A CONVERSATION WITH NORTON DODGE & VALENTIN POPOV   ND: Please let me start. I would like to go back and begin with your early years. My question is, were you interested in art through your father's occupation as an artist and professor of art, or was it the schooling and knowledge which you received later on? VP: Since my early childhood I would watch my father when he was drawing and painting. When I was young he did not have a studio, but worked at home. I was surrounded by art, but was never interested in it. When I was a child, it was actually torture for me pose for my father, it was the worst punishment. In art school in Kiev, children take an examination between 4th and 5th grade. My father would ask me, "Do you want to go to the art school?" and I said, "No, I don't want to be an artist." My family eventually moved to an apartment building where artists and their families lived. Some of my new friends went to art school and through the influence of these artistic friends I myself began to draw. I became excited about art not through my father, but through my friends. I realized then that I wanted to go to art school in the 7th grade. The art school made an exception for me and allowed me to enter, but I had to compete with students who had already studied art for three years. ND: It is interesting that you came to art through the influence of your friends but not through your father. VP: I was actually a good student in school, particularly in mathematics and physics. I was also always interested in biology and physics. My father gave up on me being an artist and thought that I should become an architect. I thought architecture even more boring than art. But by the 7th grade I had already made up my mind to become an artist. My father was very happy with this decision and found the time to spend with me because I wanted to learn from his experience in drawing. ND: In art school, were most of the exams on drawing and creating art? VP: Yes. We were given a certain amount of time for an exam. For example, we would walk into the classroom and there would be a copy of a Roman sculpture in the middle of the room. Our task was to make a still life with this sculpture as the main subject. It could be a drawing or a painting. In school, we had to be prepared for anything . ND: When you entered art school were you already experienced in watercolors and oil painting? VP: Yes. At that time I painted in oil, watercolors and drawings. ND: Did your father teach you? VP: Yes. First, my father and then I taught myself. My father still has many paintings which I made when I was a student. ND: You had a lot of training in various techniques in art school. Did you specialize in any one specific area, since I see that all of your early works are generally lithographs and etchings? VP: Yes. Everyone had to chose what he or she wanted to study after the 9th grade. The options were to specialize in either paintings or graphics - the two major subjects. I chose to join the Graphics Department. After I had graduated from school, I passed the exams and entered the Academy of Fine Arts. Then I studied in the Print Department from 1974 to 1980. Ukrainian and Russian art was very conservative at the time. Social Realism was popular, but it was boring to me. I wanted to avoid doing this type of work so I chose to specialize in book design because it gave me an enormous amount of freedom. I was illustrating Russian, European and American classical works and no longer limited by the boundaries of Socialist Realism. ND: So you did not need to paint Soviet Realism paintings?. VP: Exactly. Another option was to continue to study in the print department, but they forced you to do a particular type of composition. The Poster Department was an even a worse option if you wanted to get away from Soviet Realism. An advantage we had in the book designing department was that our works were relatively small in size and mostly in black and white. So it was much easier to enter works into big exhibitions without drawing too much attention. The big bold paintings drew much of the immediate response. If I had done exactly the same with painting as I did with illustrations I would never have been accepted into any exhibitions. ND: When did you do your first book illustrations? Did you do any while you lived in the Ukraine? VP: Yes. I did illustrations for numerous classical and contemporary Russian writers. I illustrated Shukshin, a very famous Russian writer and film maker who died quite young. I was accused that my illustrations were influenced by Chagall. They were very colorful with lots of spontaneous images. ND: So you were doing color illustrations at the time? VP: Yes, I was doing color particularly with gouache. ND: And was the book ever printed? VP: It was never printed. To get a work to a publisher is a different story. It was just part of the requirements for the academy. ND: So this was done while you were a student. VP: Yes. ND: Did you finish your formal training? VP: Yes, I finished in 1980. I then received a three year grant from the Academy of Fine Art of USSR. Then was awarded another grant for two years from the Association of Fine Art of the USSR. ND: Now I am looking at a few of the etchings which I have in my own collection. I have a number of etchings like "The Highest Mountain", which is dated 1985. In this etching, it seems as if the subject matter is a pile of very desperate things that