Valera and Natasha Cherkashins are artists who have been working together since 1983. Starting with traditional materials - painting, drawing and photography, they gradually moved on to work with photo images, installations, performances, and, since 1999 with digital images and videos. They have returned from New York to live and work in Moscow.
Cherkashins have made over 180 solo exhibitions and 270 performances. They have been the subject of over 70 television programs, including CNN, Italian Super Channel, Deutsche Welle, Russian Television. And also, there were more than 250 publications including the Washington Post, Art +Auction, Art Forum, Stern Magazine, etc. Their works are in over 20 major museum and private collections in the U.S. and other countries: The Art Institute of Chicago; Boston Museum of Fine Arts; The Museum of Art Philadelphia; Houston Museum of Fine Arts; San Francisco MOMA; State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg; Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, State Tretyakov Gallery, the State Hermitage and others.
Cherkashins have repeatedly been invited to give masterclasses and lectures on their art at many universities around the world: Harvard University, University of California, Berkeley, Columbia University, Princeton University, New York University, School of Visual Arts, The Goldsmith University, London, Tokyo University, Moscow State University and many others.
Since late 1980s, Cherkashins have worked extensively with the outgoing culture of the USSR and then with the new era of Russia, the era of capitalism. In 1994 Cherkashins visited the United States for the first time, being invited by the Santa Fe Museum of Fine Arts to do an exhibition. Since then, they travel and learn a lot about American and European cultures. They are interested in imperial cultures such as the United States: Great Britain, Germany, Spain, Japan, and China and their development and transformation in the modern world.
In 1999 Cherkashins were awarded a grant from Japanese Government Foundation to work with Japanese culture. In 2002 they received a grant from Soros Foundation to participate in the East-West International Project in Mongolia. In 2011 Cherkashins received an award from Friends of the United Nations (FOTUN) and the Chinese government for their original global work in the arts.
In 1999 with financial support from the World Bank, the EU, and Air France, Cherkashins made an underwater installation at the World Bank headquarters in Washington, D.C. «Goodbye, beloved portraits of the European people – hello, euro». It is dedicated to the retirement of European banknotes and the transition of European banking systems to the euro.
Since 2005 Cherkashins have been working on «Global Underground» project. It is a long-term multimedia project which includes works and video installations on the subways of 33 countries. It was sponsored by Swiss International Air lines, Adobe System, Inc., Embassy of Sweden and Spain in Moscow, Switzerland Tourism, Sweedbank, Beeline, Winzavod Center for Contemporary Art, Instituto Servantes. The «Global Transport» exhibition project in Dubai in 2011 was financed by Dubai Road & Transportation Authority, the state transportation company.
In 2012 Iris Foundation, Garage Museum of Contemporary Art and Rosizo State Museum and Exhibition Center of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation supported personal exhibition projects of Cherkashins in photographic festivals in Houston, Buenos Aires and Krasnodar. In 2016 they received the Maya Brin Residency Program Foundation Grant, University of Maryland, USA, and the title «Honorary Lecturers».
After visiting the Pyramids of the Sun and Moon in Mexico in November 2016, Cherkashins felt the energy of new life. Their art is now associated with energy, point, breakthrough, line, coded writing. Many works have appeared with suns, galaxies, bio-structures, which are probably built by analogy with cosmic systems.
They started to work with traditional materials in a non-traditional way. They are engaged in sports and meditation, which inspired their projects: Tennis Art, Boxing Art, Football Art. For the past few years, Cherkashins have immersed themselves in writing books about different aspects of their art. The first volume, «A Night with a Pioneer Girl. 1962-2016» which focuses on happening and performance art, and the second volume, «How I Was a Real Artist. 1967-1989». The fourth volume «The End of an Era 1984-1994» has already been published. In general, from 8 to 10 volumes are planned to be published.
«Cherkashins work with deeply rooted in social archetypes – symbols of universal human existence. They are interested in the presence and development of these eternal archetypes of human civilization in modernity, in actual life.
Recently, their attention has been sharpened on apocalyptic problems - the fate of humanity, burdened by the knowledge of tragedies and catastrophes.
As true artists, the Cherkashins feel with acute force a certain shadow that the future casts. Their function is to present in the form of art how the eternal is refracted in the momentary.»
Alexandra Shatskikh, from an unpublished interview.
New York, 2011
