Whirlpool
I am a visual artist from Kharkiv, Ukraine. My current body of work is paintings using acrylic and oil paint ranging from figurative to abstract images. My painting technique is focused on usage of a variety of colours searching for an atmosphere that would feel authentic.
Because of the Russian invasion in 2022, I moved to the Netherlands. It changed me and my perception of the world. My current artistic practice is a way to cope with reality, and attempt to understand the impact of Russian colonisation, past and present.
The series of paintings portray the river landscape in Eastern Ukraine, depicting childhood memories of a place I am unable to return to in over five years. The river, the brightest vision, consistently comes to my mind when I think of my childhood, when I reminisce on those times of visiting my family in Okhtyrka.
Growing up facing the consequences of russification, I didn’t get to live as an Ukrainian. I didn't speak my language. I lack that fundamental experience and I search for it. Being Ukrainian for me is associated with the past, with history and that is where I look for relief. I look into my own family, for those who spoke the Ukrainian language all their lives, went through famine and war.
I reject the expected imagery of war–rockets and tanks, to not let them take space in my art. I want to show my place of origin lost, refusing to be defined by Russian occupation.
