Interview Elena Snagovskaya with Guvanchmyrat Hojaniyazov

 

Guvanchmyrat Hojaniyazov

Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, 1972

 

      Guvanchmyrat lives and works in Ashgabat. He works on social topics and shows problems in society. Developing a composition and creating a painting, the artist expresses a theme, meaning and plot. The work of Guvanchmyrat can be described in one word “Relations”. Everything in the world is interconnected, consistent and harmonious. The past seems to create the present, which then creates the future. Relationships in nature, society and various spheres of human activity determine the state of the surrounding world and ourselves. In the case of distortion or violation of these relations, which is unacceptable, humanity begins to shake and create social disasters, which later leads to degradation of society. The artist considers his task to explain this to people.

 

      When did you first become interested in art and who or what influenced you in choosing a profession?

 

      My father is a production designer, and in my childhood, I often visited his creative workshop. It was always very interesting for me. I personally am a very impressionable person and, over time, I began to imagine how I could create beautiful pictures that people admire. This, of course, was a child's fantasy and dream, but at that time I was very serious about this and decided to become an artist. Noticing my desire, my father began seriously engaging in drawing with me and prepared me for enrolling in art school. Having successfully passed the exams, I entered the Ashgabat Art School named after B. Nurali. After school, I studied at the Art College, then at the Academy of Arts. In general, I never saw myself in another field other than art, and dad was always ready to support me and help with advice and teach me new practical skills.

 

      How did you come to the point that you became a painter?

 

      Of course, even in art school, many future artists face the question of choosing a specific specialization, and I was one of them. At school we were taught drawing, painting, and modeling, but I was keen with brush and paints, and so the question of specialization was decided easily by itself.

 

      Tell us about the first work you sold?

 

      After graduating from the Art School and before entering the Academy of Arts from 1991 to 1992, I was teaching at the art school. During this time, I made a number of works. If I am not mistaken, in June 1992, the first commercial art gallery opened in the former VDNH building in Ashgabat, where the first exhibition presentation included ten of my medium-sized paintings and one series of seven small-sized works. On the day of the exposition and exhibition hanging, a certain businessman from Russia went there and bought all my works. I honestly did not expect such a result, but apparently, he liked them. In general, it turned out that my work has been taken to the exhibition, where they were bought, but I did not participate in the exhibition itself.

 

      Who is your favorite artist who influenced your work?

 

      I like many artists, as there are many good artists. However, my favorite is Pablo Picasso. I understand him very well and admire his works. With his works, he literally got through to my mind and pointed out the path that I walk. I believe that he put the same meaning in his works as I do, so his work is so close to me.

 

      How do you work?

 

      Very easily: I go in the morning to the workshop and stay there all day until the evening and work. However, speaking seriously, after the composition is made, the tonal and color solution is found, I transfer the drawing to the canvas, and the actual work begins on the canvas. This is a wonderful, fascinating, but also very difficult process: you dilute the corresponding color on the palette and put it on the canvas, then the next color, then the next and the next, and so on, constantly processing the surface of the canvas, literally centimeter by centimeter.

 

      What materials do you work with?

 

      In the choice of materials, I am somewhat conservative. As I loved oil painting at once, I still paint oil only. It happens, however, for a change I will paint a landscape or a decorative composition with acrylic, but my main materials are oil paints, which I consider ideal and very rich in the technique of the material, and canvas.

 

      What technique do you use?

 

      During the technical performance, I do not limit myself to any one technique, but I paint as I feel. You can say that I am not a dry techie, but just enjoy the way paints fall on the canvas. The fact is that during my studies at school, as well as during my student years, I constantly practiced various techniques, and copied many favorite works of artists. Of course, I do not boast, but I can say that I actually mastered many technical techniques.

      For me it is not difficult to paint a still life in the technique of hyperrealism or classicism, a series of impressionistic and post-impressionistic sketches, or an academic portrait  in the style of Valentin Serov. By the way, this at one time helped me a lot in my teaching, as almost the most important thing in teaching is to be able to apply an individual approach and unleash the creative potential and talent of each student. But in the end, I came to the decision not to paint exclusively in one technique, which, of course, is easier to do, but to write freely - just as the feeling tells me to do.

 

      Tell us about your creative path?

 

      My creative path is the constant search and creation of compositions on the theme of feelings and relationships and related social topics. Everything in life and around us is interconnected: the past with the present and the future, the person and the world around him, the actions of one person and many people and so on; the interrelationship of the particles of the world around us creates the reality of the present in which we live. But the only creature in the universe that can consciously change the world is man, and it is he who is responsible for almost everything that happens on earth, and this responsibility only grows with time, as his power and sphere of influence grows. In the hands of the people themselves there is a cure for all the negative phenomena in society and many cataclysms in nature. In my pictures I try to reveal the consequences and, if possible, the causes of the wrong actions of people and make it clear that all people are both happy and experiencing the same. No one guarantees that the one who brings suffering to someone today will not fall into a similar situation tomorrow, as a bad deed is infectious.

