ГАЛЕРЕЯ СОВРЕМЕННОГО ИСКУССТВА ЛУЧ
Куратор Света Николаева | +7 (919) 990 42 25
Alexander Sokolov was born in 1986 in Moscow.
2018-2019 completed the course "Contemporary art" at the School of Contemporary Art "Free Workshops" at MMOMA. He was a student of Bakstein Institute of Contemporary Art, the course "New Artistic Strategies".
Participant of the main programs of the Wroclaw Biennale of Media Art WRO, The wrong biennale nº5 and the 1st Karelian Biennale. Alexander Sokolov's works have been presented at the Moscow Museum of Contemporary Art, Vadim Sidur Museum, CAC Vinzavod, CTI Factory, Wro Art Center, the Museum of Fine Arts of the Republic of Karelia, as well as at many festivals, such as Ars Electronica Festival, CHEAP festival, Intervals, VOSTOK 3.
Parallel to his exhibition activities, he is engaged in street art, creating urban interventions in Russia (Moscow, St.Petersburg, Kazan, Kaliningrad etc.), Europe (Berlin, Paris, Amsterdam, Budapest etc.) and Asia (Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Saigon, Phnom Penh etc.).
In his artistic practice, through painting, installations and digital art, he addresses the themes of cultural polyphony and the history of games, inspired by the works by Mikhail Bakhtin and Dominic Lopez.
Author's comment:
"In my childhood in the 1990s the aesthetics of hip-hop, manga and video games dominated. In this visual culture there is a mixture of ethnic, industrial and fantastic motifs. Today the info-landscape is constantly becoming more complex due to interpenetration of different cultures, often contradictory to each other. As an artist living in two cultural worlds at the same time – the global Western and the local Russian, I have a consciousness that lives in both dimensions.
I want to give a different interpretation to globalism through the study of games and the manipulation of their components. Games are unifying by their nature. It is a tool to resolve the intrigues, internal tension and external conflict of cultures. Game symbols, shapes and rules are accessible and create a synergy of movement between players, harmonizing their cultural setups. Working with games one can give an up-to-date and meaningful estimation of the current state of the world."
ART RESIDENCIES
2022
Cultural code. Ryabushinsky Сottage, Vyshny Volochyok
2021
White on white. Botanical Garden of Moscow State University "Aptekarsky Ogorod", Moscow
2018-2019 completed the course "Contemporary art" at the School of Contemporary Art "Free Workshops" at MMOMA. He was a student of Bakstein Institute of Contemporary Art, the course "New Artistic Strategies".
Participant of the main programs of the Wroclaw Biennale of Media Art WRO, The wrong biennale nº5 and the 1st Karelian Biennale. Alexander Sokolov's works have been presented at the Moscow Museum of Contemporary Art, Vadim Sidur Museum, CAC Vinzavod, CTI Factory, Wro Art Center, the Museum of Fine Arts of the Republic of Karelia, as well as at many festivals, such as Ars Electronica Festival, CHEAP festival, Intervals, VOSTOK 3.
Parallel to his exhibition activities, he is engaged in street art, creating urban interventions in Russia (Moscow, St.Petersburg, Kazan, Kaliningrad etc.), Europe (Berlin, Paris, Amsterdam, Budapest etc.) and Asia (Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Saigon, Phnom Penh etc.).
In his artistic practice, through painting, installations and digital art, he addresses the themes of cultural polyphony and the history of games, inspired by the works by Mikhail Bakhtin and Dominic Lopez.
Author's comment:
"In my childhood in the 1990s the aesthetics of hip-hop, manga and video games dominated. In this visual culture there is a mixture of ethnic, industrial and fantastic motifs. Today the info-landscape is constantly becoming more complex due to interpenetration of different cultures, often contradictory to each other. As an artist living in two cultural worlds at the same time – the global Western and the local Russian, I have a consciousness that lives in both dimensions.
I want to give a different interpretation to globalism through the study of games and the manipulation of their components. Games are unifying by their nature. It is a tool to resolve the intrigues, internal tension and external conflict of cultures. Game symbols, shapes and rules are accessible and create a synergy of movement between players, harmonizing their cultural setups. Working with games one can give an up-to-date and meaningful estimation of the current state of the world."
