NYAB Event - Kaletski “Out of the Blue”

Kaletski “Out of the Blue”

Anna Zorina

This event has ended.

Anna Zorina Gallery presents Out of the Blue featuring the latest series of paintings by Kaletski. The exhibition introduces the artist’s experimental use of denim as a platform for a new artistic direction. The initial tone of the fabric elevates specific themes commonly associated with the color blue such as sadness and serenity while imbuing humor and sensuality.

Kaletski paints upon a material with an established identity and elaborates on these connotations by integrating his own imagery. Popularized by movie stars and romanticism of the Wild West, jeans quickly became an international sensation due to the alluring rebellious spirit with which the garment became synonymous. Denim remains as a fashion statement representing national values of freedom and individuality effectively manifesting the cloth’s inherent adaptability to each owner. In time, denim conforms to the body with specific distressing and fading. Kaletski interacts with this distinctive character though incorporating his spontaneous and expressive figures. The artist found the fabric to offer a strong and versatile surface that further commanded an expansion of the artist’s technical repertoire through exploratory use of unconventional materials such as zippers, seams and rivets. Kaletski discovered an expansive creative potential in jeans that influenced representations of American iconography.

Today, denim constitutes the casual wear worn throughout the entire spectrum of rich and poor. However, when the artist lived in his native Soviet Russia, jeans sparked a costly demand, obtained only on the black market. The apparel boldly demonstrated a sense of individualism that opposed Communist Party ideology. Upon arriving in the United States, the artist encountered the true force behind the American cultural phenomenon reaffirming Regis Debray’s sentiment that “There is more power in blue jeans and rock and roll than the entire Red Army.” Kaletski came to view jeans as a democratizing wardrobe staple that is best matched with vital creative spirit.

Kaletski has works represented in international public and private collections including the Caldic Collection in the Netherlands, the Claryville Art Center in New York, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Belarus, the Meeschaert Collection in France and the Lynda and Stewart Resnick Collection in California.

Media

• Painting

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