Vladimir Potapov

T

he sculptor, who works in bronze, has a wide creative range. He authored the whole series of sculptures of Russian prominent artists, with Russia’s great actress Maria Ermolova, brilliant dancer Alexander Godunov and unrivaled variety performer Arkady Raikin being among them. Together with Katib Mamedov as his co-author Oleg Zakomorny did the proud eagle that crowns the cascade fountain near Moscow’s Orlenok hotel. His animalistic sculptures are always a zest of any landscape design. And the Ballet magazine, Russian choreographic association and Federation of gymnastics present copies of his works Soul of Dance and Alba as their annual awards.
Experts are lost in debates over the creative style of Oleg Zakomorny. Some emphasize his interest in mixing different styles in sculptures through various ways of material processing and using glyphic patterns. Others consider the principal peculiarity of his plasticity being significantly laconic and, at the same time, free-flowing in the modernist way. Still there are those, who find signs of Zakomorny, the graphic artist, in works by Zakomorny, the sculptor: the use of lines that suddenly go across the sculpture and have an effect of ‘turning the unmediated form into the mediated symbol’…
Oleg himself finds it difficult to define his own style rightfully considering it the task of fine art experts. But, nevertheless, he thinks of himself as a realism-style artist: "I was taught this way, that is the way I see things around, that is the way I feel about the beauty enclosed in them".
He belongs to those contemporary creative youths that, while giving their due to creative works and merits of ‘the venerable’ artists, stick to the biblical truth: "make an idol of no one’. "One can list quite a few works of great talent that do credit to and make famous those, who created them. But they all are excellent in their own way and they are beautiful precisely because of their uniqueness. Every artist seeks to give his own interpretation to the subject, he sees the beautiful his own way and reflects it in his works. In my opinion, that is what the art truly means", says Oleg explaining his position.
…The start of the 1970s, the city of Novosibirsk. An ordinary family of engineers. Georgy and Natalia Zakomorny noticed that their little son Oleg started preferring
modeling to all other toys. Soon all bookshelves in the house were completely filled with figures of animals that Oleg spent hours watching in a zoo and that he molded himself.
Probably, nothing but those bright memories dating back to his childhood brought him fame as a master of the animalistic genre. The vital wild force is spread by his works that in one case depict a lair with a she-wolf and wolf-cubs (‘The She-Wolf’) and, in another case, a panther with panther-cubs on a tree (‘The Panther’). The plastic expression and the internal dynamics are the characteristic features of his sculptors ‘The Wolf’, "The Bear and The Bull’, ‘The Antelope’ while his ‘Flamingo’ sculpture features the daintiness of lines and proportions. "You cannot meet my animals in real life", Oleg admits. "I create the generalized image, the impression, the vision… I think that there can be no mechanical soulless copying in the art. Each of my works is a piece of life".
Soon after the Zakomorny family moved from Siberia to the Ukrainian city of Kharkov, six-year old Oleg was brought to a local arts school, which he attended until his teachers said that "the bar here is already too low for the kid". That was when the parents of the future sculptor had to make the principal decision that determined their son’s destiny. It required a lot of self-sacrifice on their part. And, his tender age notwithstanding, Oleg himself had to show his willpower, perseverance and, to put it straight, the real courage. The ‘bar’ that he wanted to clear was high: to get enrolled in Moscow’s arts school with the USSR Academy of Arts. If the parents were to take care of implementing the organizational part of the bold plan, Oleg, in his turn, had to urgently learn the ways of working with clay, the material that was little known to him until then: this was one of the requirements, which had to be met by those, who wanted to participate in a tough creative contest. So, life trials like this made him morally stronger.
The country boy managed to overwhelm arts authorities. Subsequently, this experience of mental concentration and the ability to make vitally important decisions would serve him well many times over, both at the Surikov Moscow State Arts Institute and in professor L. Kerbel’s arts studio, where Oleg perfected his skill. It also helped Oleg a lot, when he graduated from the Institute and started the creative life on his own as he set up an independent arts studio refusing to get seduced by an opportunity to make a comfortable living in the shadows of the famous.
Oleg’s meeting with the outstanding Russian ballet dancer Olga Lepeshinskaya became a special landmark in his creative carrier: it was precisely she, who suggested ballet as a subject of his works. Lepeshinskaya herself characterized the sculptor as "an undoubtedly talented person": "He sees and feels the movement and he elegantly reproduces it. He fully appreciates what the human beauty is". It turned out that the ballerina was right to the point by defining the essence of Zakomorny’s gift this way.
Since the ballet is a fleeting, swift art, its duration as well as the perception of it are limited to a short stage act. "The moment of dancing, movement, gesture represents an instantly ready image. But one should manage to catch it", says Oleg. In the opinion of connoisseurs, he is very successful in this respect. The peculiarities of Oleg Zakomorny’s personal style such as the impeccability of lines, the contour expressiveness and the inborn sense of rhythm help him achieve the desired results. His Carmen, Gesel and other works of the ballet cycle vividly and naturally linked together the two kinds of arts in their plasticity.
When being in the sculptor’s hands, the bronze looks as if it loses its heaviness and mass showing just the softness and fluidity. This is the favorite material of the young master. The bronze quickly reacts to his concepts. And, in Oleg’s words, it is capable of giving a real pleasure because of the variety of solutions to realize conceived ideas. Even if the author repeats himself, his works, irrespective of their formal coincidence, are ingenious.
Every person changes quickly and Oleg is no exception. As an artist, as a personality. He is not afraid of repeating himself in his works because, as the sculptor admits, each moment is different, even if not much. Such is life…
Works by the new Zakomorny are waiting in the studio to be cast in bronze. His daughter Sophia is already one year old, although it feels like she is just born. The fatherhood has inspired Oleg with new creative ideas and it has showed the world’s new facets of the beautiful. And Oleg is ready to generously share with others everything that he has attained thanks to the magic of his hands.