Alexander Chursin (b. 1988) is a Krasnodar painter who works in oil in the technique of the old masters and brings it into an unmistakably contemporary setting. He became known for grand-manner portraits of American rappers modelled on seventeenth-century Dutch painting. The Don Foundation collection holds 6 works, all of them paintings on canvas. Estimates range from 80 000 to 140 000 ₽. Below is what is known about the artist and what the collection holds.
Alexander Chursin was born in 1988 in Krasnodar. In 2012 he graduated from the Art and Industry Academy of the Krasnodar State University of Culture and Arts; he has belonged to the Creative Union of Artists of Russia since 2009 and held a scholarship from the Government of the Russian Federation – for two years running, according to the Krasnodar press. His work rests on the technique of the old masters: the devices and expressive means of a classical canvas, which he keeps within a postmodern frame of reference, painting present-day figures in the language of an older art. He prepares everything by hand and uses nothing ready-made: he builds the stretcher, stretches the canvas and primes it himself.
All the Chursin works here are paintings in oil on canvas, in the painting section. They are dated 2012–2014 and 2022, and at the time of writing they are “Голландский натюрморт” (Dutch Still Life), “Портрет Четы WALLACE. Notorious B.I.G и Faith Evans” (Portrait of the WALLACE Couple), “Парадный портрет MF Doom Эпохи Классицизма” (A State Portrait of MF Doom in the Age of Classicism), the diptych “Сцены насилия” (Scenes of Violence), “Призраки дома моих родителей” (Ghosts of My Parents’ House) and “Железный век” (The Iron Age). The canvases measure 50 × 60.6, 70 × 90, 81.5 × 65.5, 100 × 67 and 86 × 130 cm; the diptych is in two parts. These are original works and not reproductions: each lot record states the artist, year and medium. We give no exhibition history for these particular canvases: we hold no confirmed evidence that they have been shown anywhere. The adjoining catalogue section is contemporary art.
The artist became known through ONLY FOR KINGS, a series of grand-manner portraits of American rappers done with the means of the old masters: Chursin worked from seventeenth-century Dutch realism and set some of the canvases in gilded carved frames. His sitters include Notorious B.I.G. and Faith Evans, MF DOOM, Earl Sweatshirt, Ice Cube, and B-Real of Cypress Hill; the series went on view at Tipografiya in Krasnodar in 2015 and at the MAKARONKA art centre. In 2017 the F. A. Kovalenko Krasnodar Regional Art Museum presented his solo exhibition Renovatio – a three-part installation in which oil painting is joined to imagery from the film industry and to light and sound effects, built on the parable of the prodigal son and on the crucifixion in the idiom of the Renaissance. In 2018 “Consonants. The Alphabet of the 1990s”, about the culture of the Russian nineties, travelled to MAKARONKA and the Museum of Moscow. The Calvert Journal and other outlets in Russia and abroad have written about him, and in 2020 Filipp Berezin made a short documentary about the artist, “Chursin”.
The Don Foundation is based in Rostov-on-Don and holds its sales online. The guide range for the Chursin works in the collection is from 80 000 to 140 000 ₽; the final price is settled in the bidding. The lots are in the catalogue and under painting, the schedule of forthcoming sales is on the auctions page, and registration, payment and handover are explained under buy a painting. If you own a work by the artist and are considering a sale, start with sell a painting: a preliminary valuation needs photographs, dimensions, the medium and whatever is known about the history of the piece. The full list of names in the collection is under artists. Viewing can be arranged in advance.