ART RESIDENCIES
2022
Cultural code. Ryabushinsky Сottage, Vyshny Volochyok
2021
White on white. Botanical Garden of Moscow State University "Aptekarsky Ogorod", Moscow
SELECTED EXHIBITIONS
2025
Collection of Chess Koans. Solo Exhibition. LUCH Gallery, Moscow
2024
Collection of Chess Koans. Solo Exhibition. LUCH Gallery, Moscow
2022
The era of rapid oblivion. Manor, The Swamp Volzhsk Biennale. Vasya Berezina Squat, Moscow
Everplace NFT. THIRD PLACE, St.Petersburg
Your move. GES-2, Moscow
Findings from the subconscious of a fairy-tale hero. Cube.Moscow, Moscow
The return of Kolobok and a few more strange attractors. Fabrika, Moscow
La Vita dell'arte ed. III. A60 Contemporary Art Space, Milan, Italy
BLACK and WHITE. STUDIO NEXT, Kolkata, India
DECIPRALAND. Nizhny Novgorod
NUR Media Art Festival. National Library of the Republic of Tatarstan, Kazan
The cultural layer. Bogorodskoye Gallery, Moscow
Recreation zone. 2MRW NFT Gallery, Moscow
The poetry of space. The point in[out]move. THIRD PLACE, St. Petersburg
The cultural code. Ryabushinsky Cottage, Vyshny Volochyok
SE8ER. Reinforced Concrete Products Plant No.21, Moscow
The bridge. Onegog, Moscow
2021
WRO Media Art Biennale. Wro Art Center, Wroclaw, Poland
“The time of things“ in the framework of "Winzavod.Open”, CSI Winzavod, Moscow
On Media. Signals and Connections. Millepiani, Milan, Italy
The Wrong Biennale, pavilion “Objeto Virtual Não Identificado", online
Karelian Biennale. Museum of Fine Arts of Karelia, Petrozavodsk
White on white. Botanical Garden of Moscow State University "Aptekarsky Ogorod", Moscow
2nd International Video Art Biennale “Restless Waiting”, online
Graphics. Bogorodskoye Gallery, Moscow
ConcreteHouse.art. Ars Electronica Festival, online
Touch The Could That Sleeps. A60 Contemporary Art Space, Florence, Italy
Intervals. NFTapping, Nizhny Novgorod
Starfall. HERE on Taganka, Moscow
Stuffy vs. Windy. Izmailovo Gallery, Moscow
OpenCall Exhibition. New Sincerity, Moscow
Alterglobalism. Belyaevo Gallery, Moscow
023H. ZIL Center, Moscow
2025
Collection of Chess Koans. Solo Exhibition. LUCH Gallery, Moscow
2024
Collection of Chess Koans. Solo Exhibition. LUCH Gallery, Moscow
2022
The era of rapid oblivion. Manor, The Swamp Volzhsk Biennale. Vasya Berezina Squat, Moscow
Everplace NFT. THIRD PLACE, St.Petersburg
Your move. GES-2, Moscow
Findings from the subconscious of a fairy-tale hero. Cube.Moscow, Moscow
The return of Kolobok and a few more strange attractors. Fabrika, Moscow
La Vita dell'arte ed. III. A60 Contemporary Art Space, Milan, Italy
BLACK and WHITE. STUDIO NEXT, Kolkata, India
DECIPRALAND. Nizhny Novgorod
NUR Media Art Festival. National Library of the Republic of Tatarstan, Kazan
The cultural layer. Bogorodskoye Gallery, Moscow
Recreation zone. 2MRW NFT Gallery, Moscow
The poetry of space. The point in[out]move. THIRD PLACE, St. Petersburg
The cultural code. Ryabushinsky Cottage, Vyshny Volochyok
SE8ER. Reinforced Concrete Products Plant No.21, Moscow
The bridge. Onegog, Moscow
2021
WRO Media Art Biennale. Wro Art Center, Wroclaw, Poland
“The time of things“ in the framework of "Winzavod.Open”, CSI Winzavod, Moscow
On Media. Signals and Connections. Millepiani, Milan, Italy
The Wrong Biennale, pavilion “Objeto Virtual Não Identificado", online
Karelian Biennale. Museum of Fine Arts of Karelia, Petrozavodsk
White on white. Botanical Garden of Moscow State University "Aptekarsky Ogorod", Moscow
2nd International Video Art Biennale “Restless Waiting”, online
Graphics. Bogorodskoye Gallery, Moscow
ConcreteHouse.art. Ars Electronica Festival, online
Touch The Could That Sleeps. A60 Contemporary Art Space, Florence, Italy
Intervals. NFTapping, Nizhny Novgorod
Starfall. HERE on Taganka, Moscow
Stuffy vs. Windy. Izmailovo Gallery, Moscow
OpenCall Exhibition. New Sincerity, Moscow
Alterglobalism. Belyaevo Gallery, Moscow
023H. ZIL Center, Moscow
COLLECTION OF CHESS KOANS
Solo Exhibition | LUCH Gallery
25 May – 11 August, 2024
In his work Alexander Sokolov constantly refers to the theme of game. The exhibition at LUCH Gallery is dedicated to the phenomenon of Anarchy Chess and presents a new series of paintings and objects created during the author's long journey through Asia countries.
