Tolya’s Corner – A Memory from the Artist’s Studio

This painting is a recollection of my studio, of my search for expressiveness and the beauty of everyday things. At my first exhibition in Germany, I presented several dozen paintings — all of them came from that very first studio, and they were my first attempts to strip literature out of painting. After the opening, Gisela Schröder (the gallery owner) said: “Tolya, don’t approach the audience just to show your paintings — speak to them to express your own thoughts.”

Today, I feel a connection between my recent works and those early explorations, but my thinking has changed. Now, expressiveness for me is not passion revealed through movement, but through the structure of the painting — where every part is equally valuable, where the composition and the interaction of color fields, the placement of objects and the pauses in between, all matter. Like musical harmony — where each note is a fragment of the whole.

A few years ago, Gisela Schröder said to me: “Tolya, you had that CORNER in your studio where you made coffee — I still remember it... after all these years.”

– Anatoli Gostev (1946–2022)

The Corner — a Search for Artistic Language

This little corner, where the artist brewed coffee and prepared food, became a symbol not only of his creative process, but of the time spent seeking his own artistic voice. Looking at this painting, one can feel the pulse of the past and that deep inner connection between the artist and himself that permeates all his work. “Tolya's Corner” became an inseparable part of Anatoli Gostev’s identity as an artist and reveals how his views and ideas about art evolved over time.

A cubist composition with an ironic, sensual undertone — in the form of a water faucet — also hints at the modest, sometimes improvised living conditions of that period, which for the artist became a dear and nostalgic memory. The painting is perceived as a unique bridge in time — a portal into the studio of those distant years. The artist’s son recalls:

My father arranged that corner himself. He laid ceramic tiles on a concrete wall, and included a single row of mirrors. To the right, there was a small electric stove. The washbasin was old, made of metal with a ceramic coating, and a single cold-water tap stuck out of the wall. My father had fitted a pink-and-white water filter onto it. So much is tied to that studio corner, and I remember every detail vividly. Part of my childhood unfolded there. This painting by my father is filled with a frozen fragment of time. It is like a bridge back to Studio 46A.

Authenticity — Signature and Certificate

The painting is signed on both the front and back. Anatoli Gostev belonged to a vanishing era of true artists with a distinctive, unrepeatable style. His legacy is securely protected by copyright law.

The painting “Tolya's Corner” is certified on the blockchain. Using timestamping technology, a unique digital signature of the root certificate for the painting has been permanently recorded on the blockchain, guaranteeing the immutability of data regarding provenance, authorship, and current ownership.

The COA certificate contains the root certificate data extracted from the .ots proof file. The root certificate, registered on the Bitcoin blockchain, can be transferred to a new owner only through a formal agreement of ownership transfer, ensuring transparency and trust in the resale or gifting of the artwork. This makes the authenticity of “Tolya's Corner” verifiable and valid for the lifetime of the work.