Decolonising Art.
Beyond the Obvious.

Ukrainian Pavilion Public Programme at the 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia

Decolonising Art. Beyond the Obvious is an interdisciplinary programme of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia The Milk of Dreams that engages artists, curators, public intellectuals, researchers, and a wider audience.

About the programme of the Ukrainian Pavilion

The series of discussions, talks and meetings focus on a decolonial view on Ukraine and Eastern Europe as a response to the ongoing Russian aggression in Ukraine, but also the broader perspective on the global art scene in the current shift in the geopolitical and cultural environment. 

The programme is expected to provoke an inclusive, sensitive, and critical conversation on the deep embeddedness of the (mis)perceptions of Ukraine that are reproduced in the structures of global hierarchies and injustices. The overall objective of the programme, therefore, is to introduce and spread the understanding of the imperial narratives on Ukraine that are enforced by Russia through cultural practices and relations. By unveiling the hidden goals of Russian propaganda in culture, the Ukrainian Institute aims at strengthening the Ukrainian agency and increasing the visibility of Ukrainian art which is still often overlooked.

The opening discussion titled How Russian War Against Ukraine Changed the [Art] World was launched in April. The autumn programme arranged in four modules (four long weekends) is a continuation of the started discussion:

  • “How Do We Decolonise Art?” on 2–4 September 
  • Art as a Weapon and as a Target” on 8–9 October;
  • Fallen Between the Cracks. Unknown Art Histories” on 28–29 October;
  • Histories Behind the Pavilion. Decoloniality and Biennials” on 18–19 November.

Programme was streamed online on the Ukrainian Institute Facebook and Youtube pages. All the recordings can be found on Youtube.

Histories Behind the Pavilion. Decoloniality and Biennials

This is the final of the series of four events in the framework of the Ukrainian Pavilion Public Programme conducted by the Ukrainian Institute.

During two days of the conference curators, art historians, writers and art practitioners gathered in Venice and online and discussed how decoloniality shapes the biennales and how world’s largest art forums respond to the new situation on the globe with the reference to the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine and its tragic implications on the state of culture.

The links for the event recordings are below.

18 November

Introduction Tetyana Filevska

Lecture Anastasia Platonova. Presence without pavilion. 127 years of Ukrainian art in Venice biennale.

Followed by Q&A

Anastasia Platonova

Anastasiia Platonova is a cultural critic, journalist, editor, cultural analyst. Graduated from the Faculty of Press Journalism of the Institute of Journalism of Taras Shevchenko KNU. Has over 20 years of professional experience in journalism.Wrote for such key Ukrainian media as Forbes, Ukrainska Pravda, Lb.ua, Focus, Platfor.ma, KORYDOR, ART Ukraine, as well as for international media. Has cooperated with key Ukrainian cultural institutions; and works as a lecturer and a culture expert. Specialises in criticism of contemporary visual culture, cultural policies, cultural heritage and decolonial practices.

Discussion: Decoloniality and Biennials

Nanne Buurman

Nanne Buurman is an author, editor, curator and educator working as a researcher and lecturer for documenta and exhibition studies at the Kunsthochschule Kassel, where she has been part of the team building the documenta Institut since 2018. In that capacity, she was involved in founding the Transdisciplinary Research Center for Exhibition Studies TRACES and is currently co-heading a research group on Nazi continuities at documenta. After graduating from Leipzig University, she was a member of the International Research Training Group InterArt at the Freie Universität Berlin and a visiting scholar at Goldsmiths College in London, supported by a DFG scholarship for her doctoral research on the gendered economies of curating.

Hedwig Fijen

Hedwig Fijen studied History and History of Art at the University of Amsterdam. She is founding director of Manifesta, the European Biennial of Contemporary art, since its origin in Rotterdam in 1993. Under Fijen’s direction Manifesta has developed into the fourth most influential biennial in the world. Over this period, Fijen has vastly expanded Manifesta’s operations with theoretical and educational projects including the Manifesta Journal, Manifesta Publications and the Manifesta Coffee breaks. Ms. Fijen is in charge of all aspects of the Manifesta organisation including the selection of Host cities, thematic content and the curatorial selection. The final execution of the concept of the curators is her responsibility. Before Manifesta, Fijen worked as a curator at The Netherlands Office for Fine Arts and has worked in Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union, Cuba and many other countries. She has lectured extensively and wrote many articles in the context of Manifesta as a biennial.

