Boris Mikhailov (photographer)

Boris Mikhailov (2002)

Mikhailov exhibition in the Sprengel Museum Hannover (2013)

Boris Mikhailov ( Ukrainian Борис Андрійович Михайлов Borys Andrijowytsch Mychajlow ; born August 25, 1938 in Kharkov , Ukrainian SSR ) is a Ukrainian photographer .

life and work

Boris Mikhailov's parents were engineers in high positions. In 1962, Mikhailov graduated from Kharkov Technical University with a degree in electrical engineering . He first worked for the city transport company in Kharkov and from 1963 to 1968 in rocket construction . In addition, he made his first self-taught films and photos. In his first series, such as Susi and the others (1960–1970) and Die Stadt / Schwarzes Archiv (1968–1979), Mikhailov photographed everyday scenes in the Soviet Union as well as friends, partners and himself; the latter is often “erotic and clownish at the same time”, according to the art magazine art . After the KGB found Mikhailov's nudes of his wife, he lost his job on charges of pornography , found a new job as an engineer, and began to spend his spare time doing more photography.

Before his photographs were exhibited in large format, Mikhailov put them together in books. He had no exhibitions in the Soviet Union until 1990. In 1994, after he had shown nude pictures of himself in a gallery, the exhibition was closed the next day.

In 1994 he came to New York State with the grant Light Work, Artist-in-Residence program from Syracuse University and in 1996 he came to Germany for the first time with a grant from the Landeskulturzentrum Salzau . From 1996 to 1997 he came to Berlin on a DAAD scholarship and in 1997 received another scholarship from the Bavarian capital of Munich .

His Yesterday's Sandwich series features double exposures. According to the newspaper Die Zeit, his own gaze gives the pictures “something poetic, sometimes crazy”.

The series "Salt Lake" (1986) shows people near Slovyansk bathing in a lake surrounded by factories.

In the series "I'm Not Me" (1992), Mikhailov photographed himself naked with an oversized dildo or an enema in various poses.

Sometimes he colored his pictures or painted them over with colored pencils, wrote under and on the pictures or made collages .

After the collapse of the Soviet Union , Mikhailov became internationally known for his pictures of homeless people, including the elderly, the sick and children, taken in the late 1990s, and some people - for a fee - photographed naked. He was accused of using arms for his 400-picture series Case History (1997-99, translated as “medical history” or occasionally “case studies”).

Today Mikhailov is considered one of the most respected artists from the former Soviet Union. Museums are said to have paid 100,000 euros for his early original series.

He has received several awards, including the Albert Renger Patzsch Prize in 1997 , the Hasselblad Foundation Award in 2000 and the Spectrum - International Prize for Photography from the Lower Saxony Foundation in 2012 . In 2015 he received the Kaiserring of the city of Goslar , one of the most prestigious awards for contemporary art. The laudation was given by Udo Kittelmann, Director of the National Gallery, Berlin.

Boris Mikhailov has been a member of the Academy of Arts , Fine Arts section, since 2008 .

He lives with his wife Vita Mikhailov in Charkow and Berlin.

Works (selection)

• Butterbrote von Gestern (also cross-fades) / Yesterday's Sandwich , late 1960s to late 1970s
• Calendar ( also calendar sheets ) / Calendar , late 1960s
• Color Backgrounds , late 1960s
• Susi and others / Suzi et Cetera , late 1960s - 1970s
• Rot (also Rote Serie ) / Red , 1968–1975
• Die Stadt / Schwarzes Archiv / City / Black Archive , 1968–1979
• Luriki , 1971–1985
• SOZ-ART / SOTS-ART , 1975-1986
• Dance , 1978
• Berdianski Beach. Sunday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. / Berdiansk Beach. Sunday from 11 am to 1 pm , 1981
• Snobbery in the Crimea (also Krimeischer Snobism ) / Crimean Snobbery , 1982
• Horizontal Pictures, Vertical Calendars , 1982
• Stickiness / Viscidity , 1982
• Series of Four , 1982/83
• Unfinished dissertation or discussions with oneself , 1984–1985
• SOVOK , 1985-1988
• Salt lakes , 1986
• Flussidyll / River Pastorale , 1986
• City without Central Street , 1986–87
• Am Boden / By the Gound , 1991
• I am not I / I am not I , 1992
• Twilight / At Dusk , 1993
• If I Were a German ... , 1994
• Photomania in Crimea / Photomania in Crimea , 1995
• Medical history (also case history ) / Case History , 1997–1999
• Look at me, I look at the water or perversion of repose / Look at me I look at water… or Perversion of repose , 1999
• TV mania / TV mania , 2000-02
• Tea Coffee Cappuccino , 2000-2010
• Maquette Braunschweig , 2008-09
• Structures of madness, or why shepherds living in the mountains often go crazy , 2011–2012
• When my mother was young / When my mother was young , 2011–2013

