“Начальник автографов”. Семантика альбомного корпуса А.Е. Крученых

Kruchenykh’s archive should be considered a cultural institution and at the same time an artistic practice. However, the concept of “archive” in relation to Kruchenykh’s creative phenomenon is rather conditional, because its components are dispersed around various Russian and foreign private and state repositories.

Kruchenykh’s albums are a separate “archive in the archive”: a superarchive. This superarchive was of crucial importance for the literary process in Russia from the 1930s to the end of the 1960s. Kruchenykh’s archival practices were not only a “refuge”, a marginal niche, but they were also connected with official culture through various social and individual channels. The albums acquired new functions and became meeting places for authors and audiences. Events were documented in the form of chronicles, reports, and memoirs in the albums themselves.

This article looks at the reception of Kruchenykh’s archive in the light of the metaphorical performativity of the writer’s “archival behavior”.