Anarchy Chess is one of many variations of chess rules that appeared almost as a joke. One day a reedit user with the nickname Scurlocc suggested playing the game according to the following rules: each move is selected according to the most popular comment, one move per day. It is not necessary to follow the rules of classical chess, so the participants try to offer the most absurd moves. His proposal was warmly welcomed by the community, and the new rules were given the name Anarchy Chess.
The artist believes that this phenomenon includes all previous and future changes to the rules of chess game and requires a new logic of thinking, close to the Buddhist koan*. The goal of the game is to go beyond the previously preseted options and move from a rational to a more intuitive point of view.
Following this idea, the artist creates the first collection of Anarchy Chess tasks, where the tasks are presented not in the form of a book, but in the form of canvases and objects. A special approach is required to solve them.
The exhibition presents sculptural figures of the author's chess Knight, which is the calling card of Alexander Sokolov as a street artist, a kinetic object prismatron playing hide-and-seek with the viewer, as well as eight paintings with augmented reality.
To see the virtual supplement for the paintings, you need QR to use the application with vpn enabled.
*Koan is a riddle or a short parable containing a problem that cannot be rationaly solved. In Zen Buddhism it is one of the main training methods that helps to achieve enlightenment. The main goal of the koan is the transformation of the practitioner's consciousness in order to overcome the framework of discursive logical thinking, originated from a dual perception of the world, and to gain an intuitive vision of reality that does not separate one's own "myself" from the surrounding "not-myself".
Solo Exhibition | LUCH Gallery
25 May – 11 August, 2024
In his work Alexander Sokolov constantly refers to the theme of game. The exhibition at LUCH Gallery is dedicated to the phenomenon of Anarchy Chess and presents a new series of paintings and objects created during the author's long journey through Asia countries.
Anarchy Chess is one of many variations of chess rules that appeared almost as a joke. One day a reedit user with the nickname Scurlocc suggested playing the game according to the following rules: each move is selected according to the most popular comment, one move per day. It is not necessary to follow the rules of classical chess, so the participants try to offer the most absurd moves. His proposal was warmly welcomed by the community, and the new rules were given the name Anarchy Chess.
The artist believes that this phenomenon includes all previous and future changes to the rules of chess game and requires a new logic of thinking, close to the Buddhist koan*. The goal of the game is to go beyond the previously preseted options and move from a rational to a more intuitive point of view.
Following this idea, the artist creates the first collection of Anarchy Chess tasks, where the tasks are presented not in the form of a book, but in the form of canvases and objects. A special approach is required to solve them.
The exhibition presents sculptural figures of the author's chess Knight, which is the calling card of Alexander Sokolov as a street artist, a kinetic object prismatron playing hide-and-seek with the viewer, as well as eight paintings with augmented reality.
To see the virtual supplement for the paintings, you need QR to use the application with vpn enabled.
*Koan is a riddle or a short parable containing a problem that cannot be rationaly solved. In Zen Buddhism it is one of the main training methods that helps to achieve enlightenment. The main goal of the koan is the transformation of the practitioner's consciousness in order to overcome the framework of discursive logical thinking, originated from a dual perception of the world, and to gain an intuitive vision of reality that does not separate one's own "myself" from the surrounding "not-myself".
