Pavel Pepperstein - Retrospective

Pavel Pepperstein’s artist name is a literary reference to Der Zauberberg by Thomas Mann. Far away from any village or city, the discussions between the guests of a sanatorium are crucial to the life of the inhabitants, even though these conversations are not always significant. Professor Mynheer Peeperkorn holds his recitations in front of a waterfall while the incessant noisy rush of the cascading water drones out his words.

Like his namesake, Pepperstein tries to counteract this loud noise, knowing full well that only the closest will understand his message. Waterfalls can be found again and again in Pepperstein’s drawings and paintings: the Sherlock Holmes series depicts the famous detective battling for his life against a foe standing on a precipice in front of an immense cataract. These drawings were part of Pepperstein’s first exhibition in Switzerland, 1992 in the Shedhalle Zurich. At that time the artist was still part of the group Inspection Medical Hermeneutics and presented a vast installation focused on Switzerland’s mental topography. His works often allude to Russian-Swiss history (Lenin in Switzerland) as well as to his self-image as an artist (a detective, an interpreter of signs, a therapist). In this context, the literary, psychological, philosophical, and mythological references are more important to Pepperstein than tangible historic events. Hence, several small colored symbols are to be found in the works of the Lenin series (a samovar, a frog, a stork…), which supposedly originate from the sole preserved sketch by the revolutionary himself – a drawing that could never be interpreted convincingly.

In Russia, Pavel Pepperstein is a sought-after author. In the western hemisphere he mainly appears as an artist. With just a few strokes of his brush, he creates narrative drawings of infinite vastness or conjures up deserts and oceans populated by humans, animals, and gods. Rather than simply being fairy-tale figures from a vague reminiscence of childhood, they seem to be soul-filled entities, appearing in just the right moment as mythical allies and aides.

In times of the Soviet Union the penetrating eye of state officials scrutinized any semblance of private life. Pavel Pepperstein himself experienced the end of the Soviet Union, of this “experiment with the human psyche”. Under the former rule, it was known that a single stare could seemingly pierce right through the walls. Consequently the gazes in Pepperstein’s drawings are able to penetrate any room or barrier, but for other reasons. Sometimes they link individual figures to one another or lead the observer under a shimmering sea into the murky depth. At other times the gaze is targeted from out of the picture to peer directly at us.

But where is the artist? Is he the hedgehog crawling over the paper plane? The horseman cantering off into the distance? Might he be the mafia boss pulling out his gun? Is he the eagle or the voyeur? In his exhibition at this year’s Venice Biennial at the Russian pavilion, Pepperstein flings the visitors into Future Landscapes, onto the Planet of Riders, into the World of Speaking Clouds, and the City of Houses with Heads… It is evident that Pepperstein, a maker of worlds, is able to step nimbly from one time zone to another as well as through different levels of consciousness. At the same time he is a master of withdrawing himself, of disappearing. All the more astounding is the intimate way his ambassadors accost and lure us into the most inspiring realms of experience. These landscapes of the soul will never again release one who has once been entranced by them.

(Claudia Jolles)

Pavel Pepperstein
Retrospective