Alexey Titarenko

Alexey (Aleksey, Alexis, Alexei) Viktorovich Titarenko (born November 25, 1962; Russian: Алексей Викторович Титаренко) is a Soviet Union-born American photographer and artist. He lives and works in New York City.[1][2][3]

Titarenko's Saint Petersburg, 1992, from City of Shadows series.

Alexey Titarenko
Алексей Титаренко
Born
Alexey Viktorovich Titarenko

(1962-11-25) November 25, 1962
Leningrad, Soviet Union
NationalityAmerican
Known forPhotography

Biography

Titarenko was born in Leningrad, USSR, now Saint Petersburg, Russia. His mother survived the Siege of Leningrad and later became a mathematician. His father was born at the Gulag camp Karlag in Kazakhstan, near Karaganda where his parents were deported to by bolsheviks from Ukraine during collectivization. He later became a coal mining engineer in his home town Karaganda, Kazakhstan. They met each other as students of Leningrad University.[4][5] At age 15, Alexey Titarenko became the youngest member of the independent photo club Zerkalo (Mirror).[6] He went on to graduate with honors from the Department of Cinematic and Photographic Art at Leningrad's Institute of Culture.[7][8]

Influenced by the Russian avant-garde works of Kazimir Malevich, Alexander Rodchenko and the Dada art movement (from the early 20th century), his series of collages, photomontages and images created by superposing several negatives, Nomenklatura of Signs (first exhibited in 1988, in Leningrad, and later same year, in Drouart gallery, Paris, France) is a commentary on the Communist regime as an oppressive system that converts citizens into mere signs.[9][10][11][12] In 1989, Nomenklatura of Signs was included in Photostroika, a major show of new Soviet photography that toured the US.[13][14]

During and after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991–1992, he produced several series of photographs about the human condition of ordinary people living on its territory and the suffering they endured then and throughout the twentieth century. To illustrate links between the present and the past, he created metaphors by introducing long exposure and intentional camera movement into street photography.[15][16][17] Sources have noted that his most important innovation is the way he uses long exposure.[18][19][20][21] John Bailey, in his essay about Garry Winogrand and Titarenko, mentioned that one of the obstacles that he surmounted successfully was being too visible himself and, as a consequence, people's possible reaction to his presence altering the authenticity of the image.[22] [23][24]

Titarenko's best-known series from this period is City of Shadows (which is also a title of his autobiographical novel),[25] whose urban landscapes reiterate the Odesa Steps (also known as the Primorsky or Potemkin Stairs) scene from Sergei Eisenstein's film The Battleship Potemkin.[26] Inspired by the music of Dmitri Shostakovich and the novels of Fyodor Dostoevsky, Titarenko also translated Dostoevsky's vision of the Russian soul into sometimes poetic, sometimes dramatic pictures of his native city, Saint Petersburg. Intitled "Les Quatres Mouvements de Saint Petersbourg" by French art historian, writer and curator Gabriel Bauret, these photographs were exhibited, as Titarenko's solo show curated by Gabriel Bauret, at the Rencontres d'Arles 2002 in Reattu Museum (Arles, France).[19][27][28][29]

Along with Alexander Sokurov's 2002 film Russian Ark, the City of Shadows exhibition (which now included photographs from the mid and late 1990s inspired by Dostoevsky's novels) was a part of the program celebrating the 300th anniversary of St. Petersburg at the 2003 Clifford Symposium, in Middlebury, VT: What Became of Peter's Dream? Petersburg in History and Arts[30] The Russian Ark and the City of Shadows have one similarity: both are based on the experimental innovation: Alexander Sokurov using a single, very long – 96 minutes sequence shot and Titarenko's several minutes long exposure for some of his photographs.[31][32]

In his photographs from Venice, mostly taken between 2001 and 2008, Titarenko uses "... a highly stylized technic that he put deftly in a service of strongly determined vision."[8] Moreover, "Venice also offers him a reminiscence of Saint Petersburg, similar to a recollection found in the work of Marcel Proust, who, in Albertine disparue (The Fugitive), recounts during his Venetian sojourn that he cannot resist comparisons to Combray."[33] Venice, Italy creates a counterbalance, a point of comparison with Venice of the North where he was born - Saint Petersburg.[34][35] In Titarenko's photographs, like in Proust's writings, " ... what matters is less the scrupulous description of reality than a particular vision it renders."[33]

