Valery Plotnikov

Heroes of their time

VALERY PLOTNIKOV

Heroes of Their Time

Curator: Olga Sviblova

Project realised on the initiative and with the support of the Still Art Foundation

As part of the biennale Fashion and Style in Photography – 2025, the Multimedia Art Museum, Moscow presents the exhibition ‘Heroes of Their Time’ by classic portrait photographer Valery Plotnikov, the author of hundreds of portraits featuring prominent figures in Soviet and Russian art, including Vladimir Vysotsky, Joseph Brodsky, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Svyatoslav Richter, Oleg Yankovsky, Vyacheslav Zaitsev, and others.

Legendary film director Grigory Kozintsev aptly defined Plotnikov as a photographer-director who “conceives photography as a production”. Each of his shots is like a film or performance compressed into one frame. Every detail of the artistic space is thoroughly devised and meaningful. When meeting the subject Plotnikov creates an individual environment for them, selecting the right background, clothes, hairstyle, pose and props, with nothing left to chance. “A well-found image allows you to find the right sense of self,” the photographer believes. 

Valery Plotnikov was born in 1943 in Barnaul, during evacuation. In 1945 his family returned to Leningrad. Plotnikov graduated from the Leningrad Secondary Art School at the Academy of Arts and in 1964 began studying at the VGIK cinematography department, where he became keen on photography. His first subjects were college friends, Sergei Solovyov and Lev Dodin, later to become famous directors, as well as the playwright Eduard Volodarsky. After completing his course at the institute Plotnikov took up photography professionally. 

The photographer recalls that even in his youth he “knew how to guess the significance of a person”. This talent helped realise his ambitious dream: to preserve the faces of heroes of their time for future generations. Plotnikov shot portraits of both rising stars and those already “in their declining years”. He was interested in representatives of bohemia and the creative intelligentsia across the broadest possible spectrum: from the public’s favourite actors Andrei Mironov and Mikhail Boyarsky to academician Dmitry Likhachev and the great pianist Mstislav Rostropovich. 

One of Plotnikov’s main heroes was the superstar and idol of that era Vladimir Vysotsky. The first pictures of him were taken at a concert in 1967. Vysotsky did not like being photographed, but after seeing the prints he agreed to a separate shoot. Plotnikov essentially became his photo-biographer, producing 283 black-and-white and 7 colour portraits of him. The photographer took shots of Vysotsky for 13 years, right up until his death, with the last frames made on 28 July 1980, the day mourners bid farewell to the actor and poet. Thanks to Vysotsky, Plotnikov met director Yuri Lyubimov, the reformer of Russian theatre and founder of the popular Taganka Theatre, where it was a real event to attend a performance in the 1970s. Soon Plotnikov became, in his own words, “the Taganka court photographer”. 

Plotnikov’s images were constantly featured on the covers of leading Soviet magazines such as Theatre and Soviet Screen, the main publication about cinema that was circulated in millions of copies. Clippings with Plotnikov’s photographs decorated many apartments in the Soviet Union.

When constructing the dramaturgy of the photo Plotnikov turns to the best examples of fine art: the paintings of Van Dyck and Rembrandt and the portraits of Valentin Serov or Lev Bakst, as well as images by recognised masters of 19th-century portrait photography working in pavilions and studios. 

The deliberate theatricality, picturesque compositions and strictly devised surroundings in which Plotnikov places his characters paradoxically reveal their psychology. Expressive black-and-white shots rivet our attention, compelling us to peer into the models’ faces. “Plotnikov’s characters live in another reality. Sometimes in fairy tales, in imaginary landscapes or interiors. He photographs a person as that person would like to be,” says the photographer Yuri Rost.

Plotnikov’s creative experiments in the 1970s and 1980s anticipated the emergence of fashion photography, which only appeared in Russia in the mid-1990s. The subjects of his portraits recall that being photographed by Plotnikov meant receiving the highest recognition in the art world. His images have become a valuable visual document of the period, allowing us to trace the history of Russian culture from the second half of the 20th to the early 21st centuries.