Sergey Sapozhnikov is a photographer and artist from Rostov-on-Don. He works with staged photography: he builds a scene out of found materials, sets the lighting and photographs it whole. The Don Foundation collection holds 1 work by the artist: “The Drama Machine” of 2016. The price is 83 000 $. The work comes from the project of the same name, shown in 2016 by the Don Foundation itself together with Gazprombank Private Banking.
Sergey Anatolyevich Sapozhnikov was born in 1984 in Rostov-on-Don. He came to art from street graffiti, working with photography at the same time. From 2001 to 2008 he studied at the faculty of psychology of Rostov State University, now Southern Federal University, and in 2009 he completed the New Artistic Strategies course at the Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) in Moscow. In 2014 the Poldi Pezzoli Museum in Milan held his solo exhibition “Total Picture”, curated by Francesco Bonami and co-organised by the V–A–C Foundation; it was the artist’s debut in Italy and his first show in a classical museum. From 28 January to 29 March 2020 the West Wing of the New Tretyakov Gallery on Krymsky Val presented the solo exhibition “Sergey Sapozhnikov”, in which works of 2013–2018 were assembled into a single installation.
The Don Foundation collection holds 1 work by Sergey Sapozhnikov: “The Drama Machine” of 2016, a photograph. It carries the same title as the artist’s 2016 project and comes from it. That project was organised by the Don Foundation – the same organisation whose collection now holds the work, so the piece has returned to where its exhibition history began. The exhibition history of the project itself is confirmed by an independent institutional source; the provenance of this particular print, its printing details and its condition are checked against the work itself and its accompanying documentation, and viewing can be arranged in advance. The lot record states the artist, title, year and technique. The adjacent catalogue section is contemporary art.
“The Drama Machine” was on view from 25 April to 1 June 2016 at the 16th LINE gallery; the project was curated by Irene Calderoni and organised by the Don Foundation together with Gazprombank Private Banking. Its starting point was the Rostov Academic Gorky Drama Theatre, a constructivist landmark designed in 1930 by the architects Vladimir Shchuko and Vladimir Gelfreikh in the shape of a tractor. The dialogue with constructivism runs through the artist’s work: the announcement of his 2020 solo exhibition at the New Tretyakov Gallery on the Kultura.RF portal spoke of an interpenetration of constructivist ideas and avant-garde practices in photography and theatre. Part of the project entered the corporate collection of Gazprombank, and the project itself was published as a book.
The same approach recurs from series to series: a temporary construction of found materials, arranged lighting, invited professional dancers inside it, and then the whole scene photographed at once. The Garage Museum of Contemporary Art describes the result as a transfer of baroque devices into photography: flatness of the image, an interplay of colour textures, dynamism of the composition. Hence the recognisable density of the frame, with contrasting light, saturated colour and many details working at the same time. His works are held by the State Tretyakov Gallery, the Moscow Museum of Modern Art and the Poldi Pezzoli Museum in Milan, as well as by the corporate collection of Gazprombank; in 2018 he was included in the 49ART rating of Russian contemporary artists under fifty, and he took part in a V–A–C Foundation programme at the Whitechapel Gallery in London.
The Don Foundation auction house is based in Rostov-on-Don and holds its sales online on the BidSpirit platform. The price of the work is given on its page in the catalogue: 83 000 $; at auction the final price is set by bidding. The schedule of forthcoming sales is on the auctions page, registration, bidding and payment are explained under buy a painting, and the full list of the collection’s artists is under artists. If you own a work by Sergey Sapozhnikov or by another contemporary artist and are considering a sale, the consignment terms, the valuation procedure and the commission are set out under sell a painting.
