The article examines some of the reasons and prerequisites for the relevance of the theme of myth in contemporary Russian art, and also reveals some dynamics of de- and remythologizing approaches. The object of the study is Russian art projects from the 1990s to the present, and the subject is the theme of mythology in these projects. The analysis uses a generational classification of Russian artists: artists of the 1990s are characterized as postmodernist, vital and playful, focusing on criticism and transgressive practices; artists of the 2000s are more focused on critical research, academicism and conceptualism (the so-called "new boring"); artists of the 2010s more often work with images, visuality, gravitate towards a certain mystery, and are less critical. A comparative analysis of various philosophical approaches to understanding myth and mythology, as well as an art history analysis of artworks are used. For each of the identified generations of artists, the main strategies for working with mythology have been defined: for artists of the 1990s and 2000s, a demythologizing strategy is characteristic, aimed at exposing myth as a means of naturalizing ideologies and installing, rehabilitating historical thinking. Such a strategy is largely based on the works of Roland Barthes on mythology. For artists of the 2010s, a remythologizing strategy is more characteristic, in which myth is not criticized, but constructed and recreated. Often, myth is considered as a certain universal, sacred cultural feature, which is emphasized by borrowing mythological from various cultures within a single artistic project. The hierotopic nature of the construction of exhibition and artistic space, often encountered in modern projects, is emphasized.
Artemii Eduardovich Kulemin (Fri,) studied this question.