«Ukrajins’kyj Zriz – The Ukrainian Profile» is a contemporary art project that in a certain sense is a retrospection of contemporary art of Ukraine. This is an attempt to cover geographically all important regions where contemporary artists work (Kharkiv, Kherson, Mykolaiv, Kyiv, Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Uzhhorod).
«Ukrajins’kyj Zriz» involves a wide age range of participants – from «classics» to the youngest generation that reflects the newest tendencies of contemporary art.
The Ukrainian art represented in Lublin by the exhibition “The Ukrainian Profile” is primarily a selection made by Vlodko Kaufman. His choice was based mainly on the aspects of artistic up-to-dateness and Ukrainianness. This topic (artist’s identity) is much talked about, in particular, till now there have been the debates on nationalism and art which were prompted by the Estonian exhibition “Let’s Talk About Nationalism! Between Ideology and Identity” (Kumu Art Museum) or the discussions about identity, rootedness or internationality in the art center of Viktor Pinchuk.
It is important to remember that there is no identity but rather a politics of identity, and artists often use their origins for career purposes, manipulating their belonging to a certain nation in order to sell better.
But this is not the point at all.
The names of the authors whose works the audience can see in the project «Ukrajins’kyj Zriz» gained fame in Ukraine and abroad in the 1990s and 2000s, and some of them have become known quite recently. Yet this does not mean that these artists had not worked before the 1990s: the point was that around that time the reality of the USSR was coming to an end and a new country, Ukraine, was emerging in its place. As a result many institutions of the former metropolitan country either disappeared or have been at the stage of transformation till now. For example, the National Union of Artists still has several thousands members, yet it has entirely lost its significance. The institution, once inspired by Stalin, used to be the absolute monopolist on the art market, but it has failed to respond to challenges of the free market.
Yet again this is not the point.
Ukrainian art (if not to mention Lviv or Uzhhorod) developed in the context of the Russian artistic environment for a long time. In particular, the six-volume edition “The History of Ukrainian Art”, written in the 1960s, often provoked insolent chuckles or a lack of understanding in the midst of Russian intelligentsia or Ukrainian “Little Russians”: How come Ukrainian art existed? Indeed, how come? Perhaps, it was invented by insufferable
inhabitants of Halychyna, who are, traditionally, not Ukrainians but half-Poles? Or, wasn’t that a provocation of the West?
Thus, no wonder the Ukrainian art which was exhibited in Moscow in the 1990s was only called the «Southern Russian wave» by advanced curators and gallery workers of a kind of Marat Helman. On this «wave» we often find ourselves till now, since the questions of authenticity, patriotism or nationality have never been answered in the community of Ukrainian artists.
At present Ukrainian artists often travel all over the world or live abroad and try to realize themselves under such conditions.
But this is also not the point.
After the collapse of the USSR, Ukraine got into economic difficulties: the art market practically disappeared and the artistic community turned into a dull timeserving mass. Artists that only yesterday draw portraits of Lenin commissioned by party committees or still-lives commissioned by artistic complexes took to painting churches and «creating» icons. Others went abroad to earn money.
Some of them came back, since they did not manage to get adapted, but many stayed there and now act as Ukrainian artists in Canada, the USA, Europe or Russia.
Only a small group did not have to change themselves. Some artists, quite to the contrary, left underground and their work became accessible. These are so-called non-conformists – conceptual artists, formalist painters, experimental sculptors, who did not hope to find a market for their works and who conducted creative experiments acting according to their convictions. These experiments were mainly certain echoes of high modernism of the beginning of the 20th century or “pranks” that were created in studios for artists’ adherents and often happened simultaneously with similar experiments in the West.
The process of legalization of the former «underground» became so manifest that in the 1990s a section of experimental art, headed by a famous abstractionist Vasyl Bazhaj, was established in the Lviv branch of the Union of Artists.
And finally the question in point.
The exhibition “ Ukrajins’kyj Zriz ” represents mainly the art of Ukrainian postmodernism, which development at the end of the 1980s was characterized by provocation, simulation, ironic reinterpretation of cultural codes and literary plots in accordance with intellectual rules of “the glass bead game.” The collapse of the USSR, chaotic market and reinterpretation of values became basic aspects of creativity in the 1990s. Irony or simulation became instruments of aesthetization, and provocation was used as an opportunity for shattering of conservative structures.
In spite of provocative methods and themes, the authors of Ukrainian contemporary art came out of the traditional soviet artistic environment, which was not shattered by the minimalism of Arte Povera or experiments of Fluxus, performances of Beuys or video diaries of Jonas Mekas. Ukrainian artists often started their searches at the end of the 1980s and at the beginning of the 1990s within the frameworks of youth plein-airs, such as in Sednev (1988, 1989), on the festival «VyVyKh» (1990-1992), in groups like “The Fund of Masoch,” in the art societies “Shlyakh (Way)” (1989-1995) and “Pohlyad (Look)” (1989-1992) as well as in the squat “The Paris Commune” (1990-1994). Eventually they together organized exhibitions, communicated, quarreled and sought their place in global contemporary art.
The core of the postmodern movement in Ukraine was made of Kyiv artists, who were joined by artists from Odesa and West Ukraine (mainly Lviv). Their works of the end of the 1980s – the beginning of the 1990s combine tendencies of trans-avant-garde and national traditions, in particular, Ukrainian baroque or ethnic style.
Today the notion of Ukrainian contemporary art is associated with the names of the artists who worked and experimented in the 1980s – 1990s, that is why no wonder they often represent Ukraine on international exhibitions.
The majority of contemporary Ukrainian artists work with traditional media: painting, graphics, installation. Since the 1990s media art appeared in the Ukrainian context, in particular, video art, however it has not been institutionalized yet. After all, it is diffi cult to mention at least one Ukrainian artist who works solely with media. For the most part the situation is quite the opposite: the main form of activity is associated with traditional techniques, and video or interactive art appear in creative work from time to time. (There are several Ukrainian media artists abroad, but due to their isolation from the Ukrainian context they are not in the profi le.)
At the exhibition one can see the young generation of media artists who have already caught the relay baton from the generation of the turbulent 1990s, quite successfully started on «Week of Contemporary Art» and nicely represented Ukraine on various internatioinal art forums.
Performing arts (in particular performance) are also quite scarcely represented in Ukrainian contemporary art, however there has been a tendency towards improvement – largely thanks to the influence of the Days of Performance in Lviv. “ Ukrajins’kyj Zriz ” also represents the young Ukrainian artists of performance who have made themselves known on local and international levels.
All in all, the exhibition’s program is quite representative and gives a good idea of the Ukrainian art of the epoch of postmodernism.