Close
Back to Exhibitions

Dogs do (not) live long

2 December 2021 – 30 June 2022
сцена/szena gallery, Moscow, Russia

Riding a ‘Kopeika’ Car

Difficult times. The situation with commissions is bad – either there are none, or those that come the commissioner doesn’t like and doesn’t take…

But then this funny incident happens. In the summer, a wonderful gallery wrote that they had been commissioned a sculpture. They wrote that the commission was strange, though.

— Who’s the commissioner?

— Unknown…but it is Our commissioner.

— And what does this mysterious commissioner of yours want?

“A retarded boy on a ‘kopeika’ car,” was the gallery’s answer…

— Meaning?

— He wants a sculpture with this title.

There was a glimpse of a silly image of a rabbit with squinted eyes riding on a giant coin.

— And what else does he want? Is this a joke?

— It is for you to decide but you are not restricted in materials, size or interpretation of the subject.

— I am?? Offer it to Tolya Osmolovsky or better to Anton Nikolaev, he is good at naïve art and he will carve you anything, a genius on an oak tree or a retard on a rouble…

— No, Oleg, the commissioner wants it to be you to make this sculpture, — the gallery wrote.  

I wondered what isolation does to people, they can’t even make funny jokes… — I decided so and forgot about it.

A month later, we had such a good time with a friend in ‘Chito-Ra’ on Nizhny Susalny lane that we had to go home arm in arm, the road turned out to be long and twisty…and I told him about the ‘commission’. My giggly friend laughed all the way and said in all kinds of ways: this is Faust – a retarded boy wants a ‘kopeika’ car, a retarded boy sat on the hood, a retarded boy wants to go to Tambov etc. At home, he saw an old photo of the ‘Mad Dog’ performance on the wall and suddenly said, “Here he is, a retarded boy on a ‘kopeika’ car.” I sobered up in a blink. That is what it meant!!!

— And you haven’t understood it?

— Noooo, damn… A retarded boy on a ‘kopeika’ car” How could I understand that he meant me??

— There, that is what you need, and you need to make it! — my friend said when he was leaving, — You are an artist, do the commission!! And you will understand who you are and if you are not a fool, you will understand who this Commissioner is.

To cut the long story short, I carved this image on a board to spite the Commissioner, responded to a joke with a joke. In the end, neither the gallery, nor the Commissioner, nor the Artist obtained the desired result. So, we are doing an exhibition of one work.

Oleg Kulik

exhibitions
Добросердечные земляничные ухмылки
24 May 2024 – 19 August 2024
сцена/szena gallery, Moscow, Russia
This has not happened yet, but here it is again
2 April 2024 – 17 May 2024
сцена/szena gallery, Moscow, Russia