Main image by Alaa Mansour
As part of the Ukrainian Institute’s Visualise programme, State of Emergence, a group exhibition of works by 20 Ukrainian and international artists, opens at the New Art Dealers Alliance’s space in Manhattan’s Lower East Side. The exhibition will be on view 21 October – 10 December, 2023.
Starting from the Russian war against Ukraine, curators Lesia Kulchynska and Catinca Tabacaru focus on ongoing emergencies around the globe and their possible techno-driven futures, proposing the consideration of empowering alliances between those who have lived through or are still living in these states. The exhibition places artists from Europe, Lebanon, Suriname, the United States, and Zimbabwe in conversation with Ukrainian artists.
Anastasiia Manuliak, Head of Visual Art for the Ukrainian Institute states, “By featuring works from Ukrainian artists alongside established artists of Ukrainian origin and renowned international artists, we hope to bring Ukrainian perspectives on global issues and challenges to the forefront. This inclusion of Ukrainian discourse in the vibrant art scene of New York City is an exciting opportunity to contribute to the artistic dialogue on a global scale.”
by Ksenia Hnylytska
State of Emergence welcomes viewers with the presence of strange and dangerous creatures: the Dancing Rubble by Slinko personifies in absurdity the destruction of war; while The Siren, a painting by Nikita Kadan reverberates with the seduction of death. As an audience, we try to adapt to their eerie presence despite having no reason to trust or understand them. Looking at the dead ends of hope, the artists call in the liberating overtones of gloom.
Alaa Mansour explores AI’s hallucinations of digital domination, while the art streaming collective UKRAïNATV invites viewers to surrender to the intoxicating messiness of being together in the digital trenches of the ongoing cyberwar.
by Maria Kulikovska
Maria Kulikovska and Ksenia Hnylytska reflect on their war-induced nomadism: strangers cut off from their endangered or destroyed homes who are learning to become their own islands. Will these islands form new archipelagos? Through the archeology of images and matter, Terrence Musekiwa and Xavier Robles de Medina find a way to reassemble colonial subjectivities into incommensurable heterogenous agency. All this takes place under the stunning and bizarre synthetic sunset of Lesia Vasylchenko, raising questions about the predictability of our future.
This New York chapter of State of Emergence is the third in an ongoing collaboration between Kulchynska and Tabacaru. It started with an exhibition of Ukrainian artists in the Catinca Tabacaru Gallery’s Bucharest space, which opened exactly 50 days after
by Nikita Kadan
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Chapter One brought together thirteen artists, eight of whom were still living in Ukraine on the day the exhibition opened. The works were first impressions, filled with emotion, danger, and short-term coping mechanisms. The exhibition brought forth reflections on the emergence of a new reality and subjectivity amid the State of Emergency. Later that year, Chapter Two was mounted at Sandwich Gallery in Bucharest as an exploration and rediscovery by five artists of their personal and shared histories erased by Russia’s colonial violence over the past centuries.
When: 21 October – 10 December
Where: NADA East Broadway 311 East Broadway, New York
Exhibiting artists
Alaa Mansour, Anatoliy Belov, Borys Kashapov, Katia Lesiv, Katia Lysovenko, Katya Grokhovsky, Ksenia Hnylytska, Lesia Vasylchenko, Luba Drozd, Maria Kulikovska, Nikita Kadan, Nona Inescu, Oksana Kazmina, Palliative Turn, Rachel Monosov, Slinko, Terrence Musekiwa, Yulia Krivich, Xavier Robles de Medina, UkraЇnaTV.
by Terrence Musekiwa
Events and performances
Friday, October 20th, 6-9pm
During the exhibition’s opening reception audiences will experience an intercontinental musical performance by UKRAïNATV.
Saturday, October 21st, 5:00pm
Curatorial walk-through with curators Lesia Kulchynska and Catinca Tabacaru
Sunday, October 22nd, 2:00pm – 6:00pm
2:00pm – Contemporary History of Ukraine. Feast of Life. Lecture Performance with Oksana Kazmina
4:00pm – Chronosphere and hallucinatory machines Performative talks by Alaa Mansour and Lesia Vasylchenko
Wednesday, October 25th, 6:30pm
Artist Talk with Luba Drozd
Friday, November 24th, 6:30pm
Performance: Death and Humor. Essayistic talk by Slinko and performative presentation by Palliative Turn Magazine with Olav Westphalen
by Xavier Robles de Medina
