24 November 2023 - 10 January 2024
Muscovy! You devoured me,
as you hanged my daughters and sons
and how you stole iron, bread and coal...
Oh, how your spirit has been demonised!
You thought you were consuming me.
but you choke and fall down into the grass.
"I affirm myself, I claim myself,
because I live".
- an adapted version of the poem "I Affirm" by Pavlo Tychyna (1943)
This exhibition could have had several different titles, each of which would have changed the angle of vision and accentuated the meanings. For example, "The Salt of the Earth", because these works are about the most important thing without which life is impossible. Or, for example, Eat Me, because these works are my challenge to the enemy and time. Because the enemy who invaded my space changed the time of my life... Another title could be "Down the Rabbit Hole"... Thoughts like butterflies, birds or drones
- Svitlana Karunska
Our country's life path was marked by a terrible war and the accompanying death and destruction. It is impossible to completely prevent this, but everyone in their place is ready to fight for a peaceful life. Similarly, the artist seeks to order the chaos around us with her work, to show that it is not capable of "eating" us and crossing out our freedom to choose.
For Svitlana Karunska, creating sculptural and graphic works is her personal way of surviving in times of war. The life of a person in a military conflict is like flying through the thickness of time, into the rabbit hole from Lewis Carroll's «Alice in Wonderland». Behind it, a new reality opens up, where the movement of time is strange and incomprehensible, where strange, illogical, seemingly illogical laws of existence constantly appear, where every day we choose between what is right and what is easy, and where consciousness has time to grasp and concretise only the most important things and thoughts. Unfortunately, most people are unable to resist this madness. That's when art comes in handy - in art, whether your own or someone else's, you find the strength to keep fighting.
The bright colours and creative, sometimes almost daring forms of the artist's works are part of a game with meanings, a challenge to the terrible reality. Mosaic fruits and toys, figures of goddesses and characters from myths, bronze grains and sketches, models of various materials that give an understanding of the process of creating a future sculptural work - this is the kaleidoscope of the author's talent. The exposition includes both humorous works with references to Wonderland and quite serious, philosophical works that make you think about the tragedy of life. But in any of her hypostases, Svitlana Karunska's work is imbued with empathy and hope, because without them, human existence is impossible.
In the end, her Ceres with a sickle completes the cycle of suffering, because in autumn comes not only the time of harvest, but also the time of retribution for the evil done. At the centre of this cycle of life and death is Psyche from the artist's works, the "immortal soul", as a promise that all bad things will pass sooner or later. She knows for sure that we all deserve a miracle in these difficult times. And the «Eat me» exhibition is truly capable of giving us this moment of wonder. After all, as Svetlana Karunska herself believes: "The meaning of the artist's work is to create in the viewer, if not catharsis, then at least an energy shift, which can result in surprise, nostalgia or just a thought that may lead to a better world."
Project team: Olena Borymska, Veronika Shchukina, Oleksandr Kukhar, Iryna Khomenko, Oleksandra Ryzhova, Oleksandra Kabakova, Yelyzaveta Shulyak, Anastasiia Shvydiuk.
Design: Malika Umarova.
The full ticket price is 120 UAH.
