Adamska Elizaveta Rakhilkina

Master of Fine Art

A film is a mosaic forged by time. Adamska Elizaveta Rakhilkina’s films exist in the chasm between two empires—the United States and Russia, and their colonial pasts. Tomorrow Was War is a short film that envisions a dystopian police state of Russia to-be while painting a disquieting portrait of a stealth transgender man, Shura, who is drowning in the environment of total surveillance, paranoia and reactive conformity.

An award-winning film director (“Best Film Audience Award” from Reeling: Chicago International Film Festival), Adamska had their films shown internationally across North and South Americas, Europe, Asia, and Africa. Their experimental documentary No Refunds in collaboration with a New York performer Juno has also been screened locally in Seattle at SOIL art gallery. As a photographer, Adamska has exhibited the globe in galleries in Milan, Berlin, London, and New York. Adamska’s work gallops through eras and genres but is always preoccupied with unpacking our notions of eeriness and nostalgia while transforming flesh with moving image and creating worlds of unbridled desire.

Their visuals hurt so bad, but feel so good. Present is pregnant with future. Home is where the haunt is.

Jai Sallay-Carrington Master of Fine Art

Jai Sallay-Carrington is a figurative ceramic sculptor creating works about human identities, behaviour, and emotions using anthropomorphic creatures. Reflecting on their queer and nonbinary gender identity, Jai creates sculptures which challenge and analyze the dominant heteronormative and cisgendered society. They question the role that these identities have in forming an individual’s character, personality, and placement within their culture. Jai’s sculptures speak to a feeling of otherness, but not necessarily of physical traits which can be immediately viewed by the public. These identities exist within, they are either shared or kept a secret. The zoomorphic qualities of their sculptures shed light on those human characteristics hidden from the naked eye. As each animal comes with its own unique qualities, as well as the myths and stories associated with them, when anthropomorphized, their addition to the human form creates a deeper understanding of that individual’s personality and experiences.

Jai Sallay-Carrington is a Canadian artist from Vancouver B.C. and Montreal QC. In 2014 they graduated from Concordia University with a BFA in ceramics. Jai has attended several artist residencies in Canada, the U.S., and Europe. They have had several solo exhibitions in recent years, such as NuQueer Power at Fatale Art Gallery and Adapting at Maison de la Culture Côtedes-Neiges. They have been featured in publications such as CBC Exhibitionists and Ceramique: 90 Artistes Contemporarian. Jai has been awarded grants from Canada Council of the Arts, SODEC, and CALQ.

Jai Sallay-Carrington, Visibly Invisible, 2023.