Publications by and about Boris Mikhailov (selection)

• Brigitte Kölle (Ed.): Boris Michaijlov. Stuttgart, 1995, ISBN 3-89611-001-2
• Inka Schube (Ed.): If I were a German ..., Dresden, 1995, ISBN 3-364-00352-1
• Boris Michajlov: On the ground. The dawn. (2 volumes) Cologne, 1996, ISBN 3-927789-91-7
• Boris Mikhailov: Unfinished Dissertation. Zurich, 1998, ISBN 3-908247-01-2
• Boris Mikhailov: Case History. 1999, Zurich, ISBN 3-908247-09-8
• Wolfgang Storch (ed.): Outer calm. In: IG Druck-Ding: Information from the printing and paper industry union for colleagues at GWP. NF, 4. Düsseldorf, 2000. ISBN 3-933807-21-2
• Gunilla Knape (Ed.): The Hasselblad Award 2000. Zurich, 2000. ISBN 3-908247-42-X
• Urs Stahel (ed.): A retrospective. Exhibition catalog, Zurich, 2003, ISBN 9783908247722
• Boris Mikhailov: Look at me I look at water. . . or Perversion of Repose. Göttingen, 2004, ISBN 9783882439687
• Margarita Tupitsyn et al .: Ilya Kabakov, Boris Mikhailov and the Moscow Archive of New Art. Serralves, 2004, ISBN 9789727391332
• Boris Mikhailov: Crimean snobism. Tokyo, 2006, ISBN 9111002166
• Boris Mikhailov: Suzi et cetera. Cologne, 2006. ISBN 978-3908247722
• Boris Mikhailov: Yesterday's Sandwich. London, 2007, ISBN 978-0714848563
• Boris Mikhaiov: Maquette Braunschweig. Göttingen, 2010, ISBN 978-3-86521-834-6
• Boris Mikhailov: Tea Coffee Cappuccino. Cologne, 2010, ISBN 978-3-86560-877-2
• Berlinische Galerie (Ed.): Boris Mikhailov, time is out of joint. Exhibition catalog, Berlin, 2010, ISBN 978-3-942405-64-5
• Inka Schube (Ed.): Boris Mikhailov, Bücher, Books. Cologne, 2013, ISBN 978-3-86335-303-2
• Boris Mikhailov: Emperor's Ring Bearer of the City of Goslar 2015 , Mönchehaus Museum Goslar , 2015

Solo exhibitions (selection)

