Petersburg artists have filed a lawsuit against the actor and artist Sergey Bugayev aka Africa.

      Oleg Zayka, Evgeny Kozlov, Oleg Maslov and Inal Savchenkov have accused him of illicit possession of their paintings.

      The suit was lodged after the artists’ works lost in the 1980s had been found at an exhibition held in St. Petersburg in May and June, 2013.

      The paintings by Zaika, Kozlov, Maslov and Savchenkov were created in the 1980s.  Then the artists together with Bugayev-Africa displayed them at the New Artists’ group exhibitions that took place in Russia and other countries. After the exhibitions the artworks were not returned to the authors and since then were considered lost.

      Five of the lost works were found at the ASSA exhibition, which did not mention their authors. The artists tried to convince Sergey Bugayev to return the paintings, but all in vain.