OLEG AND THE RARE ARTS
(Oleg y las raras artes)
dir. Andrés Duque, 2016
70 mins, Spain
In Russian with English subtitles

Having outlived his peers and disgruntled by the recent history of musicianship in Russia, Oleg Nikolaevich Karavaichuk bears his soul on screen. In a series of interviews with director Andrés Duque, Karavaichuk denounces Russian society’s diminishing respect for cultural affairs and the lack of innovation in his field.

Walking around his sylvan neighborhood on the outskirts of St. Petersburg, Karavaichuk also remarks on what being an artist was under Stalinism and recalls living among like-minded artists such as Andrei Tarkovsky. Duque’s small portrait of one of Russia’s most idiosyncratic musicians produces a larger commentary on the de-evolution of art in contemporary society, and the role power-hungry politicians play in sidelining experiments in expression.