Background news

Brovdi Art Foundation presented its works at "Permanent Revolution"

19
April

2018

Brovdi Art Foundation presented its works at "Permanent Revolution"

From 6 April to 24 June 2018 in the Budapest Museum of Ludwig, it will be held an exhibition of contemporary Ukrainian art "Permanent Revolution". A large-scale artistic presentation, organized by the Museum of Ludwig and Zenko Foundation, presents to the European spectators the works of several generations of the Ukrainian artists in the context of the country's social transformations over the past 30 years. Curators of the Budapest exhibition from the Ukrainian side – Alisa Lozhkina and Kostiantyn Akinsha, from the Hungarian side – Director of the Ludwig Museum Julia Fabene. Among the exhibited works there are two paintings from the Brovdi Art Foundation’s collection. These are "Forever Together" by the artistic duo "Natsprom" Oleg Tistol and Mykola Matsenko and "The Critical Degree" by Vasyl Tsagolov.

According to the project authors and organizers, permanent social turbulence in Ukraine has gradually become habitual and has formed several generations, whose worldview is inextricably connected with life in the era of radical change. The period from the late 1980s to the mid-2010s is an epoch of painful searches, the formation of the new Ukrainian identity and an easy deviation from the Soviet cultural model, completely subordinated to the interests of the ideology. For the past three decades, Ukraine has been going through the serious social upheavals. And thus, to some extent, these very upheavals determine the unique energy and vitality of its art.

37 Ukrainian contemporary artists and art groups exhibit their works, namely APL315, Piotr Armianovski, Serhii Bratkov, Anatolii Belov, Artem Volokitin, Stanislav Voliazlovskyi, Vova Vorotniov, Zhanna Kаdyrova, Glib Katchuk and Olga Kashimbekova, Alevtina Kakhidze, Borys Kashapov, Alina Kleitman, Taras Kovach, Daria Koltsova, Mariia Kulikovska, Yurii Leiderman and Ihor Chatskin, Mykola Matsenko, Boris Mikhailov, Roman Mykhailov, Roman Minin, Yevgen Nikiforov, Natsprom (Oleg Tistol and Mykola Matsenko), Serhii Petliuk, Ihor Petrov, Oleksii Radynskyi, Vlada Ralko, Oleksandr Roitburd, Stepan Riabchenko, Arsen Savadov, Oleksii Sai, Vasyl Tsagolov, Oleksandr Chekmenov, Davyd Chichkan, Mytia Churykov, Mykyta Shalennyi, OpenGroup, SzuperGallery (Susanne Clausen and Pavlo Kerestey).

Among the exhibited works, there are, in particular, Vasyl Tsagolov's painting "The Critical Degree" and the work "Together Forever" from the joint project "Natsprom" by Oleg Tistol and Myloka Matsenko. Both works are provided for the exposition by Art & Culture Foundation Brovdi Art.

3.jpg — 108.09 kBV. Tsagalov 'The Critical Degree',2013, oil on canvas, 240 х 570

Thus, the painting of Vasyl Tsagolov "The Critical Degree" is devoted to the theme of protest, social disobedience that can at any moment turn into a bloody revolution. The artist examines the process of rebellion, the course of events and its consequences, which gives the viewer the impression that he has just seen a picturesque scene from the film. The work became prophetic, because in a few months after the creation of the cycle "Phantom of the Revolution", in 2013 the real revolution started in Ukraine.

1.jpg — 110.80 kBM. Matsenko, O. Tistol. (Natsprom) 'Together Forever', 2013, mixed media on canvas, 300 x 300

The creative tandem "Natsprom" that unites Ukrainian artists Oleg Tistol and Mykola Matsenko, arose in the early 1990s. In one of the manifestos, in which the ideological foundations of the artistic duet were grounded in a quite ironic form, it was declared a research of national stereotypes fixed in the subject environment and "creation of a micromodel of Ukrainian culture in the European and world context".

In 2013, Oleg Tistol and Mykola Matsenko created a joint monumental painting “Together Forever”. Each of them embodied their achievements and author’s style of the last creative period. The painting expression of Tistol, along with the "cubist" style, developed in recent years, is harmoniously combined with the "heraldic" graphics of Matsenko. The theme of love and unity, ironically, but sensuously embodied in the image of a couple in a kiss, is a leitmotif in all the joint oeuvre of the artists. They have chosen this image as one of the key stereotypes associated with the romantic side of Ukrainian culture, worthy of artistic comprehension, global and ‘national promotion’.

In general, the exposition "Permanent Revolution" can demonstrate that contemporary Ukrainian art is a phenomenon with its unique history, rapid development and rich artistic process. The high artistic level of the works of the leading Ukrainian authors, as well as the depicted atmosphere of difficult transformations in the country, as the authors of the project hope, will be an interesting breakthrough for the European audience.

The publication is prepared based on © Zenko Foundation

Learn more about the exhibition "Permanent Revolution" on the website and Facebook page Zenko Foundation

Stay up to date with art events, subscribe