The Art of Nikolai Estis in the Soviet Abstract Painting of 1950s–1980s

Abstract

The work of the abstract artist Nikolai Estis is considered for the first time in the context of the Soviet version of abstract expressionism, which began to form during the Khrushchev thaw. The author analyzes the conditions, causes and sources that influenced the emergence of interest in abstractionism among a number of Soviet artists in the late 1950s, as well as the features of the forming of the abstract manner of Nikolai Estis. For the first time, a comparative analysis of the conceptual foundations and solutions of the works of Estis and other representatives of Soviet abstract expressionism such as Vladimir Nemukhin, Lidia Masterkova, Lev Kropivnitsky, Evgeny Mikhnov-Voitenko is carried out. The work of Estis is also compared with the works of Jackson Pollock that are consonant with him. The process of formation of Nikolai Estis as an abstract artist was significantly different from the folding of the abstract manner of his older contemporaries. Estis went to abstract painting gradually and wrote the first completely abstract works already in the 1970s. Accordingly, the meanings of abstract art associated with the period of the Khrushchev thaw affected his painting only partially. The works of Estis of the 1970s are the closest to the canvases of Vladimir Nemukhin and Lev Kropivnitsky of the 1950s and 1960s, but they also have significant differences. In the 1980s, the artist’s style changed and became closer to some of the early works of Yevgeny Mikhnov-Voitenko and the paintings of Jackson Pollock. At the same time, the works of the Moscow abstract artist remain original. The ideas of the work of Estis and the Soviet artists under consideration are in many ways close. They are associated with an attempt to escape from the everyday point of view and display the hidden device of reality. The study shows that the work of Nikolai Estis fits into the general line of development of the Soviet version of abstract expressionism. At the same time, in line with this direction, the painter managed to develop an individual manner.