Global Spotlight: Video Art from Ukraine
Experimental and Truland Galleries
Featured Artists: Nikolay Karabinovych, Mykola Ridnyi, and Daniil Revkovskiy and Andriy Rachinskiy,
Global Spotlight: Video Art from Ukraine introduces audiences to four of Ukraine’s leading contemporary artists, with a focus on recent video work.
When viewed from a distance (whether of time or of geography), periods of history are often reduced to one side or the other of a strict dichotomy: a period of war or a time of peace. In reality, there is rarely a distinct moment when “normal” life ends and a state of war begins. The official declaration of war is rarely the first sign of armed conflict and a war’s tragic consequences persist for years, decades, or centuries after its official conclusion.
The works in the exhibition address these liminal times and spaces, considering daily life, public memory, and civic identity preceding, in the midst of, and adjacent to war and armed conflict. They speak directly to the artists’ experiences of the ongoing war in Ukraine, as well as the periods of civic uprising, civil unrest, and separatist violence that preceded Russia’s invasion of the country in February of 2022. The exhibition also reflects more broadly on the threats faced by societies struggling to preserve or expand their democratic institutions, including the weaponization of propaganda and conspiracy theories, weakened government institutions, growing political sectarianism, failures of collective memory.
Artist Bios
Nikolay Karabinovych
b. 1988, Odessa, Ukraine
Lives and works in Antwerp, Belgium and Kyiv, Ukraine
Nikolay Karabinovych works with video, text, sound, and performance. He is interested in the fluid identities of post-socialist Eastern Europe, clashes between new nationalisms, and contradictions of historical narratives.
In 2017 Karabinovych was an assistant curator of the 5th Odessa Biennial and is currently studying at the Higher Institute for Fine Arts (HISK) in Ghent. He was awarded the First Special Prize as part of the 2020 PinchukArtCentre Prize. Karabinovych’s recent exhibitions include solo shows at Labirynt Gallery (Lublin, Poland), Hit Gallery, (Bratislava, Slovakia), Noch (Odessa, Ukraine), and Museum of Modern Art, Odessa and group exhibitions at Zwarte Zaal (Ghent, Belgium), PinchukArtCentre (Kyiv, Ukraine), M HKA (Antwerp, Belgium), KunstQuartier (Salzburg, Austria), BWA (Tarnow, Poland), and Pasinger-fabrik (Munich, Germany), among many other venues.
Daniil Revkovskiy
b. 1993, Kharkiv, Ukraine
Lives and works in Kharkiv, Ukraine and Kyiv, Ukraine.
Andriy Rachinskiy
b. 1990, Kharkiv, Ukraine
Lives and works in Kharkiv, Ukraine and Kyiv, Ukraine.
Daniil Revkovskiy and Andriy Rachinskiy work in video, photography, and installation They began working collaboratively in 2012. Recent solo exhibitions include Voloshyn Gallery (Kyiv, Ukraine), PinchukArtCentre (Kyiv, Ukraine), Detenpyla (Lviv, Ukraine), OFF/FORMAT (Brno, Czech Republic), and Miejski Ośrodek Sztuki (Gorzow Wielkopolski, Poland), among other venues.
Revkovskiy and Rachinskiy’s work has also been shown in group exhibitions and at screenings in Europe and the United States include at Arsenal (Kyiv, Ukraine), Ermilov Centre (Kharkiv, Ukraine), e-flux (Brooklyn, NY), Centre of Contemporary Art (Torun, Poland), Etc. Galerie (Prague, Czech Republic), and as part of the Second National Biennale of Young Art, Kharkiv, Ukraine. They were awarded the Public Choice Prize as part of the 2020 PinchukArtCentre Prize. Revkovskiy and Rachinskiy both graduated from the Kharkiv State Academy of Design and Art.
Mykola Ridnyi
b. 1985, Kharkiv, Ukraine
Lives and works in Kyiv, Ukraine
Mykola Ridnyi is an artist, filmmaker, curator, and writer. In 2005 he co-founded the SOSka group and the gallery-laboratory of the same name in Kharkiv, Ukraine. Ridnyi participated in the National Pavilion of Ukraine at the Venice Biennale in 2013 and 2015, as well as in the main project of the Biennale, All the World’s Futures, in 2015.
Ridnyi’s work is included in the permanent collections of the Pinakothek der Moderne (Munich, Germany), Neuer Berliner Kunstverein (Berlin, Germany), Ludwig Museum (Budapest, Hungary), Museum of Modern Art Warsaw, and Arsenal City Gallery (Bialystok, Poland). His work Lost Baggage (2019), created for the 12th Biennale in Kaunas, is included in the permanent exhibition of the IX Fort Holocaust Memorial Museum.
His work has been exhibited and screened extensively across Europe including in solo exhibitions at Voloshyn Gallery (Kyiv, Ukraine), Labirynt City Gallery (Lublin, Poland), Blockhaus DY10 (Nantes, France), and Edel Assanti (London, Great Britain), among other venues, and in group exhibitions and film festivals including the Kyiv Pavilion of the Tbilisi Architecture Biennial, the 11th Odessa International Film Festival, the 49th Molodist Kyiv International Film Festival, 12th Kaunas Biennale (Kaunas, Lithuania), PinchukArtCentre (Kyiv, Ukraine), and Haus der Kulturen der Welt (Berlin, Germany), among many others.
About Voloshyn Gallery
The artworks in Global Spotlight: Video Art from Ukraine are exhibited courtesy of the artists and Voloshyn Gallery, Kyiv, Ukraine. Established in October 2016 by Max and Julia Voloshyn, Voloshyn Gallery specializes in contemporary art. It exhibits a broad range of works in a variety of media, hosting solo and group exhibitions and taking part in leading contemporary art fairs. Over the course of the last two years, the gallery has participated in The Armory Show, ARCOmadrid, Liste Basel, Art Cologne, Enter Art Fair, viennacontemporary, Dallas Art Fair, NADA Miami, Untitled Art, Art Athina, EXPO Chicago, etc. Voloshyn Gallery is a member of the New Art Dealers Alliance (NADA).
