Misha Pedan
© Misha Pedan at F-87 Exhibition. Photo: Roman Pyatkovka, 1987
About The Artist:
Misha Pedan (b. 1957, Kharkiv, lives in Stockholm, Sweden) appeared on the Kharkiv art scene in early 1980’s. He was one of the founders of the Gosprom Group in 1986 - 1987.
A skillful organizer, Pedan curated first grand-scale exhibitions of Kharkiv School photographers in 1987 and 1988 when Perestroika was just announced. Both shows were eventually closed by the Communist party authorities and the KGB, who were at loss in recognizing the new reality and found it difficult to adapt to the new rules for the old game. Pedan used all his organizational talent, wit, and connections to initiate a public discussion, which salvaged the first show from being immediately closed down and further arose the interest of visitors. It lasted for 10 days and saw an unprecedented attendance of about 2000 visitors daily. The 1988 exhibition lived for only 4 days and resulted in Pedan’s loosing his job. Misha Pedan tells the story.
The artist’s work of the time was recently published in Sweden, where he moved in early 1990’s. The End of La Belle Époque (Khimaira förlag, 2013) is a street photography project that portrayed the decay of the Soviet epoch before its collapse in 1991. The Metro (to be published) is a series of hand-colored images of passengers on Kharkiv underground trains - a portrait of Soviet people. Unlike his elder colleagues from the Vremya group, Pedan‘s mainly documentary aesthetics (as well as the aesthetics of some other Gosprom group member photographers) didn’t resort to strong uncompromised criticism. The criticism was dissolved in irony as there were no strong feelings left towards the once formidable and sinister Soviet state.
View Portfolio: The End of La Belle Epoque
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