Titarenko creates his prints in a darkroom. Critics have called him a master of the darkroom technique.[16][36][1] Selective bleaching and toning (often done by brush) add depth to his palette of grays. Like Man Ray and Maurice Tabard, Titarenko uses so-called pseudo-solarization, but unlike his predecessors, he exposes the print to light during the developing process mostly at the edges and in a subtle way that lowers the contrast and creates a very particular kind of gray silver 'veil'. In order to emphasize the dramatic aspects of the City of Shadows series, he sometimes combines the Sabattier effect with adjacency effect created during development, called the Mackie line.[37]

Through interviews, lectures, books, curated exhibitions and two documentaries by French-German TV channel Arte (2004, 2005), Titarenko describes a particular vision of an artist and of Art, close to that of Marcel Proust, linked to literature, poetry and classical music (especially that of Dmitri Shostakovich), placing himself far apart from contemporary tendencies developing particularly in Moscow.[38]

A 2011 exhibition of 15 gelatin silver prints from his Havana, Cuba series (2003-2006) in the J. Paul Getty Museum group show, A Revolutionary Project: Cuba from Walker Evans to Now, linked Titarenko's approach to street photography in contemporary Havana to that of Walker Evans in 1933, by the subjects he photographed and aspects of his printing.[39][40][41]

Titarenko became a naturalized United States citizen in 2011; and lives and works in New York City as an artist, photographer, and printer.[1][42][43]

His work in New York continues today. "Using long exposure and darkroom technique, his goal is still to create a print that expresses his experience when creating the image ... paint with symbols, lifting them to the surface from the murk of reality. It should not be surprising, then, that Titarenko's vision of New York resonates with the work of Alvin Langdon Coburn and Alfred Stieglitz - men who strived to embody the dynamism of the city and its people in photographs at the turn of the twentieth century. As Titarenko's relationship with New York grows and changes, so too will the photographs he creates. It is the nature of his working methods."[16][2]

Publications

Publications by Titarenko
  • The Photographs from the Cycle Black and White Magic of St. Petersburg. Soros Center for Contemporary Art / Open Society Institute, St Petersburg, 1997. With an essay in Russian and English by Georgy Golenky, Senior Research Curator at the Russian State Museum, St.Peterburg.[n 1]
  • Alexei Titarenko. Toulouse, France: Galerie Municipale de Château d'Eau, 2000. ISBN 2-913241-20-4.
  • City of Shadows. Saint Petersburg, Russia: Art-Tema, 2001. ISBN 5-94258-005-7.
  • Alexey Titarenko, Photographs. Washington D.C.: Nailya Alexander, 2003. ISBN 0-9743991-0-8.
  • The City is a Novel. Bologna, Italy: Damiani, 2015. ISBN 978-88-6208-414-7.
  • Nomenklatura of Signs. Bologna, Italy: Damiani, 2020. ISBN 978-88-6208-699-8.

Publication with contributions by Titarenko

Exhibitions
  • Experiences photographiques russes, Month of Photography in Paris 1992, Grand Ecran, Paris, France. Titarenko contributed photographs from his Nomenklatura of signs series to this exhibition.[44][45]
  • Alexey Titarenko, City of Shadows, July–August 2001, Apex Fine Art, Absolut L.A. International Biennal, Los Angeles, USA.[46]
  • Alexey Titarenko, les quatre mouvements de Saint-Petersbourg, July–September 2002, Musée Réattu, Rencontres d'Arles festival, Arles, France.[47]
  • Alexey Titarenko: Saint Petersburg in Four Movements, Nailya Alexander Gallery, New York, February–April 2010.[48]
  • A Revolutionary Project: Cuba from Walker Evans to Now, May–October 2011 Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA. Titarenko contributed photographs from Cuba to this group exhibition on the island.[39]
  • Italia Inside Out. I Grandi Fotografi E L'Italia, November 2015 - February 2016, Palazzo della Ragione, Milan, Italy. Titarenko contributed photographs from Venice to this group exhibition about Italy.[49]
  • The City is a Novel & City of Shadows, September 2020 - December 2020, Multimedia Art Museum, Moscow[50]
  • Град на сенките & City of Shadows June 2022 - August 2022, National Art Gallery, Bulgaria[51]

Collections

Titarenko's work is held in the following permanent collections:

Documentary TV and film about Titarenko
  • Le Journal de la Culture series on Arte aired a 7-minute episode on Titarenko in 2004.[66]
  • Alexey Titarenko: Art et la Maniere (2005). 30 minutes. Directed by Rebecca Houzel. Produced by Image & Co. for Arte.[67]

