Stas Volyazlovsky worked in a style he himself defined as “chanson art.” Both the style and its representative became famous after Vladimir Ovcharenko, founder and director of the Moscow gallery “Regina,” began collecting Volyazlovsky’s works.
In 2011, Volyazlovsky, together with web designer Semen Khramtsov, founded the group “Rapany.” The group is named after a mollusk often found in the Black Sea.
Stas Volyazlovsky passed away on January 8, 2018. His personality and creativity influenced both the art scene of Kherson and contemporary Ukrainian art. The awareness and appreciation of this influence is only just beginning.
In May 2019, Alla Borisovna transferred all of her son’s works that she had to the Tatiana and Boris Grinyov Foundation. The couple collects Ukrainian art of the second half of the 20th century and contemporary art. One of the main conditions for transferring the archive was the promotion by the Grinyov Foundation of the personality and creativity of Volyazlovsky.
Did Volyazlovsky have a period of fascination with Ukrainian culture? Motifs of Ukrainian naivety occasionally appear in his work.
— He had different fascinations. He also painted Petrykivka; he painted about twenty boards.
Who was Stas’s father?
— His father was an ordinary man, a worker in the printing industry. There were Poles, Kazakhs in the family… Since Stas was drawing, his father brought him paper. Our neighborhood was like a suburban village. We bought chewing gum, got crystal. Stas once came and asked: Mom, why don’t we buy crystal? But I always liked ceramics more; I bought ceramics from the Lviv ceramic-sculpture factory. I always read voraciously, and he started reading early. He was friends with everyone, but he didn’t have one close friend.
Did you move or live in the same neighborhood all the time?
— We moved when Stas was about 18. In third grade, he wrote an essay about Tutankhamun and made 40 mistakes. The teachers said — he would be either a genius or an idiot. I wanted a more ordinary and standard child.
Did you draw yourself?
— In childhood, I went to a drawing club, but I didn’t like it. I can’t say I had talent, I just drew. And he liked African art. Their figurines are modern art, even though from our point of view they are savages. He found it interesting.
And Picasso was inspired by African sculptures…
— Besides Tutankhamun and the Aztecs, Stas made videos about aliens, the Yeti, and a satellite that someone is trying to sell. He was attracted by historical mysteries, but he looked skeptically at some things.
— I love the video “Mirages.” Everyone likes “Black Teapot,” but I don’t. I didn’t see that he was filming me. He pretended and played a trick on me. He said: “What’s with the teapot? It’s moving.” I answered: “Maybe a truck passed by.” And Stas had horror in his eyes. I’m a mother: I started to calm him down that the teapot moved even with me. Then I saw a camera covered with a towel and gave my son a tap on the back of the head. I was offended and worried.
Did he do that often?
— No, it was just once. He argued that I wouldn’t agree. That’s true, I don’t like such things.
Did Stas believe in astrological forecasts, omens?
— Not really. That’s why I was scared by the teapot incident; it looked like a psychosis. I, an old person, can believe in omens, but he — a progressive young artist — was talking such nonsense.
Did he like to photograph?
— In the evening, especially nature. After filming, he asked: “What should I keep, what do you think, mom?” He worked for a year as a photojournalist in a Kherson newspaper. He did well. We have an abandoned cemetery with burials after the Crimean War. He was very upset that it was neglected. His photos from this cemetery were not accepted by the newspaper — they said it was irrelevant.
— He grew up in Kherson! Once I went to an exhibition. There is a good creative association “Totem” in Kherson, which organized his trip to the Fergana Valley, a two-week jeep trip. Stas came back and showed some visitor around the exhibition. I was at the other end of the hall (he didn’t see me) and was very surprised — not a single filler word, he spoke as if written. When he was interested, he spoke beautifully and correctly because he communicated with educated people. We have an artist Vyacheslav Mashnitsky — very erudite, and my son learned a lot from him.
Who else were Stas’s teachers in life?
