Leonid Toprover is a born Volgogradian. He
has been involved in photography for over thirty years.
Thousands of his pictures have been published in local, central
and foreign press. He is reputed to be a highly qualified
portraitist.
He taught art of photography and
phototechnique at the Volgograd Higher School of Art for twenty
five years. Nowadays he shares his skills and secrets of
photography with students of the Institute Art Education
(within Volgograd State Teachers’ Training University).
However, Leonid Toprover's priority and
vocation is photoart. Photojournalism, studio photography –
whatever he tackled during all his creative career has yielded
into valuable experience of the Master - …
Tatyana Gafar, critic. THE CITY HAS STARTED
TALKING
newspaper TIME IS MONEY, ¹23, October, 13,
2004.
As the photographer confesses, the title of
the exhibition didn’t come to him spontaniously. He had to rack
up his brains. Firstly, he was thinking of some “tune” word,
conveying the musical atmosphere created by the impact of the
exhibited pieces. But finally he happened to realise that the
word “silence, voicelessness” unites the works. Indeed, no words
are more eloquent than silence. He focused on the word “íåìîé”
- “numb”, or “dumb”. But after the exposition had been opened
the name was filled with a new, unexpected sense: “íå ìîé” which
means “not mine” - not my city, an alien, strange city. It isn’t
another one but it seems mysterious, irreal, never seen before
and, what is more, hardly recognizable. That was the feeling
most of type visiters of the exhibition experienced after
watching his photoworks.
However, it’s much to Toprover’s credit that
he makes us rediscover the surrounding world and the city we
live in. As a rule, he is focused on dilapidated walls of shabby
buildings, warn up drainpipes, god-forgotten side-streets,
vaulted arches dating back to Stalin’s epoch, small and
groundsunk wooden houses which form a striking contrast with
modern glass palaces, luxurious foreign-made cars, challenging
advertisements on the roads and fireworks glamour in the
Volgograd sky. Well-known places in his works don’t always seem
attractive and some look unfamiliar. But it is still our native
hero-city.
Photography is the art of painting by light.
It leaves behind everything secondary, superfluous, vain. A
picture taken as an unfading memory is deprived of a sound
background, just a dumb city is portrayed. But silent, it is
overwhelmed with emotions giving rise to a speechless melody of
the mood. And when photography starts to speak, you stop and
suddenly get caught by an idea, that it might be not mine but an
absolutely strange city.
Elena Butenko. À SILENT VOLGOGRAD
Newspaper EVENING VOLGOGRAD. September, 19,
2003
…"Demoversion" by Leonid Toprover is
absolutely apolitical, the choice of the facts isn’t in any way
connected with any ideology, except for the artistic credo of
the author. The photographer took pictures of the above series
as though he were a passer-by or a disinterested onlooker in the
crowd attracting no attention to himself as a participant of the
events. But following his keen look we, spectators, participate
in the events.
Anna Sorokina. ACTIVE PARTICIPATION IS
LIMITED
FIRST READING. October, 30, 2004
The inner world of people interests the
master in all its diversity and variability, but human feelings
are conveyed by him through a conflict, an event, an intrigue...
“Now I am not able to remember, when and
where an event took place.
Was it this one or another one?.
Did it happen yesterday? Some days ago? Was
it in the water? In the air? In a local garden?
Did it happen to me?”
Times, customs, moral values are subjects to
change. But this verse taken from the well-known
poem by Joseph Brodsky "Epilogue", has
became a certain ideal refrain of the current exhibition.
Both, the poet and the photoartist act as
soul brothers.
Nina Belyakova. W E HAVE MUCH IN COMMON,
LIFE...
The newspaper CITY NEWS. October, 19, 2004
About exhibition Other Coventry < > Other
Volgograd
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