By Azernews

By Laman Ismayilova

YARAT Contemporary Art Space has presented artworks by Azerbaijani artist Ujal Hagverdiyev, Azernews reports.

His solo retrospective exhibition "Conversation in Presence" opened at the museum of the XIX-XXI21s Azerbaijani Painting.

Around 250 art pieces including paintings, graphic works, etudes, album sketches, poems, personal belongings, and photographs from private and state collections.

Speaking at the opening of the exhibition, the head of PR and Communications Department at YARAT Contemporary Art Space, Hokuma Karimova, said that the YARAT organized the large-scale museum exhibition of works by Ujal Hagverdiyev for the first time. Most artworks were shown to the public for the first time.

"The exposition includes about 250 art pieces that reflect all the sides of the artist's creativity. Each artwork is like a separate creation: all you want is to analyze it," said Karimova.

The curator of the exhibition Farah Alakbarli said that the YARAT team started working on the exposition. The exposition was prepared in cooperation with the artist's family, the Azerbaijan National Art Museum, and collectors.

During his lifetime, the artist did not have exhibitions, and after his death, only two small exhibitions were held in the gallery where an incomplete range of his works was shown.

"In the course of creating our exposition, we worked with collections, found works from his friends, acquaintances. Therefore, we managed to show a wide range of Ujal Hagverdiyev's work. At our exhibition, we show Ujal Hagverdiyev' as an experimenter. We demonstrate the artist's work in a format unrecognizable to many. Ujal Hagverdiev was known for certain iconic works, and we show a lot of what was kept in the studio, with friends, acquaintances, that is, we reveal a completely new Ujal Hagverdiyev", Alekperli noted.

The artist's widow, Honored Artist Elena Hagverdiyeva noted the opening of Ujal Hagverdiyev's solo exhibition at the Museum of the XIX-XXI centuries Azerbaijani Painting is a significant event for her.

"Today this is the most important exhibition in my life. Ujal Hagverdiyev is a worthy son of his country. I was amazed at how this exhibition was prepared because the exposition was collected by young and wonderful people. They were able to prepare a powerful and really fascinating exhibition. And that's all this was done by the young and talented YARAT team. They worked on this project for six months. It was very hard work. I am delighted and immensely grateful for all the work done," Hagverdiyeva said.

Ujal Khagverdiyev's son Butunai Khagverdiyev added that many of those who came to the opening of the exhibition was personally acquainted with his father.

"My father was constantly drawing. He always had a notebook, pencils, and pens with him. I think that this exhibition shows him from a new perspective for the audience," he said, expressing deep gratitude to the YARAT team.

Furthermore, the choir of the Church of Michael the Archangel performed at the event. This performance was not accidental, because the artist devoted the last five years of his life to painting frescoes in the Church of Michael the Archangel in Baku. Elena Hagverdiyeva completed this work after the artist`s death.

The exhibition "Conversation in Presence" transfuses Ujal's idea of "presence in space": illustrating all aspects of his oeuvre, it enables the spectator to engage in a sort of silent "dialogue" with the artist. Although he passed away, the exposition is built on the concept of contemplation and observation of the space by the artist himself. This very presence enables us to sense Ujal's "existence": touching upon his inner domain, the exhibition reflects on the aspects of his personality and work and also pictures him as a great color stylist and connoisseur of arts, always in search of something hitherto unknown.

Ujal Hagverdiyev, who set out on his way in the 1980s, is famous for his artistic searches and experiments in various genres and schools of art. Apart from day-to-day topics (people, animals, nature, objects, etc.), his works, which are abundant visually and thematically, allude heavily to imagination and dreams, oriental philosophy, and religious topics.

Through his searches, Ujal created a unique visual language with an inimitable style and went down in the history of art as an artist renowned for his unmatched versatility. He spent the last five years of his life painting frescoes at the Church of Michael the Archangel in Baku. His wife, Yelena Hagverdiyeva, also an artist, completed his work after his demise.

Ujal Hagverdiyev (1960-2004) is a member of the Hagverdiyev family of artists. Having graduated from the Azim Azimzade Art School in 1979, he continued his education at the Azerbaijan Pedagogical Institute. After the death of Hasan Hagverdiyev, his father, he considered Kamal Ahmadi and Sanan Gurbanov his mentors. Ujal Hagverdiyev drew inspiration from Italian renaissance art, modernistic styles such as neo-impressionism, cubism, and fauvism, and the Qajar art school. Ujal Hagverdiyev's works were showcased in Russia, Georgia, UAE, France, Tunisia, Austria, Germany, and Turkey; his masterpieces are kept in private collections across the USA, Austria, Germany, Finland, and Russia.

The exhibition will last until October 16. The curator of the exhibition is Farah Alakbarli.

Admission is free, no COVID passport is required.