He relates to painting with the stylistic flexibility of the graphic artist. For each image of the architect, Shvetsov changed the degree of conditionality. In the portrait of the St. Petersburg Art Nouveau genius Fyodor Lidval, he applied an illustrator’s approach: the head of the architect is much more detailed than the body. In a more realistic picture of the great Constructivist Konstantin Melnikov a cold, clinical light predominates. By the way, the history of Russian architecture according to Shvetsov ends precisely with Melnikov.
Valentin Dyakonov, Gif.ru
What art can be more serious than architecture? What is more optimistic? Architecture has a claim to immortality. In any case a building lives for a long time. It imprints the ideas and tastes of the age, adding its own philosophy and style. Those architects whose works have survived are considered fortunate today.
Charmed by the illusion of immortality Petr Shvetsov has been painting portraits of famous architects for thirteen years — almost all his creative life... He has painted with love, every portrait is beautiful and elegant, delicate and witty. In every portrait he tries to render the composition and techniques of the historical style in his own way, regardless of whether it is Peter’s Baroque or Stalin’s Empire.
Moreover, every portrait depicts the architect’s fate positively, not taking into account whether in fact it was good or bad, only that he was a successful personality who was able to build. Their buildings form part of our national cultural heritage, history of artsstudy, school books and tourist guide books. So, we can’t say they are forgotten, they are with us still.
Marina Koldobskaya, exhibition curator