Makhmud Rustamov sculpture exhibition kicks off in Baku
By Nigar Orujova
A solo exhibition "Echo" by Azerbaijani Sculptor Makhmud Rustamov was opened in Baku Yay gallery on November 16.
The exhibition of Rustamov, an author of monumental sculptural works both in Azerbaijan and abroad, will be open for the Baku audience at the gallery until December 10.
Rustamov is a sculptor whose works originate in a small atelier in a quiet courtyard in Baku, and end up in museums and private collections all over Europe. He is an acknowledged master, whose work was acquired in 2013 by a major collector during the London exhibition organized by the auction house Sotheby's "At the Crossroads".
The sole participant in the "012 Baku Public Art Festival" project, inspired by the idea that the Maiden Tower is of extraterrestrial origin, he took the risk of setting up a golden sculptural figure of a visitor from another planet right in the center of the city. This is Makhmud Rustamov, the artist, and the latest representative of a well-known artistic dynasty.
For the "Echo" exhibition, the display area is divided into two different zones - a bronze zone and a marble zone.
The sculptor's works are at the same time aggressive and beautiful, full of refined eroticism and self-mockery. Brittle marble, rounded, almost female forms, through which mysterious flowers made of black rubber erupt.
Some might see these dangerous flowers as more like the sharp claws of a hawk, tormenting the tender white marble flesh. Thorns and roses are inseparable. Cool restraint can be combined with unbridled sensuality.
The essence of nature goes hand in hand with the triumph of genetic engineering - the sculptor's works are like that. Looking at them, we ask ourselves: "Who do we have here- creatures of flesh and blood or superb bio-robots?"
The same feeling of duality and bipolarity arises when we view the works made from bronze. At the center of the exhibition is the skull of the dragon brought low by St George's hand. From a gaping wound, a bayonet from the time of the Civil War protrudes- a weapon that languished for many a year at the back of the extinct fireplace in Grandad's old house.
What is this - an ode to peace or a hymn to war? A touching bronze duck, whose awkward spherical body is stuffed with bronze apples, what does it symbolize? A sweetmeat from a celebratory feast unexpectedly transformed into a work of art.
The skeleton of a bird peers out through chopped-up pulp - is it a curious artistic riddle, or is it a humorous dig at human avarice and insatiability? Suddenly it starts to seem as if the questions and the doubts that have come into your mind are beginning to give birth to an endless stream of new questions and doubts.
Very possibly this is exactly the wish of the sculptor, whose works, in the opinion of Doctor of Art History Leila Akhundzade, are "...a synthesis of the real and the unreal, the living and the refined-and-intellectual, of divine and demonic principles".
It is perfectly possible that the metamorphoses which the
marble, the bronze and audience consciousness undergo through the
sculptor's will do not happen by chance, because after all, as we
know, "...In every block of marble there are heads worthy of
Praxiteles. What was sculpted had always been inside the block"
(Marcus Tullius Cicero).
Makhmud Rustamov, 46, was born in Baku. He is a graduate of the
Faculty of Sculpture of the Azimzade Azerbaijan State Academy, in
1986, and the State University of the Arts, in 1992, as well as of
the Creative Workshops at the Arts Academy headed by Omar El'darov
(1998).
In 2000, he became a holder of the "Sculptor of the Year" prize awarded by the Culture and Tourism Ministry and the Ministry of Youth and Sport in Azerbaijan.
Rustamov took part in the second International Biennale of Modern Art in Baku in 2007, 2009 and 2011, and in 2003 he was a participant in the "March" Youth Exhibition in Moscow.
His creative biography includes several personal exhibitions and also joint exhibitions alongside his older brother Teymur Rustamov. Rustamov actively exhibits both in Azerbaijan and throughout the world.
His work together with the non-commercial organization YARAT includes participation in the "012 Baku Public Art Festival" project, and in "The Commonist", a collective attempt by 18 Azerbaijani artists to make sense of the phenomena of a globalizing world.