On March 30, 2016 CYLAND MediaArtLab opens an exhibition by distinguished artists Alexander Terebenin and Alexander Shishkin-Hokusai at the Youth Educational Center of the State Hermitage. Entitled “Wish You Were Here”, it will be on display until April 3, 2016. In addition to the exhibition workshops by the artists will be organized on Saturday, April 2, at the Center.
Chaos is just an illusion. Everything gets programmed in advance. This is known only too well to the exhausted heroes of online battles, couch knights of the 21stcentury. It is no accident that the products of game corporations that simulate the “other life” proved to be consequential for the contemporary art scene. The game space is clearly defined. Its prototype is the Chernobyl alienation zone. Using the documentary video and photo materials, the authors place their stake on the realistic graphics, mysterious locations and profound atmosphere of post-apocalypse.
Artist Alexander Shishkin-Hokusai materializes the impossible. His project Morning in Chernobyl/Radioactive Versailles is not just an image of the abandoned place, but also an artificial paradise. It is a multilayered and multifigured play, much like with Bosch.There is a multitude of plywood characters in the role of participants, viewers or accidental witnesses. There are disturbing dreams with a turbulent development of the subject. The disease is progressing: the borders between reality and fiction no longer exist.
Alexander Terebenin, the other artist in the project, discovers parallel worlds without immersing into an artfully modeled digital space. Year after year, he registers a silent void that exists next to us. The roof has collapsed; the floor structures have decayed; the walls are being eaten away by mold. The paint peels off in the form of scrolls of the ancient manuscripts. It is dust, rot and decomposition. It is a shadow pantomime. But the apparitions that inhabit it continue to tune their French horns and violins, and the invisible audience is still willing to listen to their virtuoso music. This organism is still breathing. This is a carefree lethargic slumber. The video feed is continued by images placed within the frames. It is homage to the works of old masters from the classic Hermitage collections.
By Nina Filyuta
“Wish You Were Here” exhibition supported by CYLAND MediaArtLab is on display until April 3, 2016 at the Youth Educational Center of the State Hermitage (Moika emb., 47, St. Petersburg)