Anastasia Platonova

Anastasiia Platonova is a cultural critic, journalist, editor, cultural analyst. Graduated from the Faculty of Press Journalism of the Institute of Journalism of Taras Shevchenko KNU. Has over 20 years of professional experience in journalism.Wrote for such key Ukrainian media as Forbes, Ukrainska Pravda, Lb.ua, Focus, Platfor.ma, KORYDOR, ART Ukraine, as well as for international media. Has cooperated with key Ukrainian cultural institutions; and works as a lecturer and a culture expert. Specialises in criticism of contemporary visual culture, cultural policies, cultural heritage and decolonial practices.

Joanna Warsza

Joanna Warsza (b. 1976, Warsaw) is co-curator of the Polish Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale in 2022, with the work of Małgorzata Mirga-Tas, the first Roma artist to be shown in any national pavilion. She is an interdependent curator, editor, art writer and educator, the programme director of CuratorLab at Konstfack University, and a co-curator of the 4th Autostrada Biennale in Kosovo.

Tetyana Filevska

Tetyana Filevska is a creative director of the Ukrainian Institute, Ukraine’s cultural diplomacy organisation. Art-manager, curator and writer. Her background is in philosophy with experience in contemporary art and Ukrainian art history of the 20 century. Author of the books “KAZIMIR MALEVICH. Kyiv Period 1928-1930″, “Kazimir Malevich. Kyiv Aspect” and ” Dmitro Gorbachov. Sluchayi “. Worked in various art institutions in Ukraine. Tetyana is curating a public programme of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale dedicated to decolonisation.

19 November

Screening Khandakar Ohida, DREAM YOUR MUSEUM, 2022

Lecture by Hanna Rudyk. Russian Pavilion in Venice. The Khanenko Gambit.

Followed by Q&A

Hanna Rudyk

Hanna Rudyk is an Ukrainian museum curator and educator. She has been working for the Khanenko Museum (that keeps the largest national collection of world arts, Kyiv, Ukraine) for the 20 years. Rudyk graduated from the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy (MA,1998, Cultural Studies), and completed her Ph.D in Art History there (2001). As a curator of Islamic collection (since 2002) she developed the recent permanent exhibition of Islamic art (2006), as well as numerous research, curatorial and publication projects on Islamic and other non-European art collections, the history of the Khanenko Museum, its collections and the Khanenko family. Currently, she is working on a research project “Decolonizing of European Museums of Islamic and Asian Art. Concepts and practices” hosted by Technical University of Berlin and supported by Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.

Discussion: The Future of Pavilions

Linda Kaljundi

Linda Kaljundi is a professor of cultural history at the Estonian Academy of Arts and a senior research fellow at the Tallinn University. She specialises in Baltic history and cultural memory studies, postcolonialism and environmental humanities. Kaljundi has published articles and edited volumes on modern and pre-modern human and non-human history of the Eastern Baltic, as well as on Baltic and Nordic cultural memory. She has co-curated the exhibitions ‘History in Image – Image in History: The national and transnational past in Estonian art’ (2018), ‘Conqueror’s Eye: Lisa Reihana’s ‘In Pursuit of Venus’’ (2019–2020), ‘Landscapes of Identity: Estonian art 1700–1945’ (2021), and most recently, ‘Art or Science’ (2022) (all at the Kumu Art Museum, Tallinn, Estonia).

