A Run Around the Blooming Sakura

This resonant broadcast is dedicated to German Vinogradov—artist, musician, magician, poet, mystagogue, and legendary figure of the underground.

A “great sorcerer,” performer, and countercultural shaman, Vinogradov brought together several generations of Soviet unofficial artists in the late 1980s.

He could hear the “music of the celestial forest” and played it on his noise-improvisational machine BICAPO, a large-scale installation assembled from metal pipes, sheets of tin, and household objects. For many years, he hosted concerts—extended sessions of BICAPO mysteries—in his own apartment. The installation has been reconstructed and is currently on view in open storage at Garage.

“The BICAPO universe is a song of the elements. A world of endless harmonies, bell chimes, and chants. The ethereal music of this piece—composed of poetic texts and rare recordings of BICAPO sessions, romances, and recitatives, fragments of speech by Vinogradov’s friends—culminates in the poetry concert ‘I Was Catching Trout in the River,’ with the beat of tambourines and the splash of water as the artist leaps into an ice hole.”

The title refers to a home video from the artist’s archive, a moment where his daughter Dada twirls around a blooming sakura tree. This image captures the elusive lightness and magic that permeate Vinogradov’s entire body of work.

Taya Radchenko worked with the German Vinogradov archive in Garage Archive Collection.

Image from the film BICAPO, 1988. Director: Gennady Klimov

About the author

Taya Radchenko is a musician, composer, bell ringer, music program curator, keyboardist of the band Nelyudimka, multi-instrumentalist, performer, and co-founder of the WIP art space on Yauzsky Boulevard.

This broadcast was recorded on cassette by sound engineer and musician Sasha Bragin.