Ирина Цезарь

IRENE CAESAR (Ирина Цезарь) PRESS RELEASE Irene Caesar, Ph.D. is a well-known American / Russian artist, poet and philosopher based in New York. In the late 1980's, her art and esoteric philosophy become widely known in Russia via the series of solo exhibitions in Russian Museums, two documentary films about her art on all-Russia and St. Petersburg TV, via the series of TV shows about her art, radio interviews and numerous articles in major Russian newspapers. She participated in the dissident movement against the communist regime, and was invited to make a speech at the founding conference of the Free Democratic Party of Russia in the days of the 1991 Putsch. She left Russia in 1994 with a visa O of extraordinary ability on the invitation of Chuck Levitan Gallery. She is a mid-career artist with gallery representation all over the world and her art work is in four American Museums: Zimmerli Museum at Rutgers University, Bayly Museum at the University of Virginia, and the Duke University Museum of Art, and MORA (Museum of Russian Art in New Jersey). Ирина Цезарь (Доктор философии) является известным русским художником, поэтом и философом, живущим в Нью-Йорке. В конце 1980 годов ее искусство и эзотерическая философия стали широко известны в России по серии персональных выставок в русских музеях, двум документальным фильмам о ее искусстве на Всероссийском и Санкт-Петербургском телевидении, по серии телевизионных передач о ее искусстве, радио-интервью и многочисленным статьям в ведущих русских газетах. Она участвовала в диссидентском движении против коммунистического режима, и была приглашена выступить с речью на Учредительной Конференции Свободно-демократической Партии России в дни Путча 1991 г. Она покинула Россию в 1994 г. по визе "О" для выдающихся деятелей культуры, по приглашению галереи Чака Левитана в Сохо, Нью-Йорке. Она является зрелым художником, представлненным галереями по всему миру. Её работы находятся в коллекциях четырёх американских музеев: Циммерли Музея при университете Ратгерс, Музея Бейли университета Верджинии и Музея университета Дюк, и в МОРА (Музей Русского Искусства в Нью-Джерси). Irene Caesar, Ph.D. is a conceptual artist-provocateur who creates ideological and aesthetic subversions via absurd performances documented by photography to put to the test major concepts of human civilization. She bases her aesthetics upon staging role-games, which express some concept in a metaphorical, symbolic or aphoristic way via making participants interact with some symbolic object or prop, with themselves, or between each other in some very intense or boundary situations – all thoroughly absurd and pushing participants out of the ordinary or acceptable way of behavior toward revelatory experience. http://www.irenecaesar.com For her publications, exhibitions, and collections, please refer to the "Archive" section of her website. The archive has links to all the recent news, critical reviews, press releases, interview and gallery talks, including her August 2010 interview for NTV America, November and December interviews for TV3 Boston, and the photo-reportage of her November 2009 solo show at the Aragon Gallery / Orensanz Art Foundation Gallery, SoHo, NYC. Irene Caesar has a coming art show and lecture at the Harriman Institute, Columbia University, NYC (Spring 2012) presenting series "Dissent" and its appearance in the film "Dissidents" by Victor Balashov (an important Soviet-era dissident and political prisoner), done in collaboration with Irene Caesar as photography director; one-page article in "Nezavisimaja Gazeta" about Irene Caesar; lectures at the University Miguel Hernández de Elche, Spain, at their Altea Campus dedicated exclusively to arts (2012); participation in a group show at MORA (Museum of Russian Art in Jersey City, NJ) in October 2011; and a solo show at ERARTA, St. Petersburg, the biggest non-governmental Museum of Art in Russia (March, 2012). From September 17 to October 16, 2011, Irene Caesar participates in the group show “Human Rights?”, Rovereto, Italy, organized by the Spazio Tempo Arte and the Peace Bell Foundation - “Opera Campana dei caduti Maria Dolens”: http://www.robertoronca.com/eventi/hr2011.htm In the Spring of 2012, Irene Caesar participates in ONE SHOT group show at the Palazzo Ducale, Venice, curated by Chiara Casarin, under the patronage of UNICEF, MUSOCO, Emergency, Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali (MIBAC), Regione Veneto, Provincia di Venezia, Comune di Venezia. On August 9th, 2011, Irene Caesar gave an interview to Dmitry Volchek "Non-conformism is Alive" on “Radio Svoboda (Freedom)” in the Program "Above Barriers" on her project "Dissent" - portraits of dissidents in the style of dissent, and its appearance in the film "Dissidents" by Victor Balashov (an important Soviet-era dissident and political prisoner), done in collaboration with Irene Caesar as photography director: http://www.svobodanews.ru/content/transcript/24300132.html Sound for the interview: http://www.svobodanews.ru/audio/audio/322444.html In May-June 2011, Irene Caesar participated in the major group show at the Chelsea Art Museum "Concerning the Spiritual Tradition in Russian Art," Selections from the Kolodzei Art Foundation Collection of Russian and Eastern European Art (Curated by Natalia Kolodzei), alongside such artists as Mihail Chemiakin, Komar and Melamid, Oscar Rabin, Vladimir Ovchinnikov, Dmitri Plavinsky, Ernst Neizvestny, and Natalia Nesterova: http://www.chelseaartmuseum.org/portfolios/concerning-the-spiritual-tradition-in-russian-art-selections-from-the-kolodzei-art-foundation/ "Madonna Liberated" and "Salvation Now" by Irene Caesar make their appearance, along a few others, in the video by the “Voice of America,” recorded at the opening of the group show of forty artists "Concerning the Spiritual Tradition in Russian Art: Selections from