Lucia Gavulova

Lucia Gavulová is a researcher, curator, publicist, editor and organiser of contemporary art projects, events and exhibitions with experience in institutional and freelance activities. She is focused on the most recent contemporary art scene and discourse since the nineties in Slovakia and the Czech Republic, focusing on artistic collaborations. She studied the history of art at Comenius University in Bratislava. She works in Slovak National Gallery as a curator of the Collections of Modern and Contemporary Art and editor-in-chief of 365° art magazine. Since 2018 she has been a director of the Foundation – Centre for Contemporary Arts and Oskár Čepan Award, Slovakian art prize for visual artists founded in 1996. Lately she curated the exhibitions All In. At Least a Possibility… in Kunsthalle Bratislava and Disappearing Body in Schaubmar Mill, Slovak National Gallery.

Lizaveta German

Lizaveta German, PhD, curator and art historian. Co-founder of The Naked Room, Kyiv. Co-curator of the Ukrainian Pavilion, 59th La Biennale di Venezia. Lizaveta received her MA degree in Art History at the National Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture in Kyiv. In 2016, she received a PhD degree in Art History there. In 2016 she was placed as a curator-in-residence at Liverpool Biennial, supported by British Council Ukraine. In 2015, together with Olha Balashova she published a book The Art of Ukrainian Sixties (republished in English in 2021). And in 2017 they co-edited Decommunised: Ukrainian Soviet Mosaics book. In 2022 she presented the National Pavilion of Ukraine at Harvard, supported by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Community Renewal Fund, the Davis Center for Eurasian Studies, the Harvard Art Museums, and the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute. Since 2014, Lizaveta has been working with Maria Lanko as a curatorial collective. The duo organised more than 30 exhibitions in Ukraine, including National Art Museum of Ukraine, Mystetskyi Arsenal, Goethe-Institut, British Council, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Ukrainian Institute.

Hanna Rudyk

Hanna Rudyk is an Ukrainian museum curator and educator. She has been working for the Khanenko Museum (that keeps the largest national collection of world arts, Kyiv, Ukraine) for the 20 years. Rudyk graduated from the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy (MA,1998, Cultural Studies), and completed her Ph.D in Art History there (2001). As a curator of Islamic collection (since 2002) she developed the recent permanent exhibition of Islamic art (2006), as well as numerous research, curatorial and publication projects on Islamic and other non-European art collections, the history of the Khanenko Museum, its collections and the Khanenko family. Currently, she is working on a research project “Decolonizing of European Museums of Islamic and Asian Art. Concepts and practices” hosted by Technical University of Berlin and supported by Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.

Tetyana Filevska

Tetyana Filevska is a creative director of the Ukrainian Institute, Ukraine’s cultural diplomacy organisation. Art-manager, curator and writer. Her background is in philosophy with experience in contemporary art and Ukrainian art history of the 20 century. Author of the books “KAZIMIR MALEVICH. Kyiv Period 1928-1930″, “Kazimir Malevich. Kyiv Aspect” and ” Dmitro Gorbachov. Sluchayi “. Worked in various art institutions in Ukraine. Tetyana is curating a public programme of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale dedicated to decolonisation.

Fallen Between the Cracks. Unknown Art Histories

This third of the series of events within the programme tооk place on 28–29 October in Venice. Programme was streamed online on the Ukrainian Institute Facebook and Youtube pages. 

28 October

Introduction Tetyana Filevska

Keynote Olena Chervonik. Does Ukraine Have an Art History? 

Followed by Q&A

Olena Chervonik

Olena Chervonik is a PhD candidate in art history at the University of Oxford, writing her dissertation on the early history of photography. Previously, Chervonik received her master’s degree in art history from the Institute of Fine Arts in New York. Chervonik worked as a curator of contemporary art in a number of institutions, including the Philadelphia Museum of Art (USA), Izolyatsia. Platform for Cultural Initiatives (Donetsk, Ukraine), and Videonale. Festival of Video Art in Kunstmuseum Bonn (Germany) and Spencer Museum of Art in Kansas (USA).

Opening discussionArt History in Cracks, Blanks and Gaps. What Stories Are We Missing?

Beatrice von Bormann

Beatrice von Bormann is curator of modern art at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam. On 1 January 2023 she will start as director of Museum de Fundatie in Zwolle in the Netherlands. Before, she served as head of collections and chief curator at Museum der Moderne Salzburg, curating various shows as well as overseeing the construction of a new depot. She has curated shows in various museums in the Netherlands and Germany, worked as an art critic and taught at the University of Amsterdam.

