The unique plastic features of tempera technique, the colour and tone having incomparably greater resistance to outward impact (compared with oil painting) were used by great masters of the past not only in icon and fresco painting. Historically the technique of easel tempera painting was perfected and changed continually (from "St. Sebastian" by Andrea Mantegna to "The Island of the Dead" by Arnold Boecklin).

    Dmitry Dergunov's handling the tempera technique, being a result of many-years study of the aesthetics of tempera painting, opened wide possibilities in the sphere of experiment.

    The style of his works is in many ways determined by substantive contents, personal vision and mastery inherent to the artist. The precisely built colour, texture and notional contrasts let him achieve multifaceted, polyphonic and sometimes - mystical sounding, making it visible. Here the formal and decorative solution has profound bond with the potential of the image, allows the artist to restore the unity of the symbolic, narrative and decorative. The semantic line is organized with the help of profound immersion in the objective and sensual world, creation of spiritual image of inanimate objects.

    His realism opens the outlet to the other dimension with reigning mysterious meanings and illusions.

    Dmitry Dergunov's paintings have properties and features beyond the framework of ordinary utility; they make one not only contemplate, but also reflect, causing the feeling of involvement.

William Douglas