Painting by Stanislav Atuchin

Artist

My practice centres on pictorial structure—the relationships between large masses, shapes, rhythm, colour, gesture and scale. I work in series, using repetition and variation to test how far a single structure can change while retaining its internal coherence.

I use drawing and digital sketches as a score: they establish the initial organisation of a work, but should not determine its final form. What matters most to me in painting is the encounter between a structure worked out in advance and physical material. Scale, the movement of the hand, the viscosity and transparency of paint, the edge of a shape, a layer, a drip, a correction or a mistake can all change the initial decision.

One of my working criteria is simple: has something emerged on the canvas that was not already present in the sketch? If not, the painting has merely carried out a preliminary plan. If so, the work begins to exist independently of it.

I am interested not only in how an image is constructed, but also in how it shapes the viewer’s encounter with it. I do not aim to prescribe a single correct reading. What matters to me is the possibility of sustained looking: first taking in the broad relationships of colour and mass, then the surface, layers, traces of movement and details.

Selected series

Inozemtsy

Inozemtsy is a completed series of twenty large-scale paintings created in Georgia. In it, I worked with character, gaze, vivid colour, large masses, ornament and the density of the surface.

Returning to these paintings later, I recognised relationships that continue to interest me today: scale, rhythm, colour and the interaction of large shapes.

This gradually led to the next question:

What happens if recognisable imagery and most of the symbolic information are removed, while the organisation of the image itself is preserved?

Inozemtsy, work 01 by Stanislav Atuchin
Inozemtsy, work 03 by Stanislav Atuchin
Inozemtsy, work 05 by Stanislav Atuchin
Inozemtsy, work 17 by Stanislav Atuchin
Inozemtsy, work 18 by Stanislav Atuchin

Drawing

The next stage began with the development of an extensive drawing archive.

I began reducing the image to a line, a shape, a loop, a circle, a wave, a grid and a repeated movement. Some works were made quickly, through movements of the hand and body, sometimes within a set time limit.

This archive became a laboratory. I explored how few elements an image needs to retain its internal organisation and tension.

In drawing, I continued to think as a painter—through shapes and relationships between large masses. Even a small composition could contain a structure capable of sustaining a much larger scale.

I do not regard the entire archive as a collection of finished works. It contains exploration, repetition, dead ends and fruitful discoveries. Selection becomes an essential part of the work: I need to understand which possibilities are worth developing further.

Gradually, another question emerged:

What happens if a structure, almost freed from recognisable imagery, is given back colour, scale, bodily presence and the materiality of painting?

Scores

От следа к телу / From Trace to Body
From Trace to Body
Вес и интервал / Weight and Interval
Weight and Interval
Сборка I / Давление и освобождение / Assembly I / Pressure and Release
Assembly I / Pressure and Release
Сборка II / Циркуляция и возвращение / Assembly II / Circulation and Return
Assembly II / Circulation and Return

Digital variations

This stage is beginning now.

I bring selected structures from the drawing archive into a digital environment. It allows me to test colour relationships, temperature, rhythm and variations of a single composition quickly.

For me, a digital sketch is a score. It establishes initial relationships that must then be tested through actual scale and material.

Painting

My painting also draws on inner experience—memory, perception, states of mind and feelings. This might be a memory of childhood, a walk in the woods, a sunset, a particular light or a moment that has stayed with me.

A painting does not have to depict that memory literally. A sunset may remain as a relationship between colours, a flash of light or a shift in temperature; a forest as rhythm, density or a sense of space. I am interested in the moment when an experienced image loses its direct recognisability but continues to exist within the painting as memory.

This is where structure and inner experience meet the physical material of painting. The size of the canvas, the movement of the body, the width of the brush, the transparency and density of oil paint, a layer, a drip, a change of edge, a correction and chance can transform the initial idea.

It is important to me to let the composition change as I work on the canvas. I may retain the rhythm or the relationships between large masses while rethinking the colour, drawing, density and character of the gesture.

I see this whole path as a sequence of questions:

What happens between the image and the viewer?

What remains when the recognisable image is removed?

And what might emerge if the structure is brought back into contact with memory, colour, the body, scale and material?

My working formulation:

I create structures in which memory and lived experience are translated into colour, rhythm, gesture and material. Through repetition and change, I seek in painting what could not have been fully foreseen in the sketch.

Curriculum Vitae

Stanislav Atuchin

Painter
Born 1988, Kurgan, Russia
Lives and works in Georgia

Education

2008–2014
Ural State Academy of Architecture and Arts, Yekaterinburg, Russia
Qualification: Artist-Painter, Easel Painting
2003–2008
Belovsky Pedagogical College, Belovo, Russia
Qualification: Teacher of Fine Arts and Drawing, with additional training in Decorative and Applied Arts technologies

Selected Projects & Exhibitions

2022–2025
Inozemtsy — independent project; a series of 20 large-scale paintings, Georgia
2014
Presentation of works, Olga Makeeva Gallery, Kemerovo, Russia
2013
Solo exhibition, Arterum Gallery, Novokuznetsk, Russia
Fourteen paintings presented under the pseudonym Nikolai Mikhalev
2012
New Art — New Siberia, House of Artists, Kemerovo, Russia
2012
Glorious Sons of Russia, Museum of Stone-Carving and Jewelry Art, Yekaterinburg, Russia

Awards

2012
Laureate of the Kuzbass Prize, Kemerovo Region, Russia
2009
First-Degree Diploma, 5th International Architectural Drawing Competition, Novosibirsk, Russia

Lectures & Talks

2026
“Fire, Not Ashes: How Crisis Became the Source of a New Artistic Language”
Navigation of Ideas: Space, Time, and Text in the Mirror of World Heritage
European Scientific Academy / Academics Education Academy

Professional Membership

Member, Creative Union of Artists of Decorative and Applied Arts
Membership Certificate No. 2706

Selected Press

2013
TVN, “Exhibition of an Author with a Fictional Name” — television feature on the exhibition at Arterum Gallery
2012
Kuzbass newspaper — coverage of New Art — New Siberia
2012
VSE42 and regional media — coverage of New Art — New Siberia

Collections & Public Placements

Works are held in private collections in Russia, Georgia, the United States, and Europe.
A group of works is installed at Krasnaya Gorka Medical Clinic, Kemerovo, Russia.
01CVView curriculum vitae 02ExhibitionsMaterials coming soon 03PublicationsMaterials coming soon