Igor Kozlovsky (1960) Marina Sharapova (1956) Russia Painters

Igor Kozlovsky (1960) Marina Sharapova (1956) Russia
Working as a husband-and-wife team, the Russian-born duo Igor Kozlovsky and Marina Sharapova collaborate on each painting. Igor and Marina were rigorously taught the skills of the Old Renaissance Masters within their academic training at Mukhina Academy of Art and Design in St. Petersburg, Russia and learned to combine ancient and modern techniques with fluidity. As a result, the paintings are influenced by, and recall, a diverse spectrum of artists and eras: famous avant-garde figures like Chagall, Malevich, and Kandinsky as well as fifteenth-century Russian religious painters. Marina possesses an excellent subtle touch for realistic drawing and is capable of creating new images on the basis of the works of older artists, particularly those of the Italian and Dutch renaissance. Igor’s specialty is a subtle sense for color, a wonderful appreciation for the tactile nature of paint, canvas, and wood, and an intuitive feel for how to play with abstract images.In each of Igor and Marina’s paintings, a narrative seems to emerge—yet it always eludes us, like fragments of a dream upon waking. Just as dreams weave together disparate elements into a seamless experience, Igor and Marina merge the modern with the traditional, the representational with the abstract, and even their own contrasting personalities into each work. Their figures appear at once contemporary and historical—modern individuals draped in costumes of the past, or figures of another era transported into the present. With a masterful sense of the enigmatic, the seductive, and the dreamlike, Igor and Marina invite us to cross the threshold into their surreal, imagined world.