Dmitry Prigov - poet, artist, image maker

In the family of a pianist and engineer November 5, 1940 was born the famous Soviet and Russian poet Dmitry Prigov. After graduating from school, he enrolled in the Stroganov School for the department of sculpture, and after graduating he worked in the Moscow management of architecture. Since 1975, Dmitry Prigov was a member of the Union of Artists of the USSR, and in 1985 became a member of the Avant-garde Club. Poems published mainly abroad in emigre magazines in the US, France and Germany, as well as in uncensored (samizdat) publications in Russia. There was not much fame, but many knew that there was Prigov Dmitry Alexandrovich.

Poems

The texts of his poems consisted mainly of buffoonery, the manner of exposition was exalted, a bit akin to cliche, which caused a healthy bewilderment among the bulk of readers. As a result, 1986 was marked by compulsory treatment in a psychiatric clinic, from where he quickly got the protests headed by Bella Akhmadulina both inside the country and abroad. Naturally, during perestroika Dmitry Prigov became an extremely popular poet, and since 1989 his works have been published in incredible amounts in almost all media, where the format allowed, but he changed almost everywhere.

In 1990, Prigov joined the Writers' Union of the USSR, in 1992 - joined the PEN Club. From the late 80's was an indispensable participant in television programs, published collections of poetry and prose, even a large book of his interview was published in 2001. In the meantime, Dmitry Prigov was awarded various awards and grants. Most of the patrons were German - the Alfred Tepfer Foundation, the German Academy of Arts and others. But Russia also suddenly noticed what good poems Prigov Dmitry Alexandrovich wrote.

Paintings

Literary activity did not immediately become fundamental in the work of Dmitry Prigov. He was the author of a huge number of all kinds of performances, installations, collages and graphic works. It was the most active participant of underground actions in the field of literature and fine arts.

His sculptures since 1980 participated in exhibitions abroad, and in 1988 he held a solo exhibition in Chicago. Theater and music projects were also often accompanied by Prigov. Since 1999, Prigov Dmitry Alexandrovich directed all sorts of festivals, met in the jury of various competitions.

Conceptualist

Vsevolod Nekrasov, Ilya Kabakov, Lev Rubinstein, Vladimir Sorokin, Francisco Infante and Dmitry Prigov plowed and ideologically planted the field of Russian conceptualism - a direction in art, where priority is not the quality but the semantic expression and the new concept (concept).

Poetic image - the main moment, which concentrates the entire individual system of the creator of imperishable art. Prigov developed a whole strategy of image design, where every gesture is thought out and equipped with a concept.

Image-maker

For many years, it has been spent on the exceptional usefulness of trying on various images: the poet-reasoner, the poet-klikusha, the poet-mystical leader and so on. One of the interesting elements - the use of the patronymic in a mandatory manner, you can as "Alexanych", you can without a name, but with a traditional pronunciation. The intonation is approximately this: "And who will do this for you? Dmitri Aleksanych, is that it? "- with a hint of" our everything ", that is, Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin.

Increased attention to the image itself is not a characteristic feature of conceptualism, but nevertheless there have passed the times when it was enough to write good poems in order to be a poet. Over time, the sophistication in creating your own image began to dominate creativity as such. And this phenomenon began beautifully - Lermontov, Akhmatova ... Conceptualists brought this secondary tradition almost to the point of absurdity.

Life as an experiment

Reflexive efforts Prigova summed up the poetic constructions of this strange pseudo-philosophical platform, as according to Mayakovsky - in small places. "Militjaner" comprehends the sacred role of the state in human existence, in "Tarakanomakhia" is seen an attempt to reveal the ancient low-lying beginning, which brings to life the presence of domestic insects.

Any writer-innovator experiments with material, styles, techniques, genres, language. The trend in the works of Prigov is the combination of any artistic practice with the mass culture, everyday life, often with kitsch. Effect, of course, the reader is shocked.

Envy of the "favorites of the public"?

Here you can also mention the transformation of the works of many other authors - from classics to nameless graphomaniacs, in which not so much an aesthetic as an ideological goal is pursued. "Samizdat" version of "Eugene Onegin" was an example, and Prigov from Pushkin tried to make Lermontov, replacing adjectives.

The most common performance among the adherents of the muse of Prigov is the reading of classical works aloud, with howling, chanting, in the style of Muslim and Buddhist chants, which are named after the poet ("Prigov mantras"). Poetic works Dmitry Prigov, whose biography is extremely rich in events, wrote a huge amount - more than thirty-five thousand. He died in July 2007 in a hospital after a heart attack at the age of sixty-seven. He was buried in the Don Cemetery, where he is often visited by his compatriots and foreign guests, impressed by his works and way of life.