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The
Artist's Work
A
personal note from A. Vassiliev
The highlight of this season is a
current exhibition of my private dress
collection in a famed Istanbul Sabanci
museum in Turkey. It has such a public
acclaim, that since its opening in
May 2004 more than 20,000 visitors
came to visit it on the banks of Bosphorus.
Therefore it was extended till the
end of October.
It is an enormous pleasure and the
matter of a collector's pride to present
the best of my collection in the Sakip
Sabanci museum in Istanbul. I do appreciate
a lot an effort of the late Mr. Sakip
Sabanci to create the Sabanci University
and a splendid museum, devoted to
the art collection. Its location on
the high board of the beautiful turquoise
Bosphorus, the handsome building itself
and the professional ability of the
museum stuff made an outstanding frame
to house my period dress collection
in the current exhibition.
For almost 30 years I had been collection
the garments, accessories, painting,
drawings, photography and printed
matted related to the history of fashion.
This life time passion came to me
well before the age of 14, while in
Moscow, where I was born. Encourage
at first by my parents, I was searching
with an energy of a teenager in the
devastated by the Bolsheviks homeland
the surviving costumes of the begone
czarist era, saving them often from
the destroying, burning and taking
some of the strait from the street
dust beans. Already at the age of
16 TV programs and magazines in Russia
got interested in my collection. People
started to contact me by mail, sheering
with me some of their family possessions
or archives.
After moving to France in 1982 I got
a chance to enlarge my collection
in a big way, profiting from the rich
offers on Parisian auctions, flea
markets and antique dealers. As a
professional designer and teacher,
I got an unique chance to travel the
world intensively and thanks to that,
introducing many more pieces to my
collection that is kept now near Paris.
It counts some 10 000 pieces, excluding
the accessories and fashion images
and, thanks to God, it will finally
form a Fashion Institute and a Museum,
together with the Alexandre Vassiliev
foundation in the coming future. Many
of my costumes are displayed as well
on www.vassiliev.com
For many years I was trying to popularize
my collection and showing it to thousands
of people world wide. The very first
time I was showing some of my dresses
in Paris Museum of Modern art in 1983
for the exhibition " Les Mythes
de nos nippes", organized by
a well known fashion historian and
a writer Carol Mann. Since that I
had a possibility to show some pieces
in several exhibitions of the Paris
Musee de la Mode at Galliera palace,
most recently at the exhibition "
Les souvenirs Muscovites" in
2001, and in Printemps exhibition
hall in 2002. It also had been displayed
in London, Reykjavik, Antwerp, Lugano,
Frankfurt, Moscow and Brussels. For
almost 3 years it was on show in South
America - in Chile at Santiago Museum
of Applied Art and in a city of Conception
. Several time the collection was
on show in Hong Kong, precisely at
the Hong Kong Academy for the Performing
Art, last time in 1999. Australia
as well got a keen interest in my
collection It was exhibited 3 times
in Sydney, mostly at TAFE Institute
Muse exhibition hall and then in Brisbane
David Jones gallery in 2002.
The possibility of showing my collection
in Turkey came as a result of many
years of my artistic activities in
this country that I love a lot. I
came to Turkey at first in 1987, invited
by the State Opera and ballet of Ankara
do design a popular Valery Panov's
ballet "The Idiot" based
of the Dostoyevsky's novel. The production
was a success, that leaded me to design
another 16 production for the State
Ankara Opera and Ballet, among those
such hits as "The Sleeping Beauty",
" The Three Musketeers",
" Anna Karenina", "La
Bayadere", "Romeo and Juliet",
"The Nutcracker" and last
fall 2004 a best selling ballet by
Meric Ciminciler " Calikusu".
Mersin State Opera and Ballet hired
me to design a ballet "The Harem"
in 1998, as well as I had a wonderful
chance to design a ballet "Antonius
and Cleopatra" in Istanbul state
Opera and Ballet in 1989, invited
here by a Primabalerina and a State
Artist Merih Sumen. As a result of
my artistic input to the Turkish ballet
I was twice a winner of a TOBAV theatrical
award, that was designated personally
to me by the former President Mr.
Suleyman Demirel.
A Bilkent University did invited me
to teach design and costume history
in Ankara for a semester in 1993.
My frequent trips throuout Istanbul
and elsewhere Your beautiful country
I had an chance no only studying the
Turkish culture and nature, I did
meet some wonderful people, among
them my very dear friend Miss Nazan
Bozbag, an Istanbul business lady
and an Art lover. It was thanks ho
her that I meet a director of the
Sakip Sabanci museum, Mrs. Nazan Ulcer,
who saw my dress collection in Paris
Galliera museum and by chance met
me in the plane to Istanbul in person.
So some long years came in preparation
of this show and we all are extremely
happy to present this exhibition to
you.
The collecting of textiles is a very
hard and costly hobby. It will be
impossible to enlarge and conserve
this collection alone. Many people
contributive by their generous donations,
attribution and restorations of the
garment. I'm very pleased to thank
those who's impact was the most memorable:
Stefanya Adolfsdottir, countess Yola
d' Alcantara, Jose Aldunate - Menendes,
Isabel Alvarado, countess Carmen Apraxine,
Alexandre Arbatt, countess Jacqueline
de Beaugourdon, Gillian Choa, baroness
Galina Delwig - Gorlenko, Michael
Dillon, Halinka Dorsowna, Connie Hart,
Catherine Join - Dieterle, Lemasson
family, Florence Muller, Ross O'Dell,
Caroline Pecover - Brown, Steven de
Petrie, Maya Plissetskaya, Swetlana
Samssonow, Juozas Statkiavicius, Mary
Wong.
My respects and the gratitude to Madame
Jacques Chirac, who personally helped
me to find a place to store and keep
my collection in Paris. Special thanks
to my assistants Christophe Dubois
and Cyrill Gassilin, who were in charge
of dressing and ironing of the multitude
of the historical garments and to
all the stuff of the Sakip Sabanci
museum.
Another personal achievement happened
this Fall. A new lavish and richly
illustrated book of mine was published
in Russian by "Slovo" in
Moscow. It is entitled "150 years
of the Russian fashion in the photography",
contains 2000 photos and 450p. Its
INBN number is 5-85050-729-9. It will
be in the books stores throughout
Russia late September.
My current activities enclosed a very
successful interior decorating business.
Since a year I'm directing a Moscow
based studio "Alexandre Vassiliev
Interiors" that already have
a number of quiet exquisite clients.
My contact number there is + 7095
631 09 09.
To those, who are interested to study
fashion & design with me I'm proud
to announce a special English speaking
course that I'm planning to conduct
each August in Vilnius, Lithuania.
To get more of the information one
might write to alexandre-vassiliev@yandex.ru
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