Moscow — THERE'S snow on the cupola, sunlight in the brandy and a lot of talk about metaphor, mythical symbolism and how the rich will pay incredible amounts of money for a portrait. With a prolific brush and a deft understanding of ego, Nikas Safronov, who flutters like a designer moth amid canvases in his studio, is Russia's artist to the powerful.
He recasts his country's tycoons and politicians as dukes, earls and other nobility from the past. The reigning figure, naturally, is Russian President Vladimir V. Putin, painted on a steed and resembling Napoleon charging into battle. The Kremlin leader has also been reincarnated as the pope and a shrewd-eyed Francis I, a 16th century French monarch and benefactor of the arts.
Here's Safronov’s vision of George Clooney, whom he has never met, as a powder-wigged dauphin.
He recasts his country's tycoons and politicians as dukes, earls and other nobility from the past. The reigning figure, naturally, is Russian President Vladimir V. Putin, painted on a steed and resembling Napoleon charging into battle. The Kremlin leader has also been reincarnated as the pope and a shrewd-eyed Francis I, a 16th century French monarch and benefactor of the arts.
Here's Safronov’s vision of George Clooney, whom he has never met, as a powder-wigged dauphin.
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