Artists Against the State recaptures an important time in art history when the Gorbachev era initiated a new openness in 1985, allowing a new cultural exchange between the East and West. The exhibition includes three generations of artists including the Moscow Conceptual School, many from St. Petersburg (then Leningrad), and emigre artists whose work was once again able to be included within the Russian tradition. Artists include Ilya Kabakov, Komar & Melamid, Brodsky & Utkin, The Peppers, Eric Bulatov, Grisha Bruskin, Vadim Zakharov, Sergei Bugaev, Timur Novikov, Pavel Pepperstein, Alexander Kosolapov, Oleg Vassiliev, Andrei Monastyrsky, Igor Makarevich, Elena Elagina, Konstantin Zvezdochetov, Larisa Zvezdochetova, and many others.