Olena Chervonik

Olena Chervonik is a PhD candidate in art history at the University of Oxford, writing her dissertation on the early history of photography. Previously, Chervonik received her master’s degree in art history from the Institute of Fine Arts in New York. Chervonik worked as a curator of contemporary art in a number of institutions, including the Philadelphia Museum of Art (USA), Izolyatsia. Platform for Cultural Initiatives (Donetsk, Ukraine), and Videonale. Festival of Video Art in Kunstmuseum Bonn (Germany) and Spencer Museum of Art in Kansas (USA).

Olga Zhuk

Olga Zhuk is curator from Kyiv,  Ukraine.  Since autumn 2021 she works as a deputy director on contemporary art and museum affairs at the National art, culture and museum complex “Mystetskyi Arsenal”. In 2017-2021 she was creative director of Dovzhenko Centre,  working with the team on development of the institution into modern film museum and national film archive. Among her older curatorial projects  the most notable was the International Arsenal Book Festival (2010–2016),  which is a landmark interdisciplinary literature and arts event in Ukraine. Besides that in 2016 she was chief of the new department of cultural diplomacy at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine,  where she developed new policies and recommendations on presentation of Ukrainian culture abroad,  modernised the national stand of Ukraine at Frankfurt Book Fair,  and took part in writing of the founding documents for establishment of Ukrainian Institute. She graduated with M.A. in cultural studies from the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy.

Fabio Cavallucci

Fabio Cavallucci is an Italian contemporary art critic and curator. Director of several arts institutions (Galleria Civica, Trento, 2001-2008; Center for Contemporary Art Ujazdowski Castle, Warsaw, 2010-2014; Luigi Pecci Center for Contemporary Art, Prato 2014-2017) he worked with some of the major international artists (as, for example, Marina Abramovic, Mario Merz, Maurizio Cattelan, Paul McCarthy, Cai Guo-Qiang, Joan Jonas, Santiago Sierra, Suzanne Lacy, Agnes Denes, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Gillian Wearing).

 

He was coordinator of Manifesta (2008), the touring European Biennale, artistic director of International Sculpture Biennale of Carrara (2010) and chief curator of the Bi-City Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism of Shenzhen and Hong Kong (2019).

Tetyana Filevska

Tetyana Filevska is a creative director of the Ukrainian Institute, Ukraine’s cultural diplomacy organisation. Art-manager, curator and writer. Her background is in philosophy with experience in contemporary art and Ukrainian art history of the 20 century. Author of the books “KAZIMIR MALEVICH. Kyiv Period 1928-1930″, “Kazimir Malevich. Kyiv Aspect” and ” Dmitro Gorbachov. Sluchayi “. Worked in various art institutions in Ukraine. Tetyana is curating a public programme of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale dedicated to decolonisation.

Screening: film by Judd Tully and Harold Crooks. The Melt Goes On Forever: The Art and Times of David Hammons (101’). Followed by Q&A with Harold Crooks and Lisa Cortés

Harold Crooks

Harold Crooks is the director/writer of The Price We Pay, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and had its European premier at CPH:- DOX. Named “Best Canadian Documentary” of 2014 by the Vancouver Film Critics Circle, it was a New York Times Critic’s Pick. Crooks is a recipient of a Prix Gémeaux and a Genie Award from the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television Genie Award, a Chicago International Film Festival Gold Hugo, a Leo Award for Best Screenwriter (Documentary) of the Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Foundation of B.C., a National Documentary Film Award (Best Writing) at Hot Docs 1996, and a Writers Guild of Canada Top Ten Awards finalist.

Lisa Cortés

Lisa Cortés is an Academy Award nominated and Emmy-winning producer and director. She is renowned for creating challenging, visionary stories and empowering inclusive voices. 

