Red Horizon: Contemporary Art and Photography in the USSR and Russia, 1960 – 2010

Coinciding with the centennial of the 1917 Russian Revolution, Columbus Museum of Art presents Red Horizon: Contemporary Art and Photography in the USSR and Russia, 1960-2010. This timely exhibition is drawn from two facets of Neil K. Rector’s world-class art collection: Soviet and Russian photography from the 1970s to the early 1990s, and the work of Moscow-based unofficial artists who came to prominence in the 1960s and 1970s. Combining more than 300 works from these two aspects of the collection, Red Horizon offers fresh perspective on the art and life of this period, and suggests how creativity and critical thinking manifest themselves under the most difficult social and ideological circumstances.

Red Horizon looks at the period shortly after Joseph Stalin’s death in 1953 until the late 1980s and beyond, when artists attempted to represent the everyday realities of the USSR and Russia. The exhibition is organized around four thematic sections, each of which mixes a variety of styles and media, including Pop and Conceptual art, documentary photography, Surrealism and abstraction. All of them explore the gap between government-sanctioned orthodoxies and life as it was.

Many of the artists included in the exhibition created work in an environment of political and cultural oppression. Columbus Museum of Art stands committed to the power of art and artists to bridge perspectives, to fuel our imagination, and to create opportunities to explore the complexities of the human experience. We believe it is our responsibility as a museum to champion art and creativity as well as to create a space for community dialogue and understanding. Now, more than ever, we need spaces where communities can gather, face to face, to listen and learn.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website