Oleg Tistol and Sergei Sviatchenko about the joint project "The End of Spring"

19

May

2018

On 23-27 May 2018, in the framework of the International Art Festival Kyiv Art Week, with the support of the Brovdi Art Foundation and the Abramovych.Art platform, it will be demonstrated a special project of Oleg Tistol and Sergei Sviatchenko under the title "The End of Spring". By the way, for the first time the idea the project was born in Uzhhorod in autumn of 2017 when Tistol and Sviatchenko as the Jury members of the student contest "Silver Easel" personally met after almost a thirty years' break ...

Thus, a journalist of ART UKRAINE Roksana Rublevska asked the authors about the idea of their joint project and its features.

Oleg Tistol: "Within the framework of Kyiv Art Week, we present a joint project with Sergei Sviatchenko, an artist with whom we started our career together in the late 80s. Our last exhibition "Flash" took place in 1991. After that Sergei went to Denmark where he became a well-known artist and came back not a long time ago. So, we decided to create a joint installation under the title "The End of Spring". It will include collages, photos, stained-glass windows, and sculptures. The name is associated with the arrival of Sviatchenko to Ukraine but we also keep saying about the theme of the struggle for the cultural territory of Crimea, which was perceived as a paradise in the Soviet times. I’d like to note that the project became real thanks to Igor Abramovych and Robert Brovdi. Why do I mention these names? This is not a commercial but without them, our plans with Sergei would not be realized. I have always dreamt that as many people as possible participate in such art events, then it becomes clear that it is most needed to someone."

Sergei Sviatchenko: "Everyone probably knows the state of collision, when, thinking over for a moment, you crash into someone on the turn. Fear, even physical pain. The same happened to me when I met Oleg Tistol last year. We were moving in the same direction, walking the parallel paths for many years but didn’t notice it. And when we met again, we started studying the works of each other. Carefully. Overwhelming. This is what "The End of Spring" should be. Boyishly mature and magnetic. There are some agreements as to other exhibitions in Ukraine but they are still being actively discussed."

At the request of the Brovdi Art Foundation, Sergei Sviatchenko, who, by the way, besides the visual art, is trying his own forces and in poetry, responded to a special project "The End of Spring" with an elegant vers libre (in original):

"It's easier to go towards than just to go.
Waiting for the meeting gives the strength.
To go towards Oleg Tistol in a literal and creative sense is ‘awfully pleasant’.
Like open the window in a thunderstorm...
The end of May, the end of spring".

We would like to remind that a special project "The End of Spring" by Oleg Tistol and Sergei Sviatchenko will be opened within the framework of the International Festival of Contemporary Art Kyiv Art Week on 23 May 2018 at 7 p.m. (pavilion 12, 100 Velyka Vasylkivska str., Kyiv) and will last until 27 May inclusive.

Text: © Roksana Rublevska within the framework of Igor Abramovych's media project ART NOW, © ART UKRAINE, © Brovdi Art Foundation

Photo: © Brovdi Art Foundation, © Sergei Sviatchenko