Dostoevsky-Trip: Vladimir Sorokin

Novoriznica Gallery Belgrade

About the Exhibition

Vladimir Sorokin is one of the key contemporary intellectuals, known for his deep and precise understanding of life, whose books have been translated into dozens of languages. His literary work is famous for its stylistic variety, deconstruction of linguistic and social codes, attention to power mechanisms, and social transformations. Sorokin is less known as an artist who turns to visual art. The Dostoevsky-Trip exhibition represents this aspect of his talent.

Sorokin's graphics are important and understandable. As an artist, he has designed around fifty publications and has extended this practice far beyond book design. In the last decade alone, three of his series inspired by the Russian literary tradition have been presented in Berlin, Tallinn, and Cannes. Such consistent and thoughtful attention to graphics indicates that it is not only a field of formal experimentation for Sorokin but also a unique tool for artistic exploration — an opportunity to capture and make sense of what does not always find adequate expression in other forms. The exhibition in Belgrade is the next step on this path.

The phenomenon of a writer professionally engaging in visual art is not uncommon. One can recall the drawings of Victor Hugo, the engravings of William Blake, the watercolors of Hermann Hesse, the graphics or sculptures of Günter Grass. The link between literary and artistic practices in such authors manifests differently: for some, visual art is a parallel form of self-expression, for others, a direct continuation of literary themes. Vladimir Sorokin's case is unique in that fully understanding his intention is impossible, and probably not necessary. It is best to simply trust the author and immerse yourself in the visible, following him wherever it may lead you.

The exhibition's title refers to the play of the same name from 1997, in which the characters experience a psychedelic trip under the influence of the drug 'Dostoevsky.' The exhibition offers not an academic study or homage, but an intense, possibly disorienting experience of encountering the world under the influence of Dostoevsky. The works represent a fixation of the powerful, almost toxic impact of literature and, more broadly, art on a person. Art cannot describe the trip; it can only be the trip itself. Sorokin does not illustrate Dostoevsky; he uses his texts and myths about him as material for his own visual journey. He isolates obsessive ideas, existential questions, cultural archetypes, and dresses them in a concise yet profound visual form.

Vladimir Sorokin's artistic practice is largely formed by his involvement in the circle of Moscow conceptualism in the 1970s and 1980s. Its participants considered language — whether the language of ideology or everyday life — and its relationship to reality as important subjects of their interest. A similar interest provides the context for understanding all of Sorokin's visual works, including those presented in the exhibition.

The new works consist of lines, texts, and collage elements. The line is dynamic: vibrating, it outlines vase contours and grows thorny stems, conveying a sense of instability and tension. Handwritten fragments from Dostoevsky's books ('Shall I sink into the earth, or not be served tea?', 'The man is wide; I, narrow,' etc.) become independent visual elements, defining the tonality and mood. The text functions simultaneously as a carrier of meaning and as a plastic sign woven into the composition, establishing rhythm and texture. This graphic basis is sometimes complemented by collage — the artist includes images literally cut out from another context. For example, the recognizable figure of Vasilisa the Beautiful created by Ivan Bilibin. By placing the heroine of Russian fairy tales next to Dostoevsky, reminiscent of a zombie, surrounding them with texts, and showing how they grow from numbered vases, Sorokin creates a complex palimpsest, bringing together different cultural layers: the epic novel, folklore, the aesthetics of modernism, and conceptualism.

Vladimir Sorokin's approach to visual art — working with quotations, appropriation, collage thinking, conceptually using text, creating hybrid, paradoxical images — aligns with contemporary artistic strategies that explore the mechanisms of culture, memory, and language.

book graphics / free admission