Foxy Production presents a solo exhibition by OLGA CHERNYSHEVA, marking the first presentation of her paintings in North America and the world premiere of her new video, Trashman. The exhibition opens Friday May 6 from 6:00 to 8:00 pm and runs through June 4, 2011.

Chernysheva’s third solo exhibition at the gallery comprises a series of paintings that draws inspiration from her observational films and photographs, and a new video, Trashman, about a young migrant worker who collects trash at the end of film screenings in a Moscow cinema.

Chernysheva’s paintings reinterpret images taken from her body of photography and video work. Scenes of guards, street-vendors, and park-life capture passing moments that are intense and suspenseful, despite their everyday nature. Her canvases’ subdued, often-monochromatic palette and visible brushstrokes within expanses of fluctuating tonality give them a dramatic, psychological charge. Chernysheva’s paintings explore the cinematic experience – each scene alludes to a larger story outside its edges like film frames in a reel, and their focus, depth of field, and sense of movement have a tangibly filmic quality. Chernysheva cites the poetic narratives of early Soviet director Alexander Dovzhenko as an important influence. His films depict the wider forces that impact upon everyday lives and, at times, position the earth itself as a protaganist. Likewise in Chernysheva’s paintings, ground and backdrop vie with their subjects for the center of dramatic attention.

Chernysheva’s video, Trashman, observes a young man as he stands with a large trash bag in front of the screen as people leave a cinema. Patrons fling their drink cups and other refuse into the bag he holds open, as the various films’ end-credits roll down and the final songs of their soundtracks blare out. His calm, self-possessed demeanor recalls the idealized workers of Realist painting or Soviet cinema; yet, here in the new Russia, the model worker stands alone, contemplative, appearing out of place and time, disconnected from the broader social realm moving around him.

Credits
Installation photography by Mark Woods.