The work appeared in 1962 at an exhibition dedicated to the 30th anniversary of the Moscow Union of Artists. The exposition was visited by N. S. Khrushchev and criticized a number of works by young authors, which caused their wide discussion in the press. PF Nikonov’s painting “Geologists” was in the center of discussions. She did not exhibit until 1982.
The departure from natural authenticity, the lack of narrative and poster straightness in the interpretation of the depicted event, the search for emotional expressiveness of form – all this seemed to be a provocative experiment against the background of official Soviet painting. In the art of the 1930s and 1950s, the theme of labor embodied an optimistic faith in building a new society.
The picture of P. F. Nikonov suggested controversial reflections. Her characters seem to be lonely, lost among the endless sands of the desert, which creates an alarming and dramatic tone of the emotional structure of the work.
The planar solution of the spatial composition, the silhouette interpretation of the figures, the solidity of the colors give the picture the character of a fresco. Its symbolic meaning goes beyond the plot depicted. The work turned out to be one of the peaks in the history of “severe style”.
(2 votes, average: 3.00 out of 5)