This exhibition, like all the Centre's thematic exhibitions, is complemented by a series of one-man shows by contemporary artists on the given theme. These shows are the result of open international juried competitions conducted in the period leading up to the thematic exhibition, and serve to involve artists more profoundly in the research and creative process of “Mihail Chemiakin’s Musée Imaginaire“.
The Mihail Chemiakin Centre works through the Mihail Chemiakin Foundation in St. Petersburg, which was created in 2002 and is the primary venue for public programs of the “Musée Imaginaire“ project and programs of The Institute of the Philosophy and Psychology of Art. The Centre's goals are to support Russian culture, organise cultural exchange with other countries and assist young artists, writers, performers and musicians. Since 2015 the “Musée Imaginaire“ operates under the aegis of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation.
Back in the 1960s I began collecting, comparing and analyzing reproductions of works of fine and ritual art – Metaphysical Heads, Metaphysical Figures, – with the goal of synthesizing what these works by different masters had in common, understanding the essence of the image, and on that basis I hoped to create a system of “signs” in the art of the 20>thcentury. With time my research and the number of themes I explored broadened, along with the development of my own artistic work and the broadening of my analytical visual experience.
It is important to stress that this research were and continue to be purely visual, independent of place and time. I have always been less interested in who created the work that interests me, or when it was created, than in the linear, rhythmic, compositional, coloristic and conceptual similarities of different authors, regardless of where and when they worked.
In the late 1990s it became clear that my research and the material I had collected and organized was of interest not only to me. Scholars, first scientists, then philosophers, theologians, historians, writers and art historians approached me with requests to work with my materials. Some of these colleagues and students needed more detailed information about the images collected in order to pursue their own work.