References
  1. Robertson, Rebecca "Bringing Shadows to Life. Alexey Titarenko" Art News, New York City, June 2014, page 54-57
  2. Corcoran, Sean, Museum of the City of New York "The City at the Edge of the New World"; in Titarenko, The City is a Novel, Damiani, 2015, pages 162-163, ISBN 978-88-6208-414-7
  3. Alexey Titarenko: ‘I wanted to capture my inner perception of the world around me’ A Publication of the Studio International, written by Nathasha Kurchanova, accessed January 21, 2018
  4. Ksenia Nuril. "Spheres of influence" pages 17-24 from "Nomenklatura of Signs" Bologna, Italy: Damiani, 2020. ISBN 978-88-6208-699-8.
  5. City of Shadows" in The City is a Novel / Alexey Titarenko, Damiani, 2015, pages 15-36, ISBN 978-88-6208-414-7
  6. ZERKALO: Forever After, The State Museum and Exhibition Centre ROSPHOTO, St.Petersburg, Russia, 2017, page 17, 38, 41, 42, 124-127, 271, 272, 292, 322 ISBN 978-5-91238-026-6
  7. Dictionnaire mondial de la photographie Paris, Éditions Larousse, 1994, page 629, ISBN 2-03-511335-0
  8. William Meyers. "Alexey Titarenko's Venetian Style." The New York Sun, April 24, 2008
  9. Dictionnaire mondial de la photographie Paris, Éditions Larousse, 1994, page 629, ISBN 2-03-511335-0
  10. Schwendener, Martha "A city's artistic rebellion. Photographs and other works that pushed boundaries in late-cold-war Leningrad." The New York Times, June 2, 2013
  11. "Underground Russian photography 1970s–1980s" The New Yorker, March 19, 2012
  12. Meyers, William. "Shades of Reality. Underground Russian photography in 1970s–1980s" The Wall Street Journal March 10–11, 2012
  13. Sartorti, Rosalinde (1989). "No more heroic tractors: Subverting the legacy of socialist realism." Pp 8–17 of Richardson, Nan; Hagen Charles (1989). Photostroika: New Soviet Photography. Aperture 116. New York: Aperture Foundation. ISBN 0-89381-410-5. LCCN 58-30845
  14. Nomenklatura of Signs: Alexey Titarenko. Damiani, 2019. ISBN 978-88-6208-699-8
  15. William Meyers "Two Tales of Two Cities" New York Sun March 2, 2006 , page 15
  16. William Meyers. "A Master of Technique." The Wall Street Journal, March 13–14, 2010
  17. Gabriel Bauret "Fragments of the discourse on a photographic oeuvre" Alexey Titarenko photographs / Gabriel Bauret essay, Nailya Alexander, Washington D.C. 2003, pages 20, 26, 30, 34, 40, 42. ISBN 0-9743991-0-8
  18. Pollack, Barbara. "Alexey Titarenko." Art News, April 2010, page 108
  19. A.-D. Bouzet. "Saint Petersburg en Ombre et Blanc." Libération, Paris, July 21, 2002
  20. The Elements of Photography. Understanding and Creating Sophisticated Images. Oxford, Elsevier, 2008, page 200-205, ISBN 978-0-240-80942-7
  21. Tim Smith "Black, White, Grey Titarenko's photos in new exhibit are eerily timeless and bleak" The Baltimore Sun, June 1, 2012
  22. " Street-Wise: The Photography of Garry Winogrand and Alexey Titarenko " American Cinematographer. An International Publication of the ASC, accessed January 21, 2018
  23. Glueck, Grace "Northern Light." The New York Times, New York, March 24, 2006
  24. Ollman, Leah. "Russian Photos Trace Images of Mortality and Memory." Los Angeles Times, August 3, 2001
  25. "City of Shadows" in The City is a Novel / Alexey Titarenko, Damiani, 2015, pages 15-36, ISBN 978-88-6208-414-7
  26. Protzman, Ferdinand. Landscape. Photographs of Time and Place. National Geographic, 2003, page 84-86, ISBN 0-7922-6166-6
  27. Guerrin, Michel. "Alexey Titarenko, clair-obscure." Le Monde, Paris, February 22, 2003
  28. Bouruet-Aubertot, Veronique "La Cite des Ombres." Beaux-Arts magazine, Paris, February 2003
  29. Aidan Dunne. "Camera in a City of Shadows." Irish Times, Dublin, May 5, 2007
  30. Diane E. Foulds. "Revisiting the world of the Romanovs." Boston Sunday Globe, Boston, November 2, 2003
  31. Higgins, Jackie. The World Atlas of Street Photography. Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 2014, pages 226–229, ISBN 978-0-300-20716-3, LCCN 2014-940105
