Artist Maxim Kantor was able to capture the spectator attention on his canvases long before the sunset of the Soviet era. As a writer, thinker and philosopher, he became known to the reading public after the collapse of the USSR. Let us take a closer look at this outstanding person.
How did it all start? Biography Facts
Cantor Maxim Karlovich was born in 1957. The childhood of the future artist was spent in an intelligent Moscow family, whose social circle was composed of first-rate stars from the fields of literature, philology, philosophy, poetry, painting and music. Such a habitat could not but have a decisive influence when the young man faced the problem of choosing a life path.
Maxim Kantor received his professional education at the Moscow Polygraphic Institute, specializing in portrait painter. However, he categorically did not want to follow the path of socialist realism .
Freelance artist
In the most remote years of the "era of stagnation," Maxim Kantor attracted people who did not want to remain within the framework of official art. Already in the mid-eighties, a stable group of like-minded people with similar aesthetic and life principles formed around him. Thus, Maxim Kantor led the famous creative association of independent artists, the Red House. His works are successful and become famous far beyond the borders of the Soviet Union.
As a rule, they are characterized by bright unusual imagery, expressive texture and free layout of spaces, volumes, lines and planes. Exactly what is considered to be the artistic vanguard. In the late eighties, the artist was able to travel to continue his creative activities in Europe. His works are acquired and are on display at many galleries in the world. The artist Kantor is highly rated in their ratings. Maxim knows how to be interesting to the public both in Russia and abroad.
Literary work
No less successful Maxim Kantor turned out to be as a writer. He came to great literature in the era of the so-called "dashing nineties," when there was a radical change in the traditional Soviet way of life. And this despite the fact that the artist was engaged in literary work for a very long time, evenly distributing his creative energy between painting and the word of art. His first storybook was called House in the Wasteland, he was released in 1993.
Significant public outcry was caused in 2006 by Maxim Kantor’s novel "Drawing Book". This two-volume book, nominated for several prestigious literary prizes, addresses a number of significant problems of Russian life and raises deep philosophical questions of understanding reality.
No less interesting for the reader was the recently released novel "Red Light". In Russian theaters, Kantor’s plays “Case from Practice” and “Evening with the Baboon” are successfully staged.
Journalism and social activities
The maverick by nature, Maxim Kantor does not like to be attributed to any particular political groupings and aesthetic trends. At the same time, he cannot remain indifferent to the tensions and political turbulences that Russian society lives on. Maxim Kantor responds to many events and trends in public life with short and biting journalistic articles and essays.
A significant resonance among the thinking part of the population was caused by such publications as The Scoop and a Broom, The Slow Jaws of Democracy, and The Empire Inside Out. Maxim Kantor also pays great attention to the publication of his thoughts on social networks. In virtual space, turbulence zones constantly arise around the materials published by him.