have been thrown away or blown together by a tornado. Are these particular etchings being done for any assignment or is this your own independent creative work? VP: These are definitely my own independent work. These were done in Senej - an artist residence near Moscow. ND: So you worked in Senej? VP: In 1981 I was invited to participate in a group exhibition of graphic artists. As one of the youngest members of this group I completed a series of etchings entitled "Photograph of Ancient Kiev". My work was well received and I was invited often to Senej - almost every year. I later received a studio there. ND: You mentioned doing something on old Kiev. Is this one of the works from the series which I have in my collection? I found these extremely interesting. VP: Correct. In 1981 this work was very unusual and reproduced in a book entitled "Young Russian Artists". There was an interview on Moscow Central TV and some of the artists which were presenting this show mentioned my name and showed the work on the program. They mentioned that I was exhibiting these works in a print exhibition in the Ukraine. The second day of the exhibition, my works disappeared. I still cannot find out why they were taken. They were replaced by some socialist realism work. One person at the exhibition told me that the curator from the Communist party did not need to explain what had happened. ND: It sounds that when you came to this country you had the opportunity to sort of explore, experiment and perfect new techniques, but that you also found much greater freedom in terms of what you could do, exhibit and sell. So your situation as an artist was improved in a number of different dimensions when you moved here? VP:Yes. There were still some limitations. In Russia there were political limitations but here you have to deal with financial limitations. During the time of Perestroika many artists who were doing social realist art would wish that they had the freedom to do what they wanted. But then when Perestroika finally happened and artists got this freedom, they realized that they had the limitations of their own imagination, not just political limitations. They realized that they could not do anything at all. They could not make their own decisions as they were accustomed to control. It was much easier for them not to have to be creative than take a risk. It was interesting going back to visit Kiev and follow the development of Ukrainian Art. It was always social realism art. But now, since Perestroika, the artists there are creating anti-Communist art which has become the fashion. This is a different kind of fascism. I am very happy to be in this country because I am not in the mainstream. I like to be who I am. ND: When did you decide that you wanted to leave the Ukraine? VP: I really never thought of leaving Ukraine. But it was first in 1989 when two professors from Stanford University sponsored me to come to California. I received a call from the curator of the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco. He liked my work and wanted to meet me. He recommended me to two galleries, and I had my my first one man show in San Francisco. I then went back to the Ukraine to prepare for this show. Then I came back to San Francisco in 1990. I stayed for six months and spent a month in the Djerassi Residence program. I was also working at Magnolia Press learning about hand made paper. I made many friends and became accustomed to life in San Francisco. Then I went back to Kiev for another six months. Two more shows were scheduled for me in the United States. Things were becoming difficult in Kiev and I became more busy here. I finally understood that I did not really want to go back to Kiev. It was a dramatic realization because I had no intention to immigrate. ND: That's interesting because many people feel that they are under desperate circumstances there. In recent years it has been hard to make a living as an artist the way the conditions have deteriorated. So your case is unusual as it was a natural evolution; as things got worse in the Ukraine and you had more to do in the States. I am very interested to learn more about your collages. VP: Since I was young, I loved to collect old engravings and antique postcards and reproductions. In California, I continue to search at flea markets and antique stores for interesting old images which I use for my collages. I learned from a Japanese teacher in California about hand made paper. I begin by working the collage on the top of wet pulp. When the collage part is finished, the works go to a vacuum press and then to the hot press. The collage becomes one piece of paper by this process. It is then dried and covered with an acrylic mat medium and then dried again. Then I paint with oil colors, acrylic, silk-screen and other medium on top of the acrylic surface. I use the collage with this acrylic surface as my canvas. On some parts of the collage I paint opaque colors but primarily work in thin layers. It is a fascinating process and usually I am working on 4 to 6 collages at the same time. While they are drying, I work on the Rembrandt or Bosch oil painting reproductions on Plexiglas. I go from the oil paintings with fresh eyes back to the collages. I keep going back and forth, which creates the rich layers. When this is done, I install the Plexiglas plates and finish with silk-screening and handwriting of poetry. Then I install the grommets. It is a