The film Precious (2009), which she executive produced, received the Sundance Audience Award and Grand Jury Prize for best drama and won two Academy Awards®. 2019’s Emmy-winning HBO documentary, The Apollo, which Cortés produced, explores African American cultural and political history through the story of the legendary Apollo Theater. Her film productions have received over 80 international awards and nominations.

29 October

14:30-15:00 Screening:  film by Oleksiy Radynskyi. Facade Color: Blue (23’)

Keynote by Shaheen Merali. Shifting Paradigms: The role of political Black art and curation in de-canonisation and decolonisation of the art field since the late 1980s (Britain). Followed by Q&A

Shaheen Merali

Shaheen Merali (born 1959, Tanzania) is a writer, curator, critic, and artist of Indian heritage. Merali began his artistic practice in the 1980s, committing to social, political, and personal narratives. As his practice evolved, he focused more on his work as a curator, lecturer and critic and has now moved into the sphere of research and writing. Previously he was a key lecturer at Central Saint Martin’s School of Art (1995-2003), a visiting lecturer and researcher at the University of Westminster (1997-2003) and the Head of the Department of Exhibition, Film and New Media at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin (2003-2008). A regular speaker on ideas of contemporary exhibition-making internationally, in 2018 he was the keynote speaker at the International Art Gallery of the Aga Khan Diamond Jubilee Arts Festival, Lisbon. Merali was the co-curator of the 6th Gwangju Biennale, Korea (2006) and the co-curator of Berlin Heist or the enduring fascination of walled cities for the 4th Mediations Biennale, Poland (2014-2015).

In 1988, Merali had co-founded the Panchayat Arts Education Resource Unit in Old Spitalfields Market. The Unit’s main function was one of collecting ephemera, documents, and publications, detailing the work of British political Black artists (of Asian and African descent). The collection provided research material aimed to illustrate the link between modern and contemporary art and activism through archival practices focused on the work of issue-based artists in the United Kingdom and internationally.

Discussion: Epistemic Justice in Art History. 

Shaheen Merali

Shaheen Merali (born 1959, Tanzania) is a writer, curator, critic, and artist of Indian heritage. Merali began his artistic practice in the 1980s, committing to social, political, and personal narratives. As his practice evolved, he focused more on his work as a curator, lecturer and critic and has now moved into the sphere of research and writing. Previously he was a key lecturer at Central Saint Martin’s School of Art (1995-2003), a visiting lecturer and researcher at the University of Westminster (1997-2003) and the Head of the Department of Exhibition, Film and New Media at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin (2003-2008). A regular speaker on ideas of contemporary exhibition-making internationally, in 2018 he was the keynote speaker at the International Art Gallery of the Aga Khan Diamond Jubilee Arts Festival, Lisbon. Merali was the co-curator of the 6th Gwangju Biennale, Korea (2006) and the co-curator of Berlin Heist or the enduring fascination of walled cities for the 4th Mediations Biennale, Poland (2014-2015).

In 1988, Merali had co-founded the Panchayat Arts Education Resource Unit in Old Spitalfields Market. The Unit’s main function was one of collecting ephemera, documents, and publications, detailing the work of British political Black artists (of Asian and African descent). The collection provided research material aimed to illustrate the link between modern and contemporary art and activism through archival practices focused on the work of issue-based artists in the United Kingdom and internationally.

Anastasiia Yevsieieva

Anastasiia Yevsieieva is Head of Visual Culture at the Ukrainian Institute, where she represents Visual Arts sector and runs several programmes, including the  international exhibition support programme Visualise. Prior to joining the Institute, she worked as a cultural manager and independent curator. In 2019, she co-curated the National Biennale for Young Art “Looks like I’m Entering Our Garden” in Kharkiv, Ukraine.

