Nikita Alexeev (1953-2021, Moscow) is one of the most brilliant exponents of the artistic movement of "Moscow conceptualism". In the 1970s and 1980s, Alexeev was one of the main protagonists of Moscow unofficial art and was one of the founders and participants in the first actions of the legendary group Collective Actions (1975-1980). He directed the famous APTART gallery, while collecting the first documents for the Moscow New Art Archive. From 1987 to 1993, he lived in France.

Nikita Alexeev preferred to work in sets. This method reflects the fundamental principles of his art, based on observation, endless repetition and the poetics of the ordinary. In his work, birds and vegetables float on iconic golden backgrounds, and small pocket objects form a reliquary. In some projects, Nikita depicts everyday objects as messengers from the other world, in others he shows them as bearers of memory, and he often addresses, through them, figures from the past. This dialogue was never without a certain irony.

The interplay between the verbal and the visual was crucial for the artist. Many of his series are a search for a certain "gap" between meanings. In addition, Alexeev has written texts accompanying his projects, which are not merely explanatory commentaries but constitute a kind of beginning of the pictorial history.

Nikita Alexeev's works are part of the collections of the Centre Pompidou, the Kupferstichkabinett, the Staatliche Museum zu Berlin, the Museo d'arte moderna e contemporanea di Trento e Rovereto (MART), Rovereto, the Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum. The Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection, Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, and many more.