The day of the diplomat was marked by two exhibitions
Pictures from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Fund Exhibition – in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs building /in the cinema foyer/
The pictures from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Fund exhibition challenges the specialists to look at the Ministry’s Fund as an unique reflection of the respective period of time, the aesthetical criteria of generations of diplomats, the freedom in the means of expression and the sophistication in preserving the artist’s dignity in some very much controlled public space. The revealed in the exposition artistic genres are not only the product of a specialist’s conscientious professional technique, but a result as well of the institution’s attitude towards art and towards the spirit of the time. Some of these works are “rejected” by the opinions of today, not perceiving them as “high art”.
Compositions like “Family in front of the TV Set” by Georgi Petrov, “Three Weaving Women” by Nikola Nikolov, “Relief for the Povolzhieto” by Hristo Forev and “Women hoeing” by Georgi Kovachev reveal the flexibility of art during the time of socialism in relation to the mandatory social engagement in comparison with the purely artistic expression.
The landscapes play a significant role in putting social context in Bulgarian art. The industrial landscape, for example, reflects an important, socially-meaningful topic, in the semantic limits of which the figurative emphases are prompted by certain imagination and at the same time – by the determinant role of the environment.
“Kremikovtsi / April 1970” by Georgi Baev
“Industrial Landscape”, 1961 by Vladimir Goev
The exhibition contains one of the most admired by the institution genres – the classical landscape, which is a preferred interior in the offices and the public areas of the Ministry. That’s why “Fields” by Dimitar Panayotov is the only picture from this genre not acquired by the Fund.
In the Bulgarian visual culture the portrait has a peculiar fate. Greatly accepted in bourgeois Bulgaria as a society genre, it receives a diametrically opposite value with the establishment of the socialist realism. The anonymous (more than often) worker and the leader become dominant subjects, reflecting the changes in the social and cultural context.
“Portrait of a Worker”
“Lumber-jack”
The protocol character of the artistic Fund, be it of formal essence, is another tendency in the historic tradition of its creation. The pictures of foreign artists, presented on various official occasions, are as well a way of cultural worth exchange, an opportunity to popularize foreign art. The two works displayed in the exhibition, quite apart both in relation to the time of their creation and respectively to the time of their official “appearance” in the Fund, keep this tradition live even nowadays.
“Portrait of a Russian Pomeshchik” by А. Rozenberg
“Landscape with figures” - Jorge Fuentes, Ambassador of the Kingdom of Spain in Sofia, presented by him during his first term of office in Sofia in 1993.
The sculpture “Aleksandra” by Nikolay Shekerov represents the latest generation of Bulgarian artists. Nikolay Shekerov is a graduate in the National Academy of Arts, in the course of Tsvetoslav Hristov and Angel Stanev. The display of his work is part of the State Institute for Culture policy for promotion of talented young authors.
Contemporary art is depicted in the newer acquisitions of the Fund. During the last years, the Institute for Culture is engaged in active selection and collection of new works for the Fund of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs by buying out the works of young authors and established contemporary artists. Along with “The Blind Man” by the doyen of Bulgarian painting – academician Svetlin Rusev, the exhibition includes as well works by Nikolay Petkov and Asadur Markarov that challenge to some extend the dominating aesthetic tradition of the Fund, but open its horizon and mission for the popularization of today’s generation of talented Bulgarian artists.