Ukrainian Glances. Vernissage

FLORA GATSENKO #MaskingTheLight (mixed media installation)

Eyes are the mirror of the soul, so they say in Ukraine. When you have a heavy heart, it is unbearable to look into the eyes, because you can only see sadness and darkness in them. Having arrived a few hundred kilometers from my homeland during the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, I should feel safe and open my eyes as well as my soul, filling it with fresh impressions and creative inspiration, but I am fixed only on the boarded-up windows of Сoswig’s abandoned houses. reminding me of light masking at home in Kyiv, which I have followed since February 24, which embodied my safety.

During the KarneKunst residency, I use authentic materials found in the building’s workshops, combining painting materials with natural raw materials for greater immersion in the space in which I work and by which I am inspired. 

ELENA LAZUTKINA “3 minutes before new Life” (4 min audio + polaroids)

Idea&polaroids: Lazutkina Olena https://linktr.ee/Lazutkina 

Audio: Max Kurushyn 

What matters for you in life? What things will you keep with you in your new life? Do you remember your morning today? Was it standard and slowly? What did you say to your children and relatives this morning? Imagine, the war starts. One second that changes your life immediately. And you have 3 minutes to decide what to bring.  

The process. A person puts on headphones and a 4-minute audio play. The first minute is the sound of the ordinary morning of a family person. Then an explosion sounds and a 3-minute report begins. During this time, a person is invited to choose things that are on Polaroids that he will take with him to his “new life”.

LIDIA MOROZ “Fucking Rubik’s Cube” (object + video)

Recently I feel like I am trying to complete different aspects of my life in one image but not succeeding. Personal life, career, home, safety…It’s not easy to combine them even in a peaceful time. War made it delusive…They all are separated by distance, time, lack of emotional recourses, and even exclude each other. Because, for example, home excludes safety, and safety – home. It’s like trying to complete the Rubik’s cube with missing elements.

Objects: 

1. Rubik’s cube with the words written on it  – “personal life”, “career”, “family” etc, messy screwed up. 

2. Video with my hands trying to complete it. 

NATALIA GOLUBENKO “Raping the Earth” (video + sound)

When they are raping the Earth, it hurts. 

Money, weapons, soldiers, explosions, oil pumps, naked women, blood, pain, and destruction – are the main symbols of war and masculine power, that remain unchanged since ancient times. In my work “Raping the Earth” I used the footage about the military history from Prelinger Archives alongside today’s videos from security cameras in Ukraine and shots of Putin’s public speech, to show that over the last 100 years nothing has changed in this world.  

ALEKSANDRA GORKOVA (SHUBBE) “The Guardian”

My project is called “The second life of a tree”. The name of the sculpture is “Guardian”.

Guardian is a woman. It is an image that gives life. The main thing about it is that it is impossible to see with the eyes, but can only be felt with the heart.