Martin Lawrence Galleries

Liudmila Kondakova’s first childhood memories were all bright color: reds, blues, greens, yellows, and whites. She recalls her first persistent question to the adults around her was “What color is this”? Painting absorbs Kondakova’s whole being. If she is not painting she is thinking about her current or future projects. Days when she does not work, she considers lost. Liudmila Kondakova painted with egg tempera for many years. It is an unforgiving technique. If you make a mistake, you have to start over. Through this process, she learned planning and discipline, and she uses those skills to create highly detailed paintings of her favorite cities, places, and spaces.  She starts painting from the farthest background area and then moves forward. From the darkest parts of the painting to the lightest, as if she is bringing her composition from darkness to light. Paris is a city that Kondakova has portrayed time and again in her work, and its architecture has inspired many of her works.

When one thinks of Paris, what comes to mind most often is a series of images and, for a lucky few, a wellspring of emotions. The excitement you felt when you first saw the Eiffel Tower. The hushed awe as you first stepped into the Cathedral of Notre Dame. The see-and-be-seen feeling of sitting at a sidewalk cafe on the Champs-Elysees, enjoying a view of the Arc de Triomphe in one direction, and the Place de la Concorde in the other. Liudmila Kondakova brought all these images and emotions together in the “Tojours Paris!” suite. The “Tojours Paris!” suite details Liudmila Kondakova’s love for highly detailed art, where she brings to magical life architectural structure such as “Le Tour Eiffel”, “Cathedral Notre Dame”, “Arc De Triomphe” and “Place De La Concorde”.

With four individual prints named for the monuments they depict, “Arc De Triomphe” is part of an artistic guidebook that depicts the very best of Paris and a fond remembrance from Kondakova’s time in the city of love and light. The “Arc de Triomphe”, is located at the end of the famous Champs-Elysees, and on the right bank of the Seine at the center of a dodecagonal configuration of twelve radiating avenues. It was commissioned by Napoleon I in 1806 as a triumphal arch patterned after those of ancient Rome and dedicated to the glory of his imperial armies. It has been the home of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier since 1920, and the last leg of the Tour de France bicycle race culminates here yearly on the third or fourth Sunday in July. "Tojours Paris” is an 18 x 13 – inch hand-signed serigraph on gesso board.