“My initial interest in art was connected with the “Ogonyok” magazine: my dad and grandad would pull out the supplement pages with reproductions of works by great artists and paste them all over the walls of our apartment. How else would someone in the provinces come across Rembrandt?” That was how this little boy from the small town of Salsk in the Rostov region was introduced to classical painting - perhaps this childhood memory is the key to his own daring approach to art: he makes his works from corrugated cardboard, garbage bags, Scotch tape and boxes. Koshlyakov first became known as an artist while taking part in the “Zhupel action performance” that took place in a public toilet in Rostov-on-Don in 1988 and ended in disgrace. He remembers: “We had to explain our artwork to the district Party committee. Then it was a matter of conformism, and now it is just a residual effect.” After that scandal, Koshlyakov moved to Moscow, worked at the studios on Trekhprudny Lane and joined in various collaborative exhibition events. Since the end of the 1990s he has lived in Europe, and his solo exhibitions have been held in Russia, Germany, France, the US and Estonia. His artwork can now be found in private collections and museums abroad, as well as in the Tretyakov Gallery, the Shchusev Museum of Architecture in Moscow and the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg.