

2000

Photobiennale 2000, Moscow House of Photography, Moscow

Novonovosibirsk, Instrumenta, Novy Manezh, State Duma, Moscow

Paris Photo Fair 2000, Louvre Carrousel, Carré Noir Gallery, Paris

1999

Art Manege 99, Yakut Gallery, Moscow

COLLECTIONS

The State Russian Museum, St Petersburg

Freud's Dream Museum, St Petersburg

Schusev State Museum of Architecture, Moscow

European and American private collections