Conceptualism in the Work of Sergej Sigej and Rea Nikonova

Conceptualist literature can be found elsewhere in Russia besides Moscow. Information about the newest trends in Western art and literature circulated well beyond the capital city. Sergej Sigej and Rea Nikonova and their colleagues of the Uktus School in Sverdlovsk developed their own conceptualist poetry and theory as early as the mid-1960s independently of Moscow. Examples of their poetry of this sort will be examined, as well as their writings on conceptualist theory and practice. Their works include appropriations of ready-mades, poems in the form of charts, instructions for poetic “actions” and, in general, the various genres of what they term “transponirovanie” [transposition], which involved using found material in new artistic environments. On this basis, one can credibly conclude that conceptualism was not exclusively a Moscow phenomenon.