  32. Ian Haydn Smith. The Short Story of Photography. Laurence King Publishing, London, 2018, page 209, ISBN 978-1786272010, LCCN 1786-272016
  33. Bauret, Gabriel "The Theatre and its Wings"; in Titarenko The City is a Novel, Damiani, 2015, page 104, ISBN 978-88-6208-414-7
  34. Tim, Smith "Fascinating exhibit of photographs, smoke drawings at Grimaldis"; The Baltimore Sun, June 25, 2013
  35. Bret, McCabe "Venice by Alexey Titarenko" Baltimore City Paper, June 19, 2013
  36. Bauret, Gabriel "La Ville est un Roman"; in Titarenko, The City is a Novel, Damiani, 2015, pages 10-11, ISBN 978-88-6208-414-7
  37. Hugues, Sylvie "Alexey Titarenko, esthetique et documentaire." Response Photo magazine n.132, Paris, France, March 2003, page 80-89
  38. Aspects de la photographie Russe (Aspects of Russian photography) Nice Musées, Nice, France, 2002, page 86, 130–133, 151, ISBN 2-913548-41-5
  39. Johnson, Reed. "Cuba under the lens at the Getty Museum." Los Angeles Times, May 27, 2011
  40. Brett, Abbott "Waiting to Awake"; in Titarenko, The City is a Novel, Damiani, 2015, pages 132-133, ISBN 978-88-6208-414-7
  41. "Our Men in Havana: Walker Evans and Alexey Titarenko" American Cinematographer. An International Publication of the ASC, accédé le 21 janvier 2018
  42. Burnstine, Susan "Connection American." Black&White photography magazine, United Kingdom, June 2010, page 20, 21
  43. "Alexey Titarenko", The New Yorker magazine, May 11, 2015
  44. Mois de la Photo a Paris 1992, Paris-Audiovisuel, Paris, France. ISBN 978-2-904732-55-3
  45. Dictionnaire mondial de la photographie des origines a nos jours, Éditions Larousse, 1994, 978-5-91238-026-6, page 629
  46. Russian Photos Trace Images of Mortality and Memory. Art Reviews by LEAH OLLMAN, special to the Times. Los Angeles Times, August 3, 2001, page F20
  47. A.-D. Bouzet. "Saint Petersburg en Ombre et Blanc." Libération, Paris, July 21, 2002, page 27
  48. "Alexey Titarenko: Saint Petersburg in Four Movements", Nailya Alexander Gallery, Accessed 3 September 2016
  49. Henri Cartier-Bresson e gli altri. I Grandi Fotografi E L'Italia, A cura di Giovanna Calvenzi, Contrasto, Milan, Italy, 2015, pages 115-123, ISBN 978-88-09-82779-0
  50. Newspaper Kommersant n 173, page 8, September 29, 2020.
  51. "Alexey Titarenko: Град на сенките & City of Shadows", Bulgarian National Radio BNR, Sofia, Bulgaria
  52. " Collections", Philadelphia Museum of Art, Accessed 28 November 2017
  53. " Collections", Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Accessed 28 November 2017
  54. " Works from the collection", Houston Museum of Fine Arts, Accessed 3 November 2016
  55. "Untitled (Crowd 2)", Chrysler Museum of Art via Squarespace, Accessed 3 September 2016
  56. "Objects", Davis Museum at Wellesley College, Accessed 3 September 2016
  57. " Works from the collection", The J. Paul Getty Museum, Accessed 8 September 2016
  58. " ‘Leningrad’s Perestroika,’ at Zimmerli Art Museum in New Brunswick", The New York Times, Accessed 14 January 2018
  59. " Works from the collection", Yale University Art Gallery, Accessed 14 January 2018
  60. " Works from the collection", Multimedia Art Museum, Moscow, Accessed 24 May 2018
  61. "Unlimited: Recent Gifts from the William Goodman and Victoria Belco Photography Collection", BAMPFA, Accessed 30 June 2019
  62. "Collecting New York's stories", Museum of the City of New York, Accessed 21 January 2020
  63. "Urban Life in Contemporary Photography", Edition du Musée de l'Élysée, Lausanne 2016, pages 35-39, ISBN 978-2-88350-111-9.
  64. "Collections", Denver Art Museum, Accessed 18 January 2023
  65. "Collections", Baltimore Museum of Art, Accessed 3 July 2023
  66. Le Journal de la Culture via youtube., Accessed 18 December 2016
  67. "Art et la Maniere" via youtube., Accessed 14 December 2016

Notes
  1. The essay can be viewed as a PDF here within Titarenko's site.
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