Death of a Prototype: The Portrait

Death of a Prototype’s plot focuses on the artistic endeavours of a group of Muscovite intellectuals and unfolds against a backdrop of serious and jocular conversations, distorted-mirror parodies and riddles. The male protagonists- predominantly writers and visual artists-expend their creative energies in fashioning an authentic portrait of Adele, the ever-metamorphosing prototype of the title. However, they are themselves forever changing and morphing into other characters. Likewise, the stories they tell-and the pictures they paint-are never the same.