Painting Again?!
International Symposium

On 6 November, 2002, the Hermitage Theater hosted an international symposium dedicated to the contemporary American art, organized by the State Hermitage Museum in cooperation with Julia Sylvester, Curator of Contemporary Art Exhibitions (U.S.A.).

The leading U.S. artists Cecily Brown, Alex Katz, David Salle and Philip Taafe made presentations.

This symposium inaugurates a series of discussions of Russian and American art critics and artists organized in connection with exhibitions of contemporary American art at the Hermitage. The recent shows of Andy Warhol and Louise Bourgeois were accompanied by conferences which stirred the artistic circles of St. Petersburg. In summer of 2003 the Hermitage will host an exhibition of the legendary U.S. artist Cy Twombli (curator Julia Sylvester) as a preparation for which this symposium is designed.

The symposium is organized with the support of Trust for Mutual Understanding, the U.S. Consulate General in St. Petersburg and the Club of American Friends of the Hermitage.

Presentations were made by Lisa Phillips, New Museum Director and Contemporary Art Curator, Whitney Museum, New York, Cecily Brown, Alex Katz, David Salle and Philip Taafe.

New Interest for Painting in the New Millenium was discussed by Yekaterina Andreyeva, Aleksandr Borovsky, Olesya Turkina (State Russian Museum), Mikhail Busev (Russian State Institute of Art History, Academy of Arts, Moscow), art critic Yekaterina Degot (Moscow), art critic Viktor Miziano (Moscow), Marina Koldobskaya (State Center for Modern Art) and Dmitry Ozerkov (State Hermitage Museum).

Hermitage Director Mikhail B. Piotrovsky ad the meeting

Presidium of the Meeting