Mikhnov-Voitenko Evgeny

Evgeny Mikhnov-Voitenko — legendary abstract artist, representative of Leningrad nonconformism.

Born in Kherson, in 1939 moved to Leningrad. During the war he was evacuated to Semipalatinsk, then returned to the city on Neva River. He studied at the Scandinavian department of the Pedagogical Institute of Foreign Languages ​​(1951-1954), in the workshop of N. Akimov at the Theater Institute (1954-1958). He worked as a designer at the Leningrad Art Fund. The leader of the older generation of the Leningrad underground, was friends with L. Aronzon, A. Knaifel, B. Ponizovsky. Since 1956, he became interested in abstract painting. He was one of the first artist who began to work in an abstract-expressionist manner.

In 1976 he took part in the first post-war exhibition of non-objective art “Painting. Graphic arts. Object" in the Leningrad DK im. Ordzhonikidze. Since 1981 - Member of the Association of Experimental Fine Arts.

E. Mikhnov-Voitenko created an original aesthetics of spontaneous painting, inventing technical possibilities for the emergence of an image uncontrolled by the artist. I used a movable table that changes the angle of inclination and, accordingly, the trajectory of the spreading paint. Worked with wet cardboard, giving unpredictable stains; applied paint with large brushes (each jar of paint had its own brush), formed the composition with a palette knife and spatula. Unlike American abstract expressionism, which arose under the influence of surrealism, psychoanalysis, and studies of archaic mythologies, Mikhnov-Voitenko's painting was formed in a spiritual and religious quest. He is rightfully considered one of the brightest Russian nonconformist artists of the 20th century.

Collections

State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg Museum of Nonconformist Art, St. Petersburg New Museum of Modern Art, St. Petersburg St. Petersburg State Museum of Theatrical and Musical Art, St. Petersburg Museum of Contemporary Art Art4.Ru, Moscow Georges Pompidou National Center for Art and Culture, Paris Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection, Rutgers University Zimmerli Museum, New Brunswick, NJ, USA