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The primary work many guests to the fifth Kyiv Biennial in Vienna encounter tells a narrative that begins two days earlier than the Russian invasion of Ukraine, in February 2022.
“I’m completely not scared,” asserts one scholar to the digital camera, whereas one other blithely performs ukulele. The video ends at 5am on 24 February, with the sound of sirens wailing.
The work, by Kharkiv-born artist Alisa Sizyk, units a poignant tone for the biennial, entitled In opposition to the Logic of Battle. It’s on view at Augarten Modern, the central venue of the eight throughout Austrian capital which can be internet hosting the present, till 17 December.
A lot of the works assembled at Augarten converse on to the Ukrainian battle with Russia, however others handle battle and violence, authoritarian rule and political subjugation extra broadly.
Vienna is the principle venue of the Kyiv Biennial this 12 months, which, as the results of the battle, has been conceived as a pan-European occasion, to reveal that the European artwork world stands with the Ukrainians, with extra exhibitions occurring in cities resembling Kyiv, Warsaw, Lublin, Antwerp and Berlin.
“We put the entire thing collectively in simply 4 months as an act of solidarity,” stated Georg Schöllhammer, one of many co-curators of the Vienna occasion.
“The thought was to reintegrate the diaspora of Ukrainian artists that’s now unfold throughout Europe, with those residing in Ukraine nonetheless and with worldwide colleagues who’ve related experiences or have labored already with Ukraine.”
Some 2,000 artists and guests attended the Vienna opening on October 17, stated Schöllhammer, which featured reside efficiency items by the Greek artist Georgia Sagri and the queer multimedia artist and musician Boji, from Kyiv.
Ukrainian artists within the present embrace Kateryna Lysovenko, Kateryna Aliinyk, filmmaker duo Yarema Malashchuk & Roman Hīmey, and Anton Shebtko. Featured artists from different international locations embrace French artist Laure Prouvost, German photographer Wolfgang Tillmans, and Romanian multidisciplinary artist Dan Perjovsskhi.
Co-curators Schöllhammer and Hedwig Saxenhuber labored with Kyiv Biennial curator and managing director, Serge Klymko, on the Vienna exhibition. They beforehand co-hosted the primary Kyiv Biennial in 2015 with the non-profit Kyiv Visible Tradition Analysis Centre.
The group made the choice to mount the Viennese present in Could, and organised it swiftly, and with all of the issues of transferring artworks out of a battle zone. “It was actually a sophisticated course of to get works out of Ukraine,” stated Saxenhuber, “however we succeeded to find a means.”
The most important assortment of works in Vienna, totalling round 30, is displayed on the Augarten, a sprawling studio with solar roofs that permit in ample gentle. Schöllhammer described it as a “contaminated house,” as a result of it was a former atelier for an Austrian sculptor who made Nazi monuments throughout World Battle II.
A second location, By no means At Dwelling artwork house, incorporates a lot of works that target the LGBTQ group in Kyiv, each earlier than and throughout the battle. New media works, together with digital actuality installations, are featured on the Neuer Kunstverein Wien.
Lots of the works on show discover methods of holding collectively fragments of the nation the artists have been compelled to go away. At Augarten, Salute by the Ukrainian artwork group De Ne De encompasses a badly-damaged brutalist chandelier from a Soviet-era lodge in Kyiv referred to as The Salute. To rescue the damaged chandelier from Ukraine organisers needed to label it as “theatre units,” Saxenhuber says.
Two acrylic work by Aliinyk, Uncared for A part of the Backyard and Ukrainian River, characteristic the panorama of Donbas plagued by artillery shells and shrapnel.
Prouvost’s five-part video set up is proven on TV screens which can be lined with fabric or turned in direction of the ground or wall in order that they’re practically unimaginable to view, suggesting one thing unwatchable or deliberately obscured. Tillmans presents a big 2014 inkjet print depicting what appears to be like like tv static, whereas additionally giving house to photojournalist Friedrich Bungert’s pictures of wounded Ukrainian fighters.
An enormous LED gentle set up, There may be an Elephant within the Room, by the Danish artwork collective, SUPERFLEX, merely feedback on the fact of the state of affairs. On the By no means at Dwelling house, in the meantime, Colombian collage artist Daniel Otero Torres has created a sculpture that mixes photos from historic battle zones together with the Vietnam Battle and the Algerian Battle, made in meticulous pencil drawings on polished stainless-steel.
“There was such a powerful motion between the individuals to convey their works and to share their concepts,” Saxenhuber says. “I’ve by no means skilled it earlier than.”
Whether or not their works immediately handle the Russia-Ukraine battle or different worldwide conflicts, all of the artists concerned have some expertise with the violence of political aggression.
“You’ll be able to see the battle,” stated Saxenhuber. “This undertone of the battle is all the time there.”
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