• 2019 "Boris Mikhailov", c / o Berlin, Berlin, Germany,
• 2015 "io non sono io", Museo Madre, Naples, Italy
• 2015 "Profiles and ...", Barbara Gross Galerie, Munich
• 2015 "Boris Mikhailov - Goslar Emperor's Ring Bearer 2015", Mönchshaus Museum Goslar
• 2015 "Boris Mikhailov. Ukraine", Camera, Centro Italiano per la Fotografia, Turin, Italy
• 2013: Sprengel Museum Hannover 'Spectrum' International Prize for Photography from the Lower Saxony Foundation: Boris Mikhailov. The books 1968-2012.
• 2012: Berlinische Galerie , Berlin; Boris Mikhailov: Time is out of joint. Photographs 1966 - 2011
• 2011: Case History Museum of Modern Art , New York
• 2007: Look at me, I look at the water, or perversion of calm , Sprengel Museum Hannover; Barbara Gross Gallery, Munich; Rat Hole Gallery, Tokyo
• 2005: Center de la Photographie, Geneve, France; Look at me, I look at water ; Foam Photography Museum, Amsterdam
• 2004: Kunsthalle Villa Kobe , Halle (Saale); Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston MA, USA
• 2003: Private joys, burdensome boredom, public decay , Fotomuseum Winterthur
• 2001: House of World Cultures, Berlin; Case History and Heiner Müller Project
• 2000: Saatchi Gallery, London, UK
• 1999: Case History , DAAD Gallery, Berlin; Scalo Gallery, Zurich
• 1998 Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Les Misérables , Sprengel Museum Hannover; Nobuyoshi Araki & Boris Mikhailov, Satani Gallery, Tokyo
• 1997: Photomania, DAAD Gallery, Berlin; Crimean Grafomania, gallery in the bread factory, Berlin;
• 1996: Kunsthalle Zurich; Boris Mikhailov - A Retrospective , Soros Center of Contemporary Art, Kiev, Ukraine
• 1994: Twilight , Brotfabrik Berlin at the Photo Festival Rotterdam
• 1993: Salt Lakes , gallery in the Berlin bread factory
• 1992: Works from 1970 to 1991, Forum Stadtpark , Graz
• 1990: Museum of Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv
• 1990: Boris Mikhailov: Arles - Paris 1989 , signal halls, Armémuseum, Stockholm
• 1990: The Missing Picture , Alternative Contemporary Photography from the Soviet Union, List Visual Arts Center, MIT, Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge Union Bank Collection, Helsinki

Awards

• 1996: Coutts Contemporary Art Foundation Award , Zurich
• 1997: Albert Renger Patzsch Prize from the Dietrich Oppenberg Foundation
• 2000: The Hasselblad Award in Photography, Göteborg, Sweden
• 2001: Citibank Photography Prize
• 2000: Photo Book Prize of the Krazna-Krausz Foundation, London ( Kraszna-Krausz Book Award ) for Case History
• 2003: General Satellite corporation art prize , (contribution on the development of contemporary art in Moscow)
• 2012: Spectrum - International Prize for Photography from the Lower Saxony Foundation
• 2015: Goslarer Kaiserring

Quote

"The fight against uniform social taste, the abolition of taboos and the search for the truth require new forms of expression."

- from: Brigitte Kölle (Ed.): Boris Michaijlov. Stuttgart, 1995

Web links

• Literature by and about Boris Mikhailov in the catalog of the German National Library
• Christine Mefferet, Die Zeit : Photo Art. Boris Mikhailov , October 10, 2007
• Ingeborg Ruthe, Berliner Zeitung : Disabled in an unarmed war , February 23, 2012
• Video , lecture Boris Mikhailov in the Sprengel Museum Hannover, 2013
• Boris Mikhailov at Barbara Gross Galerie, Munich, [1]
• Boris Mikhailov at Galerie Suzanne Tarasieve, Paris, [2]
• Interview Boris Mikhailov with Martha Gnyp [3] , January 2012

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Munzinger archive online: Boris Mikhailov, Ukrainian photographer , accessed on February 17, 2014
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g} art - the art magazine : Boris Mikhailov - Hanover - everyday life, art and contradiction ( Memento of the original from April 12, 2013 in the web archive archive.today ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , March 6, 2013 
3. ↑ Deutschlandradio Kultur : The Photographer of the Homeless , February 23, 2012
4. ↑ ^{a b c d e} The time : photo art. Boris Mikhailov , October 5, 2007
5. ↑ ^{a b c d} Academy of Arts : Boris Mikhailov , accessed on February 22, 2014
6. ↑ ^{a b} DAAD magazine: Photo artist Boris Mikhailov. Between Berlin and Kharkov , April 13, 2012
7. ↑ paris-art, 2012
8. ↑ The Globalist 27.5.2002, ev. By Friedrich Meschede
9. ↑ http://www.moenchehaus.de/kaiserring/boris-mikhailov/