El Kazovszkij was a painter, stage and costume designer, poet, and performer whose shape-shifting career made him one of the era’s key figurative artists. He burst onto the scene in the late 1970s with performances that stitched together painting, sculpture, and theatrical staging, building a singular visual language that never played it safe.
Myth, Identity, Obsession
Characters from classical mythology haunt his work, but they’re not museum pieces—they collide with pressing questions of gender identity and selfhood. His recurring symbols form a private pantheon, circling desire, transformation, and the tension between public persona and inner truth. The performances weren’t side projects; they powered the imagery in his canvases and objects, and vice versa.
A Life’s Work, Unpacked
Godot Gallery (Godot Galéria)’s exhibition, Idol Installation, pulls from across the decades: early engravings and collages, lyrical texts, and installations appear alongside interview excerpts that let his voice cut through the noise. The show tracks his shifts in medium and mood without sanding off the edges. It’s an intimate map of an artist who made spectacle and sincerity live in the same frame. The exhibition runs through November 15.
