Exhibitions

The project is the visual reconstruction of the interior, fragments and images of a uninque space, rather irreal for a common viewer and at the same time existing in real life where the strange constructions, mechanisms, the "life" of manequinns and immersion suits are organized in the form of rituals whereas their environment bears reflections and signs of the passed events.

The project Emergency Ascent initially sprang from the impression of the interior of one of St.-Petersburg Orthodox churches (Church of the Icon of Mater Amabilis on Vassilievsky Island) where a training station for submariners was founded in 1930-ies. Author of the project, Zakhar Kolovsky, captured stage by stage each element of the space in full detail. All that was left from the past decoration of the church were fragments of marble facing and flaked plaster. Appliances for experimenting and training were costructed in side-altars. A place for a swimming pool was found, too. The focus of this complex was the deep diving and emergency ascent simulator rising up to the dome and embraced by the spiral stairs.
Zakhar Kolovsky's pictures, with their reportage veracity, form a story full of allusions when combined in multiparticulate compositions. Through a glass-pane door with broken cross we enter the space of the church. Dry texts of instructions instead of icons can be seen on the walls. The deep diving simulator strangely reminds of a chandelier: same form of rod with rings around it, corresponding scale and directly opposite meaning. As if the symbol of heavenly world were replaced by a volume imitating underwater space.
Such project would be in line for any postmodernist. But there is no place for any irony here, everything is for real. We face a unique example of a case when basic archetypes initially inherent to a sacral space transfer to objects heterogeous for it. The purposeless overlaying of meanings seems to have spiritualized this training station and turned it into a peculiar monument to the submarine force, its victories and tragedies.

Born in 1956.

1984 Graduates from Leningrad Polytechnic Institute, Control Automation Faculty.

2000 Graduates from Art History faculty of the St.-Petersburg Academy of Arts.

1986 Appointed General Director of St.-Petersburg branch of the A-Ya Society established by the Academy of Sciences and Moscow News office. Among the important institutes of St.-Petersburg art life established under the auspices of A-Ya are the Free Chair of Visual Art (1990), Contemporary Art Research Center (1991), Art Engineers school (1991), Sergei Kurekhin's Space Research Center (1991), Contemporary Art and Design Center (1991).

1995 Appointed Director of St.-Petersburg branch of the National Centre of Contemporary Art.

1996 exhibition «FLUXUS VIRUS». St.-Petersburg – Moscow.

Projects created in partnership with ARS BALTICA international cultural organization:

• 1996 ARS BALTICA – TRIENNALE DER PHOTOKUNST. Helsinki-Berlin.

• 1998 Kaliningrad – Koenigsberg, the Fifth International Biennial of Graphics in the Baltic States, Kaliningrad.

• 1998 Baltic Photography School established in St.-Petersburg with active participation of Z.Kolovsky. The Baltic Photoschool is a unique educational structure for young photographers allowing them to learn from the experience of well known international and national masters through a series of lectures and practical seminars.

1996 Becomes Director of the Contemporary Art Project Curators School in St.-Petersburg.
One of the many educational programs of the School is Use of Information Systems and Internet Resources for the Preparation and Implementation of Contemporary Art Projects (1999).
School graduates take part in a number of outstanding projects including Yellow Movement, the exhibition of Vladimir Zagorov in the State Russian Museum (1997).

2002 Appointed Director of the National Centre of Photography established in St.-Petersburg.
Some of the Centre's projects:

• 2004

Crimean Album, exhibition and research project, in collaboration with St.-Petersburg Archive of Cinematic and Photographic Documents and the Photo-archive of the Institute of Material Culture History at the Russian Academy of Sciences (St.-Petersburg branch).

New Digital Age. Eight young Japanese photographers. In collaboration with Art Kollegiya gallery (Moscow).

• 2005

Chronicles of Victory. Supported by the Federal Agency for Culture and Cinematography.

Video Art Festival. In collaboration with galleries: Blickensdorff(Berlin), Brandstrup (Oslo), Caprice Horn (Berlin), Christian Roellin (Saint Gallin), Shilla (Korea), Rafael Vostell (Berlin).

• 2006

The Best of Ara Guler. In collaboration with Istanbul House of Photography. Supported by the Turkish Ministry for Culture and Tourism.

• 2006 – 2007

French Photography of the Second Half of 19 Century. In collaboration with the Photo-archive of the Institute of Material Culture History at the Russian Academy of Sciences (St.-Petersburg). Supported by Institut Francais in St.-Petersburg.

• 2007

Deborah Turbeville. Russian Years. Supported by the US Consulate General in St.-Petersburg.

Boris Mikhalevkin. Retrospective.

• 2008

«Beauty in exile». Photographs from Alexander Vasiliev's collection.
«Old Saint-Petersburg». St.-Petersburg in the photographs of the middle of XIX - beginning XX centuries.

• 2009
«Russian Hollywood». Photographs from Alexander Vasiliev's collection.
«Italy, 1946 - 2006: from reconstruction to the Millenium», based on the collection of the Centre for Photographic Research and Registration (CRAF), supported by Italian Institute of Culture in Saint-Petersburg.
Andrew Moore. «Beyond ideology». With CM ART Gallery (Paris).
«Fotokunst». With IFA and Goethe-Institut St.Petersburg

• 2010

Brassai. «Paris la Nuit». Together with L'Institut Français de Saint-Pétersbourg
«Colors of Early French Photography». The exhibition of the middle-XIX century French photographs is presented by ROSPHOTO in collaboration with Clémentine Foundation (Paris).

The artworks by Zakhar Kolovsky are part of the collections of the State Russian Museum and the Latvian National Museum of Art.

Meanwhile, Zakhar Kolovsky continues his art practice. He considers the most important of his series the following:

2001- 2002 Windows
2002 -2003 Electorate
2003 – 2007 Traces

2005 – 2007 Naval Architecture
2010 Emergency Ascent

Solo exhibitions