      At the moment I create semantic works in the style of postmodernism - this is the main direction in my work, so to speak, for the rest of my life, but since these my paintings are “heavy” in semantic terms, I also periodically take a great interest in the series of works more, so to say, “light " within the meaning of.

 

      What inspires you to create works and where do you get ideas for new compositions?

 

      I always paid attention to the mood of people around me, and it became easy and joyful when I saw the happiness of others, and I wanted people to always live and enjoy each day with pleasure. But when I see sadness in the eyes of people, I want to do everything in my power to remove the cause of this sadness. This is what drives me in the creation of works, showing the consequences and causes of the unhealthy state of society. I want everyone to realize that it is in his power to make those around him live in joy.

      As for ideas, it happens like this: I'm waiting. Constantly waiting. But suddenly there is a fleeting idea, a vision, a thought. At this moment I do not cling to it - I do not torture myself, because I know that soon she will mature and I will see her in a more “ripe” form. This time is coming, and here I am firmly clinging to the idea that has come. I begin to examine it from all sides, think over and complement details, presenting a tonal and color solution.

      That is, the main work takes place in the mind, so to speak, virtually. And the rest is a purely technical process. But the main thing is that I get great pleasure both during the virtual process and during the practical implementation. The artist's work is truly a flour, but so desirable and interesting that, once you know it, you no longer want and cannot do anything else.

      But sometimes it is different. Once, as a teacher, during summer practice, I took my students to an ancient cemetery. There are three old mausoleums, which we painted. The traditions of our people say that the ancestral spirits always help people who turn to them for help. People never come there alone, but that time I saw a young woman who came alone, and when she passed by me, I saw her eyes. They were so depressed that in the following days I just could not calm down until I had painted a picture of her. Unfortunately, I cannot now show the original, as the canvas was purchased and is in the United States.

 

      Have there been dramatic changes in the world or your life, which ultimately affected your work?

 

      I myself am a stable, conservative person and do not like dramatic changes in my life. But in 2013, after 10 years of teaching at an art school and 5 years at the Academy of Arts, I nevertheless decided to leave teaching and completely devote myself to creativity. This, of course, gave me a powerful impetus to the creation of new works.

      And in the spring of 2007 there was a story that in some way affected my work. When you paintan etude on the street, people often come up to see, sometimes they ask questions, chat, wish me good luck. That spring, I wrote a study in one of the Ashgabat courtyards, and a boy of about nine with a school satchel came up behind me, very polite, neatly dressed.

      He asked me a few questions: is it good to be an artist, where you can learn to draw and the like. I answered him honestly, trying to explain what it means to be an artist, and for a moment I even thought that I was not talking to a nine-year-old boy, but to an adult.

      Children of the same age were playing near the sandbox: and suddenly he asked me for permission to play with them. At first, I automatically gave permission, but then a surprise came and the question arose: why does he ask me if I am a stranger to him? But then I saw his mother, who screamed out of the window, so that he immediately moved away from other children and quickly ran home to do homework, and after music and English, I realized that this boy simply had no childhood.

      Looking at how he ran home, I realized that he was already used to mindlessly obeying adults, and it doesn’t even matter who. I felt sad about these thoughts, because children should have a serene childhood: after school they have to run through the streets, ride bicycles, build stuff, play football and hide and seek ... In a few days I already imagined the future picture on the subject of the protection of the childhood of our boys and girls, and indeed since then, I have become much more likely to refer to the images of children in my works.

 

      What are you working on right now?

 

      Now I am working on my main series of thematic works and writing a multi-figure composition on the tragedy of the Middle East. This is my second work on this topic. The first work entitled "Immigrants: -" The sun does not shine there "is dedicated to the fate of immigrants who were forced to flee their native country because of wars and destruction. At home, they leave their ancestors, relatives, their homes, their history and part of their lives. In addition, I continue to work on a series of abstract canvases on the subject of human feelings and intend to paint two more such paintings.

 

      Tell us more about your series.

 

      As I said, my main series of paintings reveals the theme of relationships and social problems of society. I started painting this series in the style of postmodernism at the very beginning of my creative path, and it will continue as long as I create. But between the works of this subject, I create a small series of paintings, so to say, to complement the main series, and paint them, for example, in the style of vorticism ("Peace", "Jester", "Dance", etc.) or abstract impressionism (series "Feelings").

 

      Is there any interesting idea that you are carrying and dreaming to embody?

 

      Of course, not one. I would like to create at least two pictures, revealing the problem of traditional family relationships of some layers of society. I already imagine what they will be, and the compositional solution is already completely ready. All that remains is to consider the details and proceed to the practical implementation. But I would not want to disclose the details of future pictures ahead of time. In general, I now have a lot of ideas, but their execution takes time.

 

      How would you like people to relate to your creativity?

 

      My works are not beautiful pictures, they are created for reflection. The main thing that I want is for people to understand me. So that the viewer would not just look at the picture, but try to see it, see what meaning I put into this work, so that he could feel and understand everything I wanted to say.

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   VI / 2019