— At vocational school, the teacher of Ukrainian art headed the ceramics department. Vladimir Ilyich was very intelligent and influenced young guys well. He was 37, Stas was 20, and they addressed each other formally. While studying at vocational school, they held an exhibition at the Shovkunenko museum… Youth and young age passed without alcoholic drinks. Friends gathered around Stas not because he was a leader, but because he was interested in new things and could infect others with this. My son’s character was uneven, hot-tempered, with mood swings and an inferiority complex. He could tear up drawings thinking he ruined them. Yulia (his wife) was calm; she would look and say: everything is fine. He definitely needed someone to say that everything was okay.
Which of Stas’s works are closer and more understandable to you?
— I explained to all my acquaintances that if there are elements of profanity in his work, they should not be taken literally. It is concentrated negativity of our time. The artist hyperbolizes reality. He apparently was not interested in politics, but he painted both Yushchenko and Tymoshenko.
How did he feel about Poroshenko?
— He couldn’t feel good about Poroshenko because, according to Stas, Putin is not the only one to blame for the war. Volunteers mainly helped the military. We don’t have an army, we only have fat generals. He didn’t want to talk about this topic at all. Politics irritated him a lot.
— He has prison poems; he communicated with prisoners when he was in rehab. He started binge drinking and was on an IV drip. Artists and poets can write about things they have never experienced. The topic caught him — and off he went. For example, Vysotsky never fought in a war but wrote very clearly about war, and it feels like he went through it. I understood that Stas took the position of the person he wrote about.
When did he start writing poetry?
— He always wrote, depending on his mood. He had binges with breaks of a year and eight months. He went to a company where everyone drank, but he didn’t even want to. He was an unusual alcoholic. Depression was due to fear for the future, because of the war and age crisis — everything coincided. I was amazed: friends drink, and Stas says he doesn’t want to. “I drink not because I want to drink, but because I’m afraid of what will happen next.” He couldn’t restructure and adapt. Singers become judges — he was not capable of that. He exhausted himself with creativity. He had no desire to win. Ovcharenko (Russian entrepreneur, founder and director of the “Regina” gallery — ed.) paid money; Ovcharenko and Stas had good relations. I realized that rich people can be smart and interesting. Ovcharenko is a literate and witty man. Stas saw the world thanks to him: he was in New York and Moscow. I didn’t underestimate, but I was surprised that my son was so singled out. Some things I didn’t like very much, after all, I’m a conservative in this matter. Some drawings are over the top. Abroad, it is perceived differently.
— I don’t want to sell what he painted. I have no money problems; I put the surplus from selling the apartment in a safe place. I changed apartments — I couldn’t look at the chair he sat in. I moved in September 2018. It was easier for me, and I couldn’t pay for 42 square meters even with a subsidy. I asked Stas’s friends: let’s mark the first birthday after his death, organize an exhibition. “Yes, yes,” but no one did anything. I have a bad attitude to alcohol: I know what it leads to. About ten years ago, the guys were really active; they held many exhibitions. I don’t want to judge them, but the green serpent makes itself known. I’m 77 years old, I need something to hold on to so as not to fall into melancholy. Someone needs to keep my son’s archive. When I visited Kherson parties, I realized there was a lot of talk, little action. They can’t even handle Polina Raiko’s house. Maybe I’m a bit of a cynic, but I realized that all these works will lie as they did in a dirty sofa. Semen Khramtsov kept nagging — let’s sell. He said he needed some money. But I don’t need money; I need to put Stas’s creativity in reliable hands. So that sometimes they remember him. In a year and a half in Kherson, there was not a single exhibition. Words and deeds don’t match, everyone wants a buffet.
Khramtsov appeared about eight years ago. Stas introduced him to everyone in Kyiv. Stas always shared with him both his acquaintances and knowledge. I treated Semen as one of my own, but within a year after Stas’s death, I realized he wanted to have a document on the inheritance. He wanted to formalize ownership rights to get me to transfer everything to him. I didn’t transfer not because I’m angry, but because I don’t trust them. While I’m alive, I want to do something for my son, and Khramtsov is dragging his feet.
The Odessa exhibition (the first posthumous exhibition “STAS and all this aforementioned mess with today’s art market and art in general” was held from November 3 to December 16, 2018 — ed.) was proposed by Sasha Tryanova from the Odessa Museum of Contemporary Art. I don’t see Stas’s art in an ordinary museum. Our museums have leaking storages; even Rembrandt gets flooded. And with a person who owns a large collection, Stas’s works will be preserved.
