{"id":267136,"date":"2020-01-03T17:50:10","date_gmt":"2020-01-03T15:50:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/basilica.ro\/?p=267136"},"modified":"2020-01-03T17:50:10","modified_gmt":"2020-01-03T15:50:10","slug":"why-does-this-muscovite-artist-make-religious-graffiti","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/why-does-this-muscovite-artist-make-religious-graffiti\/","title":{"rendered":"Why does this Muscovite artist make religious graffiti?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"article__summary article__summary_short\">\n<div class=\"article__summary-wrapper article__summary-wrapper_short\"><strong>His creations appear in traditional places \u2014 on the walls of apartment blocks and under bridges, but they depict either Jesus or the Virgin Mary.<\/strong><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"article__text article__text_short\">\n<p>A huge graffiti face of Jesus Christ appeared in Moscow in late October. It wasn\u2019t the first and won&#8217;t be the last. It was painted on a bridge bearing by 28-year-old <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/alexandrtsypkov\/\">Alexander Tsypkov<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The artist had to stand on a stepladder to complete the work, which reaches almost five meters high.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>\u201cThe first such graffiti I did with a few classmates back in the art institute, about five years ago,\u201d Alexander told Russia Beyond. The students were on a practical assignment in Rostov Veliky, where they decided to visit abandoned churches and paint inside them.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn Russia there are lots of neglected architectural monuments. There are thousands of them, everyone\u2019s forgotten about them and they\u2019re literally falling to pieces. So we went there to raise awareness,\u201d says the artist.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rferl.org\/embed\/player\/0\/30357540.html?type=video\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>After the university, Alexander painted mainly mosaics and icons in and for churches. Only in May of this year did he and a group of graffiti artists head out into the streets. \u201cThe first thing I did was draw a huge Savior. It was really cool. I realized that\u2019s what I wanted to do.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Graffiti icon painting is an attempt to bring icons out of the churches and into people\u2019s everyday lives, to rethink them in a new context, he says. \u201cIcon painting is a beautiful art, it kick-started the Renaissance.<\/p>\n<p>Alexander\u2019s activity forms part of a large art project called\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/after_icon\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" data-saferedirecturl=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/url?q=https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/after_icon\/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1573571286277000&amp;usg=AFQjCNH2HW4yAuN5ndryrp-wSr5Wu-wX3w\">After Icon<\/a>, involving several dozen artists. The project covers everything from organizing exhibitions in museums and the Cathedral of Christ the Savior to creating street art. The aim is to revive the dialogue on Christianity in contemporary art.<\/p>\n<p>Alexander has the Orthodox Church\u2019s blessing for his graffiti and has never once encountered opposition.<\/p>\n<p>Tranlated by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rbth.com\/arts\/331261-muscovite-artist-religious-graffiti\">rbth.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-267136 gallery-columns-4 gallery-size-thumbnail'><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a data-size='663x663' href='https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/71764760_390701268290189_353605091271376896_n.jpg'><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"360\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/71764760_390701268290189_353605091271376896_n-360x360.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a data-size='1080x810' href='https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/67686695_2110626565906706_1596801431440468948_n.jpg'><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"360\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/67686695_2110626565906706_1596801431440468948_n-360x360.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a data-size='1080x1080' href='https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/59570033_2239239559496955_7422203139876778573_n.jpg'><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"360\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/59570033_2239239559496955_7422203139876778573_n-360x360.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon portrait'>\n\t\t\t\t<a data-size='900x1116' href='https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/5dc98f9f85600a32544465e3.jpg'><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"360\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/5dc98f9f85600a32544465e3-360x360.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<p>Photo courtersy of Instagram\/ Aleksandr Tsypkov<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>His creations appear in traditional places \u2014 on the walls of apartment blocks and under bridges, but they depict either Jesus or the Virgin Mary. A huge graffiti face of Jesus Christ appeared in Moscow in late October. It wasn\u2019t the first and won&#8217;t be the last. It was painted on a bridge bearing by&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":267123,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[22133,2010,22134,22132],"class_list":["post-267136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-social-en","tag-architectural-monuments","tag-blessing","tag-paint","tag-religious-graffiti"],"better_featured_image":{"id":267123,"alt_text":"","caption":"","description":"","media_type":"image","media_details":{"width":1200,"height":900,"file":"2020\/01\/5dc98fe215e9f92d5002d65d.jpg","sizes":{"thumbnail":{"file":"5dc98fe215e9f92d5002d65d-360x360.jpg","width":360,"height":360,"mime-type":"image\/jpeg","source_url":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/5dc98fe215e9f92d5002d65d-360x360.jpg"},"medium":{"file":"5dc98fe215e9f92d5002d65d-890x668.jpg","width":890,"height":668,"mime-type":"image\/jpeg","source_url":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/5dc98fe215e9f92d5002d65d-890x668.jpg"},"large":{"file":"5dc98fe215e9f92d5002d65d-1024x768.jpg","width":1024,"height":768,"mime-type":"image\/jpeg","source_url":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/5dc98fe215e9f92d5002d65d-1024x768.jpg"}},"image_meta":{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0","keywords":[]}},"post":267136,"source_url":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/5dc98fe215e9f92d5002d65d.jpg"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267136\/"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post\/"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18\/"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments\/?post=267136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267136\/revisions\/"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/267123\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/?parent=267136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories\/?post=267136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags\/?post=267136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}