Andrey Filippov’s posthumous exhibition explains why the world is collapsing

“Mene, tekel, fares” – these words from the Old Testament book of the prophet Daniel are written in Hebrew in orange-red on the gray gallery wall. It is worth taking a closer look, and it becomes clear that the letters are made up of small double-headed eagles.

The coat of arms, which became the symbol of the Russian state under Ivan III, has ancient roots. The symbol came to Rus’ from Byzantium when the Russian Tsar married Sophia Paleolog, but back in the 4th century, an eagle with two heads was the personal totem of the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great.

The image of a double-headed eagle appeared in the work of Andrei Filippov back in the 1980s – it either appeared in his works as a large ferocious bird, or turned into pixels with which the artist wrote words or phrases. The author himself called his “eagles” a “social mutation”, which indicates a “doubled consciousness”. For Filippov, the transformation of something big and great into a word-forming element was a kind of alchemy. The magic of the author’s handwriting is paradoxical: the appeal to “eternal values” does not go into pompous pathos, while not slipping into mocking irony. Filippov analyzes the collective and personal “I” from the point of view of global history, philosophy, religion and finds answers to the questions of today in ancient texts.

“Mene, tekel, fares” is the most famous “cryptogram” in the Bible – and the most mysterious. She refers to the story that happened, according to the biblical parable, in the midst of the feast of the king of Babylon, Belshazzar. During the last feast before the capture of the city by the Persians, the king drank and ate with his courtiers, and when the dishes for wine ran out, he sent servants to the temple to fetch the vessels.

When wine was poured into the sacred vessels, a divine hand appeared in the air, which inscribed a fiery inscription of three words. “Me – God has numbered your kingdom and put an end to it; tekel – you are weighed and found very light; Peres – your kingdom is divided and given to the Medes and Persians ”- this is how it is interpreted in the book of the prophet Daniel.

This biblical story was repeatedly addressed by artists of the past – among them the most famous work belongs to the brush of Rembrandt. For the Dutch artist, a new creative period began with her – he painted the painting “Belshazzar’s Feast” in 1635, a year after the wedding, just after it, orders fell on the master one after another. The founder of the art space, Elena Kuprina-Lyakhovich, is sure that Filippov’s new installation could also become a new chapter in the work of the Russian conceptualist. But fate decreed otherwise.

– When the pandemic began, we moved to the country. Andrei was finishing these works, he decided to distract himself and take a walk, – says the widow of the artist Marina Mavropulo. – He returned, and, only going into the gate, he died. He died suddenly and instantly.

A strange coincidence: Andrey Filippov was born in the city of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, and he died on the day of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, whose ashes are kept in Rome (“To Rome – Rome” is one of the most famous works of the artist), under Emperor Constantine ( whose totem, as we remember, was a double-headed eagle), the first temples were built in honor of these saints.

The first posthumous exhibition of the artist is supplemented by old works. One of them is the “Old Testament”, where the melted wax of an extinct candle covers the sacred book. Another illustrates the Revelation of St. John the Theologian: on a black background, white “eagles” are inscribed with a reference to chapter 22.5 (“And there will be no night there, and they will not need a lamp or sunlight, for the Lord God illuminates them; and they will reign till the end of time”).

Another painting from the Dead Sea series depicts a stone woman in blue tones – this is a reference to the story of Lot’s wife, who turned into a pillar of salt, violating the command of God.

Finally, a small work represents an eagle swimming on a mirror surface. This metaphor also has a practical function: it is a sundial. This is one of the most famous works of Filippov called “Gnomon” – in a large format it is installed in the Orthodox Academy on the island of Crete. Last year, one of its versions stood in front of the Kremlin on Red Square.

But the main work is located directly below the “fiery inscription”: it is a series of seven paintings, each of which depicts one of the deadly sins. Their names are derived by the same pixel eagles in Latin. Each plot is written against the backdrop of a blue Babylonian battlement. Each picture contains its own set of images-symbols that can be read like a gospel verse.

For example, envy. Here, among other objects, on the red table lies the jaw of a donkey – according to one of the legends, it was with this object that Cain killed Abel. Lust in another picture is personified by various objects, among them the unobvious one is a sea shell, a symbol of vanity and futility. On the canvas about pride, Babylon appears in the wall opening – an unfinished tower, during the construction of which God divided the peoples by misunderstanding – then, according to the Bible, people began to speak different languages.

– Andrey continued to live in Byzantium – he looked at everything from a height of 2000 years. His works are not only related to Russian statehood, it is much broader and deeper,” says gallery owner and curator of the exhibition Elena Kuprina-Lyakhovich, who inspired Filippov to this series a year ago. – His latest work is not a prophecy, but the situation of today. Today we are like in the Tower of Babel – in a situation of separation. Consent on earth will not come until people think about a serious fight against mortal sins. Andrei felt that the world was changing, the world system was collapsing, because it did not stand on divine principles.