The Tretyakov Gallery's exhibition of Maxim Kantor's work is an event of historical proportions. This is true not only because the pictures represent work done by a modern Russian artist in the last four years, but because of the dynamic and controversial nature of the display.

Kantor does not mince his words, artistically speaking. His vision is serious, vast in scope and sure of itself. Often with a tinge of mockery and irony, he presents an all-sweeping view of life in present-day Russia that blasts the viewer with its uncomfortable directness and honesty. His commentaries about social and political realities are those that need to be made and, more pertinently, those that Russia's art world generally chooses to avoid.

His work, and particularly his paintings, has been described as "dark and breeding." Indeed, the gothic images of tormented, deprived, psychologically entrapped Russians – caught up in an existence that owes much of its misfortunes to the dictates of mediocrity and philistinism induced by communism – is not, in Kantor's lexicon, a recipe for optimism. The portrayal of the destructive power of demonic forces in their communist guise is unsparing in its condemnation. Even more pessimistic is the depiction of a human condition that has not yet found a way out of its dilemma.

And yet, many of his paintings are deeply intimate and touching. An oil portrait of his mother, another oil painting entitled "Roditelsky dom" (Family Home) and etchings of his father and mother project the exhibition into another domain – that of a personal album documenting life and social attitudes, with which no other country and its people can begin to compare.

The avant-garde Krokin Gallery's curator, Alexander Petrovichev, who was present at the exhibition's opening, commented: "Kantor is a master of an approach that is serious and multi-layered, particularly in European terms – I think it's fair to say his work is influenced by the German Expressionism of the 30's. It's not a precise analogy but Kantor, as it were, develops the tradlition."

In Petrovich's view, it would be a mistake to assume that, in his treatment of sociological and psychological issues, the artist has taken a hostile stance toward his material. "The direction of his work should not be understood as a criticism of the victims of the Russian dilemma," he said. "Kantor's position is that of involvement and sympathy. He doesn't stand aside, but suffers alongside his subjects."

Aptly titled "Pustyir. Atlas" (Wasteland. Atlas), the exhibition is divided into three parts – 16 large canvases that are further remarkable for the intensive and vivid use of colour; 70 etchings in predominantly gray and red and around 100 pages of text in the form of two letters written to a mythical "loved one" living in Russia and a "dearest friend" in Europe that address questions ranging from the Russian avant-garde to "Russia's last chance." Kantor, who was born in 1957 in Moscow, where he still lives when not in London, is an artist whose work has understandably been mainly exhibited in galleries abroad. It takes courage to address topically painful issues and just as much to exhibit them. Probably only the Tretyakov is big enough to take the likes of Kantor on board – which is not to say there are any more like him. Kantor, particularly in the current socio-economic climate, is a uniquely gifted artist of uncommon power.