PARIS.- The exhibition "Back in the USSR – Artists of Perestroika" brings together a series of photographs taken by Michael von Graffenried in Moscow in the spring of 1988, on the threshold of an uncertain turning point. Nearly forty years later, the exhibition at ESPACE MVG in Paris presents a selection of these prints, which continue to question the role of the artist in the face of authoritarianism, both then and now.

Just months before the fall of the Berlin Wall, as Perestroika ("restructuring") and Glasnost ("transparency") carried a wind of reform into a faltering Soviet Union, Graffenried immersed himself in Moscow’s underground art scene. In studios, and more rarely in public spaces, he met and photographed artists whose freedom of expression remained precarious despite the liberalization announced by Gorbachev. The series bears witness to the resilience of figures such as Erik Bulatov, Eduard Gorokhovsky, and Georgy Litichevsky, and to their role in imagining a post-Soviet future. Some subverted the codes of Socialist Realism to reveal its cracks; others, like Dmitri Prigov, explored new forms such as performances, ephemeral installations, or hidden works, often at the risk of their own personal freedom. Art was practiced in silence, on the margins, in anticipation of a public space yet to be reclaimed.

First presented in Berlin in 1988–89 at the nGbK (neue Gesellschaft für bildende Kunst), and awarded a World Press Photo in 1989, this series documents a burgeoning generation that was already inventing other possible narratives, more open and free from state-imposed aesthetics.

Curator : Natasha Guy

In dialogue with Graffenried’s work, the exhibition also features portraits by his longtime friend Alex Kayser (1949–2015). The two crossed paths in New York between the 1980s and 2010s, united by a shared interest in the figure of the artist. In his intimate black-and-white prints, hand-tinted with color, Kayser immortalized key figures of Western art such as Andy Warhol, David Hockney, and Niki de Saint Phalle. While Graffenried captured Soviet artists within their constrained environment, Kayser gave primacy to the individual, transforming each face into an icon. Together, their works trace a contrasting cartography of the artist’s condition at the end of the 20th century—between East and West, collective resistance and singular affirmation.