Nadia Kaabi-Linke

Nadia Kaabi-Linke is an international artist born in Tunis, Tunisia, of Ukrainian and Tunisian heritage. After growing up in Tunis, Kyiv, Ukraine, Sharjah, and Dubai, UAE, she earned a Ph.D. from Sorbonne University in Paris before moving to Berlin, Germany. Her origins often made her feel like a stranger, and her person- al history of migration greatly influenced her body of work. Nadia Kaabi-Linke has won several awards, including Alexandria Biennale’s Jury Prize in 2009, Abraaj Group Art Prize in 2011, The Discoveries Prize for Emerging Art in 2014 at Art Basel Hong Kong, and Ithra Museum’s Art Prize in 2021. In addition, she exhibited her work at the Centre Pompidou in Paris, the Solomon R. Guggen- heim Museum, the Museum of Modern Art, the Rubin Museum in New York, The Warehouse and the Dallas Museum of Art in Texas, Nam June Paik Art Center in Seoul, Lousiana Museum, Denmark, and Kunstmuseum Bonn, Martha Herford Museum and Gropius Bau in Berlin among others. Furthermore, she participated in the Lyon Biennale (2022), Bruges Triennale (2021), Diriyah Biennale (2021), Lahore Biennale (2018) and Karachi Biennale (2017), Kochi- Muziris Biennale (2012), Liverpool Biennale (2012), Venice Biennale (2011) and Sharjah Bi-enale (2009). Today she lives and works with her family either in Berlin or Kyiv.

Tetyana Filevska

Tetyana Filevska is a creative director of the Ukrainian Institute, Ukraine’s cultural diplomacy organisation. Art-manager, curator and writer. Her background is in philosophy with experience in contemporary art and Ukrainian art history of the 20 century. Author of the books “KAZIMIR MALEVICH. Kyiv Period 1928-1930″, “Kazimir Malevich. Kyiv Aspect” and ” Dmitro Gorbachov. Sluchayi “. Worked in various art institutions in Ukraine. Tetyana is curating a public programme of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale dedicated to decolonisation.

Art as a Weapon and as a Target

This second of the series of events within the programme took place on 8–9 October in Venice (Teatro Piccolo Arsenale ). Programme was streamed online on the Ukrainian Institute Facebook and Youtube pages. 

8 October

Introduction Tetyana Filevska.

Key-note Borys Filonenko. Art After Pacifism.

Borys Filonenko

Borys Filonenko (Kharkiv) is an independent curator, art critic, lecturer, and editor-in-chief of IST Publishing (Kharkiv—Khmelnytskyi—Kyїv). He is a co-curator of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia. He previously co-curated the Second National Biennial of Young Art (Kharkiv, 2019), Aeneas Path. Artists of the Present Face to Face with the Past (Kharkiv, 2019) and Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors (Kyiv, Lviv, 2016). In 2015—2018 he was the curator of the Kharkiv Come in gallery. During 2017—2021 — he was a tutor and curator of the Humanities Department at the Kharkiv School of Architecture.

Opening discussion: Art and War: Beyond the Obvious.

 Moderated by Tetyana Filevska

Borys Filonenko

Borys Filonenko (Kharkiv) is an independent curator, art critic, lecturer, and editor-in-chief of IST Publishing (Kharkiv—Khmelnytskyi—Kyїv). He is a co-curator of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia. He previously co-curated the Second National Biennial of Young Art (Kharkiv, 2019), Aeneas Path. Artists of the Present Face to Face with the Past (Kharkiv, 2019) and Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors (Kyiv, Lviv, 2016). In 2015—2018 he was the curator of the Kharkiv Come in gallery. During 2017—2021 — he was a tutor and curator of the Humanities Department at the Kharkiv School of Architecture.

Kuba Snopek

Kuba Snopek is an urban designer and writer. He is the author of critically acclaimed books: Belyayevo Forever, about the preservation of intangible heritage and Day-VII Architecture, a comprehensive study of the Polish churches built during the Communist era. Kuba co-created Stage, an awardwinning crowdfunded public space built in Dnipro, Ukraine. He worked as a Program Director at the Kharkiv School of Architecture. He is a Fulbright scholar, and a graduate of Strelka Institute and UC Berkeley.

Rosie Cooper

Rosie Cooper is Director of Wysing Arts Centre, in rural Cambridgeshire, UK.  Wysing’s vision is to cultivate the freewheeling imagination, and often works with artists and publics who have been marginalised. 