— I graduated from the library faculty, worked as a librarian for four years. Then, when Stas was born and was very sick as a child, life forced me to change profession. My son grew up, I separated from my husband; I adapted. Like Ostap Bender, I was everything. Even a lift operator. I worked as a nurse in a hospital — I know what medicine is. It was in the early 1960s: in the hospital, all the kids were fed prednisolone, it was fashionable then. But the drug turned out to be very harmful — like hormone therapy, it’s a double-edged sword. It can only be used in incurable cases. I didn’t become a medic. But the library is mine; since I was five, I read voraciously, and to this day it saves me. I miss Stas not only as my child but also as a person.
Who are your favorite writers?
— Remarque, O’Henry, Bulgakov… When you read, you go through everything, including the guilt complex that you couldn’t save your child. When you read, you get distracted. I started reading “Dead Souls” and realized that Stas liked Gogol — such interesting humor. Stas also had sympathetic humor. With obscene language, he sympathizes with his heroes.
What were your favorite family holidays?
— New Year. There must be a Christmas tree. Even at 25, he asked: “Mom, will we really not have a Christmas tree?” The last year there was no tree.
When fate drove me away
From home, evil fate
I live on a poplar,
Like a forest bird.
I built myself a nest
From what was at hand.
I live on a poplar
Beautiful like this.
* * *
Bad people spoil the estuary
Gudgeons die at the speed of sound.
Something urgent must be done
Fuck — to extend a friendly hand to nature.
The estuary has dried the fuck up
The gudgeon suffers from this,
And you dig there and piss –
Gudgeon urine kills
You throw condoms into the estuary
And the gudgeons choke on them,
Fuck better without condoms,
So that children are born in Ukraine!
Or fuck a girlfriend
Or a friend — that’s your business.
Let them swallow so
That eating those condoms won’t
Harm the gudgeons.
* * *
I don’t fuck roosters on principle,
Neither anally, bitch, nor orally,
But, covering the bunk with a towel,
I jerk off to the chocolate “Alenka”,
And if I were a zoophile,
I would jerk off to the chocolate “Chaika”.
* * *
One day I stuck a ballpoint pen up my dick,
My hands got tired of drawing something.
To make my dick stand, I brought a bitch to the workshop,
But the dick didn’t want to stand for some reason.
Apparently, it interfered with doing creative work —
That I inserted a foreign body.
So for now I draw with my hands,
And drawing with my dick is a dream beyond the clouds.
But then I decided to draw with my ass,
Erection is not needed for the ass.
And if you insert a ballpoint pen into your ass,
Then the pen should draw in the ass.
When inserting the pen, I used soap,
So as not to tear anything while inserting.
Everything worked out!
It was even pleasant in the ass
Drawing, I probably came about five times!
That’s how art and sex life
Suddenly happened to combine!
* * *
A passive lesbian
Suddenly had mustaches pushed out under her nose by a friend.
At that moment, the doorbell rang.
It was her active girlfriend’s bell,
Who came home with a stick of smoked sausage.
But the one who had mustaches pushed out under her nose against her status,
Frightened, put on her friend’s new active panties on her head.
From “Gucci” — which cost a lot of money.
Neighbors heard screams: “Take it off! Take off my panties, you bitch!
You’ll stretch them, bitch! Your head is fucking big!”
They say that besides these words,
There were muffled hits of the sausage on the body.
The police arrived, a criminal case was opened.
Then the investigation began, and every investigation has an important moment:
Called “investigative experiment.”
— Defendant, take the sausage in your hands
(given a foam one, not real).
Show how you hit the victim with mustaches.
Where was she? Where were you standing?
They brought some aunt, put mustaches on her face.
And the defendant cold-bloodedly hit her on the head
48 times with the foam sausage.
Now she hated women and “Gucci” panties.
In short, a terrible story happened then in that apartment:
The girl with mustaches was buried,
The other is in prison.
This story was accidentally told to me by an active gay man.
I met him at the market where they sell cheap panties.
He was scared by the case with passive mustaches.
“I,” he says, “am also hot-tempered!
I loved expensive lingerie, but now I don’t!
I just bought, if anything, family parachute panties,
25 pairs for a ruble!”
