Private Moon Project By Leonid Tishkov And Boris Bendikov

Curator Marcus Williams met Leonid Tishkov in his Moscow studio in 2005 and again in 2007. In 2009 he included a suite of silk-screen prints from Leonid’s best known allegorical narrative; ‘The Dabloids’ into his survey exhibition of contemporary Russian art at the Dunedin Public Art Gallery.
The concept of a “private moon” and the eerie light of the photographic images were immediately compelling to me and they continue to evoke a longing inside of me which is born of actual experience in my life as well as the sensate memory of the great stories of my childhood., read to me by my father. We all are bathed under the moons light and she affects us all and all things around us. Yet our contemplation, our longing and questing, ultimately leaves us alone; alone with our private moon.
In an act of ‘lune d’apprentissage’ Marcus took a group of his students on a night shoot and together they made Te marama mai runga i a Rangitoto…and so the Private Moon exhibition moves on its inexorable, elliptical journey around the globe and is photographed in each place.