MYTH Gallery is a new gallery of contemporary art in St. Petersburg, which opened in May 2019. Olga Profatilo, the co-founder of the gallery, tells us about the wonderful artist Liza Bobkova the gallery represents and her, and the gallery’s first published artist catalog.
Olga Profatilo: “The key area of the MYTH Gallery’s activity is to acquaint a professional and art-interested audience with the works of young Russian artists. First of all, the gallery is aimed at supporting the development of young Russian art – artists who are at the beginning of their careers. We are sure that young curators are those specialists who change the environment and are catalysts that bring artists to a high professional level. The tasks also include the formation of a new generation of collectors, with whom the gallery plans long-term and fruitful cooperation.
We understand the importance of being present on the international art scene, therefore participation in international fairs and exhibitions is one of the important vectors of the gallery’s development.”
A personal artist catalog is an important stage in the development of an artist. It not only allows you to summarize and analyze the projects created but also to identify the vector of further development.
“Liza Bobkova is the first artist whose personal exhibition we held in the gallery. We presented her works at our stand during our first fairs at Cosmoscow (Moscow, 2020) and the Viennacontemporary (Vienna, 2020). When we thought about publishing our first catalog, we immediately realized that it should be a catalog of Lisa Bobkova, one of our headliner artists. It was important for us to have time to prepare the book and present it at the Cosmoscow contemporary art fair, which ultimately succeeded! “
Liza Bobkova (Ostrov, 1987): artist, explores the problems of human socialization in the modern world, works with sculptures, total installations, drawing, and graphics
Liza Bobkova: “It was important for me to make a “living” book, and not just a soulless catalog of works, so I decided to add elements of diary entries, messages from friends, and scanned italic signatures. During the design process, there was nothing that I would call difficult, as I really loved this time and I loved working with difficulties. Moreover, I was lucky with my partner, we typeset the book together with Dasha Dobrovolskaya, it is difficult to imagine a better one in her place.”
Olga Profatilo: “For the catalog, we chose Munken Kristall 300 gsm paper, Munken Polar 130 gsm paper, and the Glama Basic 90 gsm tracing paper. We also added foil stamping on the cover, colored thread in the block, and pasting the spine with the binding material. Paper from the Munken collection has almost magical properties – it is unusually tactile, not provocative, noble. The tracing paper insert, as well as the red thread in the binding, are the accents that make the publication unique.”
Liza Bobkova: “The catalog is a real brainchild! The feeling of new birth. When so many people put a huge amount of energy into something, and it was born, you feel this energy with your skin. The book turned out to be alive. This is the most important thing. I really like the cover, for which I decided to use a dense matte paper that is delicate in texture, it melts in my hands, and for contrast, we put a glossy illustration with a hologram effect on it. I wanted to make a white book with red stitching, like a blank A4 sheet or a new white canvas on which information will already be the protagonist. “
The catalog can be purchased at the MYTH Gallery, by contacting the gallery staff, as well as in St. Petersburg bookstores: Podpisnie Izdaniya and Masters bookstore. Perhaps a little later, the book will appear in other stores too.