the Kolodzei Art Foundation" in the Chelsea Art Museum (Apr. 14-May 5th), NY, where Irene Caesar participates with these two works: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLY1LvGJn_0&feature=player_embedded In May 2011, Irene Caesar participated in Artantique Art Fair in Utrecht, Netherlands, represented by Eduard Planting Gallery: http://www.galeries.nl/beurs.asp?beursnr=560 In 2010, Irene Caesar participated in two major group shows “New Vision” and “Conceptual Russian Games” at the Alexandre Gertsman Gallery, SoHo, NYC, alongside such artists as Komar & Melamid, Grisha Bruskin, and Natalia Nesterova: http://agcontemporaryart.com/pastexib.html Her recent projects include "A New History of Ideas in Pictures," "Counter Portraits," "People of Art as Objects of Art," and “Dissent.” “Dissent” represents portraits of dissidents in the style of dissent, including such renowned Soviet-era dissidents as Elena Bonner, Pavel Litvinov, Alexander Esenin-Volpin, Andrey Grigorenko, Father Michael Meerson, and others. The stills from this series constitute a part of the experimental film project by Victor Balashov (an important Soviet-era dissident and political prisoner) “Dissidents,” for which Irene Caesar is a co-partner / photography director: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11VOfCE9FFM&feature=channel_video_title The film, still in making, is the original video and photo archive of the intellectual dissent history and underground culture in ex USSR. Video film “Irene Caesar makes her statement about the concept of her project “Dissent:” http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xk3xea_dissident-cinema-project-irene-caesar-photograpy-director_creation http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=POpbKi0FvL4 Video film “Irene Caesar shooting Father Michael Meerson for the film “Dissidents”: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xjv2kh_irene-caesar-shooting-the-priest_news "A New History of Ideas in Pictures" creates some kind of conceptual encyclopedia in the form of staged and photographed role-games testing the most general concepts of human culture, such as human nature and the origin of man, the sacred and the profane, the universal good and evil, the Divine father and the Divine mother, the sublime and the bestial, race, social modes, gender and its ambiguities, ego and alter-ego, fetish, super-hero, objectification of women, modes of mass consciousness like modes of seriality and patriarchal domination, modes of inferiority and suffering, and attitudes towards death: http://www.irenecaesar.com/a_new_history_of_ideas_in_pictures/ as video: http://vimeo.com/9556599 "Counter Portraits" represents portrait as an absurd performance documented by photography: http://www.irenecaesar.com/counter_portraits/ as video: http://vimeo.com/15853457 "People of Art as Objects of Art" includes conceptual portraits of art crowd, featuring "Arthur Danto with Wise Puffy Cheese Doodles". This project validates the major art concepts of the 20th century by making some important artists and art critics enact some art concept via creating an art piece in front of the camera. Among the participants are Arthur Danto, Vadim Perelman, Vitaly Komar, Alexander Melamid, Dan Cameron, John Haber, David Gibson, Larry Litt, Carter Ratcliff, and others. http://www.irenecaesar.com/people_of_art_as_objects_of_art/ as video: http://vimeo.com/15851829 2011 interview: The Art Assassin 2 -

a nonfiction novel by Albert Wang in the form of interviews with artists “A Portrait of the Artist as Joan of Arc, or the Ideological Provocateur: Irene Caesar, Artist Represented by Alexandre Gertsman Gallery:” http://theartassassin2.wordpress.com/2011/05/14/assassination-irene-caesar-artist-represented-by-alexandre-gertsman-gallery/ 2011 Interview for RUNY Web: “My Ideological Struggle:” http://www.runyweb.com/articles/culture/art/irene-caesar-interview.html Portrait of Edmund Voyer, the Prior of Knights Templar, NYC, by Irene Caesar appears on the cover of the book by Ekaterina Dais "John Fowles and mysterial tradition" (published April 2011). The book is included in the list of the best books of the last week of April by the "Nezavisimaia Gazeta": http://exlibris.ng.ru/five /2011-04-21/1_fbook.html The November 2010 interview for TV3 Boston with Elena Neva “Meeting Interesting People”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D612JSVMZEY The November 2010 interview for TV3 Boston with Elena Neva “Russian Time”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-d9mHyAb_w Arthur Danto, a world-famous art critic, on Irene Caesar (2010): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aK1cSrzBrGY 2010 Interview for Responses at Wanderlustmind: http://wanderlustmind.com/2010/08/20/irene-caesar/ 2010 Interview for NTV-AMERICA: Mikhail Gusev interviews Irene Caesar for the Program PERSONA GRATA: http://vimeo.com/14454945 2010 Review of Irene Caesar’s Project “People of Art as Objects of Art” by John Haber, NEW.YORK.ART.CRIT.: “Critic Victorious:” http://www.haberarts.com/ubarth.htm 2010 Interview for In To Views: http://intoviews.wordpress.com/2010/01/27/irene-caesar/ Ekaterina Dais, "The Return of The Great Goddess," essay about Irene Caesar, magazine LADY BOSS, #14, July 2010, p. 44. Doctoral dissertation by Irene Caesar, Ph.D. “WHY WE SHOULD NOT BE UNHAPPY ABOUT HAPPINESS VIA ARISTOTLE: The functionalist account of Aristotle’s notion of eudaimonia” is published as a book by Lambert Academic Publishing (Germany), ISBN-10: 3838344995 / ISBN-13: 978-3838344997: http://www.amazon.com/SHOULD-UNHAPPY-ABOUT-HAPPINESS-ARISTOTLE/dp/3838344995 2009 VASA Gallery talk: http://vasa-project.com/archive/video/caesar.html November 2009 Solo Show at the Aragon Gallery / Angel Orensanz Foundation, NYC “A New History of Ideas in Pictures”: http://artscapeweb.com/orensanznews/irenecaesarinvite.html