Represented in Ludwig Museum’s collection with two works from different periods, Timur Novikov was an influential figure of Russian art in the 1980s and 1990s. Both tendencies launched by him (New Artists, Neoacademism) came to be deeply embedded in the contemporary Russian scene, for which he achieved international renown. Novikov was barely twenty years old when he joined the avant-garde group Letopis, with which he broke ties after a conflict regarding Object Zero, and he founded his own group named New Artists. Instead of the squatted apartments hosting the previous exhibitions, Novikov established the ASSA Gallery (ACCA) in his own atelier-apartment. The regular get-togethers of the New Artists were pervaded by fashion and underground/rock music, heralding a kind of new feeling and philosophy of life. As the theoretician of the New Artists, Novikov published his first articles under a pseudonym, continually developing his theoretical approach: in 1988 he founded the “Free University of Various Acts”. He had a considerable role in the making and success of the cult film ASSA directed by Solovyov in 1987, and owing to his role in founding Pirate TV, he is considered to be one of the first Russian media artists. His landscape of mixed media with “expressive traces” is a snapshot of Leningrad with a symbolic overtone (cf. the caption ACCA). Otherwise quite characteristic of this period are his photo collages, indicating the transition towards Neoacademism.