WEISBERG PORTRAIT OF LEADING SOVIET DISSIDENT FOR SALE AT BONHAMS:FRIEND OF SOLZHENITSYN
WEISBERG PORTRAIT OF LEADING SOVIET DISSIDENT FOR SALE AT BONHAMS
FRIEND OF SOLZHENITSYN: GUEST OF THATCHER
A stunning portrait of leading Soviet dissident Alexander Guinsberg by the Russian painter and art theoretician Vladimir Weisberg is for auction at Bonhams Russian sale on 7 June in London (estimate £50,000 – 70,000).
The painting, ‘Portrait of Guinsberg in a plaster-cast,which depicts the 24 year old Guinsberg dressed in white with his arm in a sling, was painted in 1960 – the year he was expelled from Moscow University and sent to a labour camp for two years for editing the underground magazine ‘Syntaxis’. This was the first of his three spells in prison for opposition to the regime and championing of human rights. A five year sentence in 1967 was following by further imprisonment in 1978 for his involvement with the Solzhenitsyn Fund which distributed royalties from ‘The Gulag Archipelago’ to Soviet political prisoners and their families. He had also in 1976 joined an organisation monitoring breaches of the human rights principles enshrined in the Helsinki Accords which the USSR had signed in 1975.
By 1978, Guinsberg was an international figure – a status which probably saved his life - and his trial was widely reported abroad. In 1979 he was deported with three other dissidents in exchange for two Russians who had been jailed for spying in the USA.
Guinsberg became a celebrity, visiting Mrs Thatcher in Downing Street and undertaking lecture tours of the USA. He settled in Paris where he lobbied incessantly for fellow dissidents left behind in the Soviet Union. He never returned to Russia and died in France in 2002 after taking French citizenship in the late 1990s.
For further sale information please go to www.bonhams.com/russia
Bonhams
Bonhams, founded in 1793, is one of the world's oldest and largest auctioneers of fine art and antiques. The present company was formed by the merger in November 2001 of Bonhams & Brooks and Phillips Son and Neale UK. In August 2002, the company acquired Butterfields, the principal firm of auctioneers on the West Coast of America. Today, Bonhams offers more sales than any of its rivals, through two major salerooms in London: New Bond Street, and Knightsbridge, and a further five throughout the UK. Sales are also held in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Carmel, New York and Boston in the USA; Toronto, Canada; and France, Monaco, Hong Kong and Dubai. Bonhams has a worldwide network of offices and regional representatives in 25 countries offering sales advice and valuation services in 57 specialist areas. By the end of 2009, Bonhams had become UK market leaders in ten key specialist collecting areas.For a full listing of upcoming sales, plus details of Bonhams specialist departments, go to www.bonhams.com