very complicated way of creating work and usually everything that I collect and find in my studio eventually gets put into the collages. It is a spontaneous process. ND: I see in one of your collages the word BRANDT. Is this actually printed on or is it also collage? VP: The letters BRANDT are painted on by hand. I use a very fine pigment which changes color when you change the angle at which you view it. The pigment is from a Swiss company and they use it for publishing currency. BRANDT comes from the word Rembrandt. I am also influenced by two Dutch artists at, (first name) Bosch and (first name) Breugel. ND: The actual painting of a Rembrandt on this collage - it looks as if it could be out of some art book and then transposed in the paper, so that it becomes part of the paper. VP: Yes, exactly. ND: The fist time that I saw these remarkable effects was when I saw your work at Mimi Ferzt Gallery. You had a number of collages on exhibition there. Then I met you at the reception of the "Torrents of Spring", which went back to a more classic etching technique. I have these etchings in my collection. Did you develop any new techniques in etching when you did the "Torrents of Sprint" VP: Yes. From 1980 to 1990 I was primarily doing etchings and concentrating on printmaking. I spent much of my time printing at Finesh. They have very good printmaking facilities. At some point though, I stopped doing just etchings because it is a very toxic and poisonous process. You can kill your lungs if there is no proper ventilation. You are working with all kinds of acids, turpentine's and acetone's. In the winter, Finesh is so cold, it is just a disaster. Also, etching is beautiful when you discover a number of techniques. There exist an enormous amount of techniques in etching, and I also began creating my own techniques. Etching is not only a creative process, it is also an intellectual process. When you work on an etching, you deal with the negative or mirror image. You also need to calculate how long the plate should be in acid in order to get the correct result and line quality. Then you have to keep an emotion about a piece for weeks until you have completed the etching. You do not see the result of your labor for one or two weeks. Until your idea is finally realized, there is a lot of stress. After etching for ten years I discovered that I wanted to work in a more spontaneous process. When you take a pencil and paper, you see the result immediately. I returned to drawing and painting. ND: You also did monotypes? Is this a more spontaneous process than etching? VP: Yes. In Russia I concentrated on etching. Then when I came to America, I was invited to do a monotype project with Smith Anderson Press in Palo Alto. At that point I had already begun to paint quite a lot. The monotype process to me was incredible and I worked eighteen hour days. From that point on I was in love with the monotype. However they are not colorful, primarily greys and greens, and my paintings are wonderfully rich with color. One of the reasons why I love collages is I combined all of these things in my collages, so it became a mixture of paper and color. This duality which I have inside of me began pushing me towards both painting and etching which I have married in my collages. ND: I now have questions about your Saint Batman project. Currently, Sots Art is a movement that has an ironical usage of Socialist Realism Art, where the political aspects of it are inspired by Pop Art. In the United States, there is the glorification of commodities with all of our advertising; and its counterparts in the Soviet Union, glorifying the party doctrines and policies of individual leaders. I was wondering whether you thought out your own usage of Batman. Maybe you call it Religious Art? Are you making fun of the United States, and our Batman? VP: A little bit of both. I was Russian Orthodox by baptism, and religion was prohibited during this time. I can't say that I am very religious, but I belong to the Russian Orthodox church. With my Saint Batman project, it was so much fun to take a big country such as the United States, and see this major hero acting as a Jesus; taking care of the problems of society. Therefore, I've created a religion of childhood - Batman comes to save the day! It turned out to become a huge project for me. ND: I was wondering, if as in the case of Sots Art, they tend to parody or be ironic about various Soviet leaders and slogans? I was also wondering if you might also go on to include Madonna or Charlie Chaplin, and the like? Did you decide to move on beyond Batman? VP: I have thought about it, but many symbols; like Mickey Mouse, Marilyn Monroe, and so on, have already been used by many artists. To my knowledge, nobody has used Batman very much. I was very happy to discover him, and I use this image as my symbol as much as I can. Other artists, like Andy Warhol, have also used many American symbols in their artwork. ND: But these artists have never created them in the same iconic form. VP: That's true. ND: So, are you adding a new message here? VP: I combine my American experience with my Russian orthodox background. I represent two different cultures. My life in Kiev and my six years here. I don't know the United States as well as the Ukraine but when I return from the Ukraine, I feel an alien. I'm not used to the mentality and the system there today. There have been a lot of changes in the Ukraine.