October 1-22, 2023. OSSI MI, Samara, Russia

The project was presented in the form of a journey that begins with a scene - Hellin's Square - depicting either an apocalyptic scene of a fall into hell, or a revolutionary act.

The journey included several locations where the viewer could get acquainted with either the virtual part of the project or the physical exhibition. These points were: the Revolution Square, the Museum of the Literature, a tram, a forest with a swamp, an apartment gallery on the outskirts of Samara.

Curator: Ilya Mikheev
Travel moderator: Snezhana Mikheeva
Bot developer: Ksenia Kovshova
Photos: Dima Ptitsyn

Rivet rivet rivet
scraps comrade
about it
not otherwise/
we're all under
them
earth glue/

Traveling through time points of the past, present and future became the starting point for connecting the virtual and physical forms of representation of the project, which expands the initial walk between virtual spaces in the artist’s project, adding to this the convergence points of virtual rooms in geographical points on the city map and several physical exhibitions. Also important is the impossibility of transporting some works for representation, since they are inaccessible, which raises the issue of the artist’s relocation.

The project itself, which represents bureaucratic horror, introduces the viewer to the artistic practices of artist Irсa Solza and offers the opportunity for an existential journey that questions the relationship between man and state, man and faith, which are usually blocked by canonical law or ideologically imbued with state apparatuses. Or even makes them, the viewer, an accomplice in the process. For example, in the “Bureau” hall, which is located in the apartment hall, you can canonize miracles. Then move to the balcony (let’s say, to a simulated artist’s studio) and dissolve. What?

Poetic texts are inserted in many of the rooms and provide one possible conceptual framework for viewing the works. The linearity of time is broken into pieces, so illogical transactions at points in time are possible.

The artist’s practices combine several methodological techniques and strategies to create works:
For example, the engagement of objects and the creation of corporeal and metaphorical situations (for example: the political metaphor of frogs and wasps), in which the propaganda story is intertwined and the breakdown in the form of a traumatized body superimposed on top, symbolically destroys apparatuses of influence such as the mass media and the church with the voice of the oppressed (for example : the work “Sleeping” in the room 'Frogs and Wasps' and the work “Untitled”). Or complex installations in which parallels are drawn between the modern subject and ancient myths (for example: "Antigone") or subjects from the poems of Mandelstam and Korolev (for example: the work “Time to Read Remarque Again”). As well as dystopian total futurological installations (for example: the works “Hellin’s Square” and “Everything Dissolves in the Air”), which raise questions about the future that are difficult to answer after visiting the research room in the “Culture” hall.

The central point is the “Bureaucracy of Miracle” hall, framed a table containing the work “Art Killer” on the de-artification of a work of art and two mythical figures disintegrating into de-collage fragments. By turning the gaze downward, cutting off the Other is possible and it has an anarcho-ethical character, passing through the body and getting into it, in which the gaze turns to oneself and suddenly, I appear near an aurotic swamp, with frogs, wasps and footprints in the forest.

7 points are scattered around the city. 3 hours 23 minutes is the approximate travel time from the center to the outskirts. Agree to the terms of the trip, continue flânerie, be disappointed in something, linger at one of the points or turn around and leave - the choice is yours.

So does everything dissolve into thin air?

Ilya Mikheev