Contemporary art is valuable first of all because it is created now and here, literally before our very eyes. Secondly, it reflects the situation we are living in every day. At the same time works that will become part of art history should be universal – so both intelectually and emotionally they could be understood by viewers who are daily living in different context. Both up-to-the-minute and universal are, we believe, are works that participate in “Kylym. Contemporary Ukrainian Artists” which is the first all-Ukrainian project of Zenko Foundation. Curators of the foundation Igor Abramovych and Oleksander Solovyov invited 20 most promising aspiring Ukrainian contemporary artists to participate in the project and challenged them to create their own definition of the traditional Ukrainian “kylym” – woven carpet. Some of them understood the challenge literally, some of them created metaphors. But everyone presented original and authentic works, universal, as they are in one way or another connected to ethnic theme, and at the same time up-to-the-minute, as every artist talks about the problems that bother them, about the situation in the society we are all living in. “Kylym” was created by the artists from Odessa, Kharkiv, and Lviv, from Crimea and Donbass region. The exposition also had a chance to travel across the country. On the 8th of April, 2016, the project took off in the Carpathians – in Tatariv village in Ivano-Frankivsk region. On the 26th of June the project came to Lviv Palace of Arts, and on the 27th of October, 2016, it opened in Kharkiv “YermilovCentre”. One of the “Kylym” missions was to unite – artists from different regions in one project, viewers from different cities – infront of the same works. The third exposition of the all-Ukrainian project has shown that we succeeded. And the summarizing part of the project would be the exposition in Kyiv. “Kylym” in the Ukrainian capital will be on the view from the 6th of December. See you there!
Founders of Zenko Foundation
Zenko Aftanaziv and Yana Symoshenko
The first part of the project, demonstrated in the Carpathians, featured 17 authors. In Lviv they were joined by three more artists. In Kharkiv the exposition expanded because of the new works. Each of the artists showed an own view of traditional art in the contemporary world by using the elements of ethnic symbols to reflect on the present issues of today’s Ukrainian society. Most of the works were creates especially for the “Kylym” project. The exhibition includes painting, sculpture, installations, and videoart.
The main idea of the project “Kylym” is to unite traditional and contemporary art, bring the ethnic culture up to date and to enrich contemporary art with new “folk” meanings.
Special feature of the project is its travelling nature. By moving from the Carpathians to Lviv, and then to Kharkiv and Kyiv, it is growing as with the new works of present participants, so by adding new authors. And conjointly it demonstrates the wholesomeness of the cultural field of the country.
IHOR ABRAMOVICH
curator
The history of the carpet (“kylym” from Ukrainian means “woven carpet”) is just about as old as the proto-origins of civilization. Ever since, as tradition demands, the weaving of the carpet means enclosing in its ornaments, along with the secret warmth of heart, both nationally peculiar and universally human notions about happiness and beauty, life and death, whole successions and layers of deepest values, connected with anthropocosmological worldview of a human, and first-priority forces of human life, which are in fact the very living canvas of the history. A carpet is a fixture of common living space, a detail inside every dwelling. Its meaning is both practical and symbolical: it acts as a provider of heat and decoration, but mostly of protection - it is an amulet. Today we are not very conscious of those meanings, quietly simmering in traditional ornaments. But a contemporary artist, despite having completely different modern context, different problems, and different goals, than those of the folk masters, also thinks in images and symbols, using them to lay new, but still rich range of reformed meanings and motives traditional and contemporary. Akin to a carpet, that includes symbols of different meanings and always has two sides - front and back, contemporary art reflects different parts of reality - aesthetic and idiomatic, positive and negative, it’s obverse and converse. Perpetually important themes of life and death, inconsistencies of human fate, coded in the patterns of carpet, are especially sharp during present dramatic and violent times for our country. Surely, this explosive dynamics is caused by periodic socio-political paroxysms leading to wars and revolutions. In accordance, Ukrainian contemporary art resides in the permanent transitional state, impossible to cram into any convincing and
OLEKSANDER SOLOVYOV
curator
firm definitions, characteristics, and generalizations. For example, the “new young”, that appeared recently on Ukrainian art scene, build their own search athwart the above-mentioned determinism, claiming the idea of aesthetic autonomy instead of the collective rapid response. The denial of publicity is also getting more noticeable - it is countered with self-immersion so deep, that immediate political reference is dimmed, being mutated into biopolitics, which means - the existential problematics is once again on-time. The inevitable exposure of the “wounds of reality” is more and more seldom viewed as social therapy, further turning into an openly-grim artistic fixation. This torn consciousness violates and confuses the established status quo, leading the usual circulation of events, into the realm of irreversible, almost catastrophic interpenetration that allows to display on one surface different times and ideological models in quite pressed blitz-historic reciprocity. This principle of collecting different times in a focus, where incommensurable coincide, is a vibrant sign of post-traumatic times, just what the Ukrainian transitive “today” is - a vast roar of voices and thoughts in their sore confusion. Gathered around and formed by a common idea of the project, its expressive and complete conception, individual statements of a group of young Ukrainian artists, so dissimilar by their content, nevertheless form a surprisingly unified “weaved canvas”, multi-dimensional “carpet”, filled with symbols: endlessly changeable in its unstoppable movement, but still perfectly self-sufficient, living organism.
PARTICIPANTS APL315
Anna Myronova
Kateryna Berlova
Roman Mikhaylov
Nazar Bilyk
Zoya Orlova
Myroslav Vayda
Serhiy Petlyuk
Artem Volokitin
Yuriy Pikul
Oleksii Zolotariov Stepan Ryabchenko Darya Koltsova
Oleksiy Say
Anton Logov
Andriy Sydorenko
Tetyana Malynovska
Anna Sorokovaya
Roman Minin
Oleksiy Yalovega
PROJECT PARTNERS
Zenko Foundation was established in 2015. The main mission of this art institution is to support and promote contemporary Ukrainian art. The collection of Zenko Foundation includes more than 200 works of contemporary Ukrainian art. The debut project of the foundation was the exhibition “Contemporary Ukrainian Art. From Private Collections” (October 2015-March 2016, hotel complex “Koruna” art space). In April of 2016 in Zenko Foundation art space in the Carpathians started the second project “Kylym. Contemporary Ukrainian Artists”. The project was established as all-Ukrainian and after its launch in the Carpathians during the year was travelling to Lviv and Kharkiv. The main directions of development for Zenko Foundation are the exposition program that involves exhibitions at the venues of Zenko Foundation, and supporting Ukrainian artists in prominent local and international projects, contemporary art auctions; and the publishing program, that aims to inform the public in Ukraine and abroad about Ukrainian art-process. In April of 2016 the foundation took part in a publishing project “Ukrainian Art Book”. In May Zenko Foundation became the official partner of the “Gala Europe” concert, that was organized during the Days of Europe in Ukraine with the support of Italian Culture Institute in Ukraine and was dedicated to the celebration of the 70th anniversary of Italian Republic. info@zenkofoundation.com www.zenkofoundation.com zenkofoundation @zenkofoundation
TEAM
Zenko Foundation Curators
PR
Ihor Abramovych
Yulia Kuprina
Photo Maksim Belousov
Oleksandr Solovyov
Design Serhiy Fedynyak
Logistics Artur Antonenko
Project coordination Adrian Aftanaziv