Александр Соколов
Александр Соколов. Анархическая шахматная задача о Тайлере и гончих.
2023. Холст, акрил. 70х70 см
Александр Соколов. Анархическая шахматная задача о чёрном квадрате Малевича и трёх дьявольских фруктах.
2023. Холст, акрил. 70х70 см
Александр Соколов. Анархическая шахматная задача об Эл, го и смертельной битве.
2023. Холст, акрил. 70х70 см
Александр Соколов. Анархическая шахматная задача о пиковой даме и зеркальных прыжках в длину.
2023. Холст, акрил. 70х70 см
Александр Соколов. Анархическая шахматная задача о дураке и молнии.
2023. Холст, акрил. 70х70 см
Александр Соколов. Анархическая шахматная задача об оригинальном гангстерском кавайном городе.
2023 Холст, акрил. 70х70 см
Александр Соколов. Анархическая шахматная задача о Кураме и шестнадцати ладьях.
2023. Холст, акрил. 70х70 см
GUANGZHOU
The series describe the artist's perseption of the city on his journey: there are children's drawings on the walls and items in museums, information posters in the subway, advertising, people, objects, architecture and... inprints of sewerage system. In the color scheme he uses a palette that has a symbolic meaning and direct association with traditional Chinese culture.
The series describe the artist's perseption of the city on his journey: there are children's drawings on the walls and items in museums, information posters in the subway, advertising, people, objects, architecture and... inprints of sewerage system. In the color scheme he uses a palette that has a symbolic meaning and direct association with traditional Chinese culture.
Александр Соколов. Гуанчжоу I
SAMSARA
The video installation was made in collaboration with Alexander Makarov. It is based on the idea of the transience of gaming life, reflections on death and new life. The death of a PC (playing character) at 8 and 16-bit playstations is when the PC is destroyed and turned off from the gameplay (usually irreversibly). Often the death of a character is seen as a negative phenomenon — it throws the player out of the normal course of the gameplay, sending him to regenerate and forcing him to return to the beginning of the game. And sometimes the player prefers to switch to a new game with a different character and setting. Thus, a person resembles a Hindu god who "descends" into the game world and incarnates in the guise of a PC for the sake of "saving the world", and the character becomes his avatar (Sansrit अवतार, IAST: avatāra, «descent»). And the path of rebirth in the form of different heroes is nothing but samsara (Sansrit saṃsāra "wander") — the cycle of birth and death in the worlds.
Technical design: 12-channel video installation. The duration of one video cycle is 9 seconds. On twelve computer screens arranged in a circle, the characters of computer games move clockwise, "moving" from screen to screen and appearing each time in a new image. The installation literally fixing this cycle, this journey from one game to another, and despite the fact that the characters change quite quickly, along the trajectory, we can guess that it is a ongoing path of the same player in different images.
The video installation was made in collaboration with Alexander Makarov. It is based on the idea of the transience of gaming life, reflections on death and new life. The death of a PC (playing character) at 8 and 16-bit playstations is when the PC is destroyed and turned off from the gameplay (usually irreversibly). Often the death of a character is seen as a negative phenomenon — it throws the player out of the normal course of the gameplay, sending him to regenerate and forcing him to return to the beginning of the game. And sometimes the player prefers to switch to a new game with a different character and setting. Thus, a person resembles a Hindu god who "descends" into the game world and incarnates in the guise of a PC for the sake of "saving the world", and the character becomes his avatar (Sansrit अवतार, IAST: avatāra, «descent»). And the path of rebirth in the form of different heroes is nothing but samsara (Sansrit saṃsāra "wander") — the cycle of birth and death in the worlds.
Technical design: 12-channel video installation. The duration of one video cycle is 9 seconds. On twelve computer screens arranged in a circle, the characters of computer games move clockwise, "moving" from screen to screen and appearing each time in a new image. The installation literally fixing this cycle, this journey from one game to another, and despite the fact that the characters change quite quickly, along the trajectory, we can guess that it is a ongoing path of the same player in different images.
