PETER BELYI | 'PINOCCHIO'S LIBRARY'

June 19th - July 31st, 2008

Pinocchio’s Library is the title chosen by Peter Belyi for this solo show at Daneyal Mahmood Gallery. The theme of the exhibit is the academic genre of modellatura. Modellatura, which generally included an ideal vision of the future, was an extremely popular genre during the 1920s, an age of grand utopias. Not only did artists invest time and energy in creating models of future cities, but conceived their own artworks as indicators for potential technical projects. Peter Belyi’s “memorial modelling,” however, casts its gaze into the past, to the 1960s and 1970s, a period that saw the existence of one of the last utopian expressions of our era. The artist’s intent is to use this “new” genre of representation to search for one of the paradigms of humanity: hope in the future produced by disillusionment with the past.

The wooden puppet Pinocchio is the project’s protagonist, incarnating the figure of an architect obsessed with grandiose projects through which he hopes to transform the world, as well as an indissoluble deposit of utopian ideology present in each and every one of us. Like its hero, Pinocchio’s Library is made of wood, and its books cannot be opened. They are solid marker stones of useless knowledge, inaccessible and impossible to consult ever again. That which was once a source of knowledge has been transformed into an indissoluble deposit of utopian knowledge, a memorial to utopia itself. And yet Pinocchio’s Library is rife with the hopes of each one of us and above all, with the fact that one day the wooden puppet will be transformed into a real child.

Peter Belyi, DANGER ZONE @ Daneyal Mahmood Gallery, Whitehot Magazine, May, 2007

About Peter Belyi:

Peter Belyi is enchanted by the ruins of empires. He sings to his motherland, but it cannot be called nostalgia. It is rather a squaring of accounts with that which no longer exsists, but which continues to exsist in our memories. The artist belongs to the generation, which escaped at the last minute from under the wheels of the Soviet Socialist machine. His is the first free generation that has been well and truly scared.

Solo Exhibitions

2008

"Russian Povera" curated by Marat Guelman

Garden of Rubber Stones, St. Petersburg, Russia

Pinocchio’s Library, Daneyal Mahmood Gallery, New York

Pinocchio’s Library, Galleria Pack, Milan, Italy

2007

Unnecessary Alphabet, Anna Frants Gallery Space, New York

Danger Zone, Daneyal Mahmood Gallery, New York

Memorial Model-Making, Gisich Gallery, St Petersburg, Russia

Minute of Silence, Navicula Artis, St Petersburg, Russia

Lenproekt, State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg, Russia

2006

Circle 2, Gisich Gallery, St Petersburg, Russia

Climactic Zone Navicula Artis, St Petersburg, Russia

2005

SH854, Guelman Gallery, Moscow

My Neighbourhood, Moscow Biennale

White Project, Art Moscow

2004

Metaphysical Slide Tower, Udine City Museum, Udine, Italy

Dream of a Dictator, Art Moscow

2003

Head of the Artist, Gisich Gallery, St Petersburg, Russia

Dreams of a Concierge, Navicula Artis, St Petersburg, Russia

2002

Invasion, Extra, St Petersburg, Russia

Superprints, Che, St Petersburg, Russia

2001

City Heights, Gallery 27, Cork Street, London

1998

Peter’s Fountains, The Blythe Gallery, Manchester

1995

Exhibition Hall of Odense University, Odense, Denmark

1994

11 Portraits of Prince Charles, Institute of Contemporary Art, St Petersburg

Selected Group Exhibitions

2007 Celestial Mechanics, Pulkovo Observatory, St Petersburg , Russia

2007 Something About Power, 2 man show, 2nd Moscow Biennale, L Gallery, Moscow, Russia

2007 Border Territory, Mars Gallery, 2nd Moscow Biennale, Moscow, Russia

2007 Architecture Ad Marginum, State Russian Museum, St Petersburg, Russia

2006 Collage in Russia, Russian State Museum, St Petersburg

2006 Crescendo, Russian State Museum, St Petersburg

2004 Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy, London

2004 Art Moscow, Central Hall of Artists, Moscow

2003 ‘Dream of the Dictator’, Art Manezh, Manezh, Moscow

2003 Lorgues Print Festival, Lorgues, France

2003 ‘Dream of Triton’, Anna Akhmatova Museum, St Petersburg

2003 Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy, London

2003 National Print Exhibition, The Mall Galleries, London

2002 Discerning Eye, The Mall Galleries, London

2002 Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy, London

2002 Art Futures 2002, Contemporary Art Society, London

2002 National Print Exhibition, The Mall Galleries, London

2001 Discerning Eye, The Mall Galleries, London

2001 Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy, London

2001 National Print Exhibition, The Mall Galleries, London

5th Open Print Exhibition, Royal West of England Academy, Bristol

2000 National Print Exhibition, The Mall Galleries, London (publicity materials)

1999 Discerning Eye, The Mall Galleries, London

1999 National Print Exhibition, The Mall Galleries, London (catalogue cover)

The End of Style, City Museum, St Petersburg

1997 Paper Theatre III, Bookcamera or The Book & The Elements, St Petersburg

1996 National Print Exhibition, The Mall Galleries, London

1992-1994 ‘Time of Transition’ travelling exhibition in England and Wales

Collections

The Margulies Collection-permanent collection - Miami, USA

Victoria & Albert Museum – permanent collection – London, UK

Ashmolean Museum – RE Diploma collection – Cambridge, UK

Murmansk Art Museum – permanent collection – Murmansk, Russia

Awards

Murmansk Art Museum – Outstanding Printmaking Award 2006

Novosibirsk Print Biennale - Outstanding Printmaking Award 2005

National Print Exhibition (UK) - Birgit Skiold Prize 2003

National Print Exhibition (UK) - Gavin Graham Gallery Award 2002

St Petersburg Print Biennale - Outstanding Printmaking Award- 2001

National Print Exhibition (UK) - Galleries Magazine Award 2000