Konstantin Chmutin

Flight of the Elephant Garlic

2007

Konstantin Chmutin was born in Leningrad, where he pursued his studies at the Highest School of Civil Engineering. He is a member of the Saint Petersburg Artists Association in Russia and a Fellow Member of the Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers, London. His mezzotints have been exhibited in many solo shows in the United States, Poland, Russia and Scotland and have been accepted in numerous international print competitions where they have won more than ten awards. His works are included in more than 20 public collections around the world, ranging from Stanford University, to the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. Most of Chmutin's mezzotints are tiny, and his subjects are the simplest of everyday objects: an egg, seashell, carrot, potatoes. There is an intense intellectualism throughout and a dramatic approach to the subject. An egg is balanced on the very edge of a table in a preposterously contrived fashion that nonetheless rivets our attention with its equilibrium. Another egg stands on its crushed end, alluding perhaps to the old tale of how Christopher Columbus demonstrated to the Spanish intellectuals that it was not impossible to stand an egg on its tip. As in the historical Mannerism of Tintoretto and El Greco, or more appropriately of Giuseppe Arcimboldi's fantasy portraits made of fruit, vegetables, and flowers, there are two modes in Chmutin's mezzotints, the technical ingenuities of the style and the medium itself. There is a complex psychology that strains the form with disproportion and disturbed balance. In their disjointed and unexpected ways, Chmutin's objects exploit ambiguities and complexities to create a very physical and mysterious visual poetry.- George Bumgardner