She was previously Head of Exhibitions at De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhill-on-Sea, where she developed an ambitious vision for the visual arts programme, with a high-profile programme of exhibitions including the group shows ‘Still I Rise: Feminisms, Gender, Resistance Acts 1-3’ (2019, co-curated with Irene Aristízabal and Cédric Fauq), and ‘How Chicago! Imagists 1960s & 70s’ (2019, co-curated with Sarah McCrory). Prior to this, as Head of Programmes at Liverpool Biennial, Cooper led a year-round programme of interdisciplinary art commissions, socially engaged projects, residencies, and education and publishing projects, collaborating with arts and civic organisations across the city and further afield.

Tetyana Filevska

Tetyana Filevska is a creative director of the Ukrainian Institute, Ukraine’s cultural diplomacy organisation. Art-manager, curator and writer. Her background is in philosophy with experience in contemporary art and Ukrainian art history of the 20 century. Author of the books “KAZIMIR MALEVICH. Kyiv Period 1928-1930″, “Kazimir Malevich. Kyiv Aspect” and ” Dmitro Gorbachov. Sluchayi “. Worked in various art institutions in Ukraine. Tetyana is curating a public programme of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale dedicated to decolonisation.

9 October

Key-note by Daria Badior. The Power of Culture During the War: Who Will Watch the Watchmen

Daria Badior

Daria Badior has graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy of the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. She worked as a journalist and editor of the “Culture” section of the online publication LB.ua. Presently, she is a freelancer; at different times, she published in LB.ua, Liga.net, Korydor, Osteuropa, Hyperallergic, The Independent, and other outlets. Daria writes about cinema, culture policies and memory practices. Recently, together with her colleagues Anastasia Platonova and Sofia Dyak, she launched a series of publications in international media about Ukrainian culture and the decolonial approach towards it, towards Russian culture and the current war. Daria is also a co-curator of the Kyiv Critics’ Week film festival and a co-founder of the Union of Film Critics of Ukraine and the Coalition of Culture Actors.

Discussion: Decolonising Art at the Time of War.

Daria Badior

Daria Badior has graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy of the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. She worked as a journalist and editor of the “Culture” section of the online publication LB.ua. Presently, she is a freelancer; at different times, she published in LB.ua, Liga.net, Korydor, Osteuropa, Hyperallergic, The Independent, and other outlets. Daria writes about cinema, culture policies and memory practices. Recently, together with her colleagues Anastasia Platonova and Sofia Dyak, she launched a series of publications in international media about Ukrainian culture and the decolonial approach towards it, towards Russian culture and the current war. Daria is also a co-curator of the Kyiv Critics’ Week film festival and a co-founder of the Union of Film Critics of Ukraine and the Coalition of Culture Actors.

Furqat Palvan-Zade

Furqat Palvan-Zade is an independent curator, researcher, and filmmaker. Since 2014 he has been working on the syg.ma project – a community-run platform and an expanding archive of texts on society and art. This platform serves as an engine and a tool for launching various collaborative projects mapping an international community of writers, activists, artists, and designers. As a filmmaker he is working on a series of experimental projects investigating the transient geographies and overlapping cultures of Central Eurasia.

Maria Blyzinsky

Maria Blyzinsky is a UK-based heritage consultant and independent curator specialising in exhibitions and interpretation. She has worked for the Victoria & Albert Museum and Royal Museums Greenwich, where she now holds the post of Curator Emeritus. In 2007, Maria co-founded The Exhibitions Team, an association of independent museum professionals with a passion for exhibitions, collections and interpretation. Her clients include an array of nationally and internationally recognised names from the heritage and culture sectors, including the British Museum, V&A, Westminster Abbey, National Theatre and Abbey Road Studios. She is a published author and is currently writing a book about generating ideas for exhibitions, due to be published in 2023. Maria has a longstanding interest in the use of heritage and culture as a weapon during times of war. She was an advisor to Heritage Without Borders, a now-defunct charity that trained museum professionals to work with colleagues in post-conflict countries. She is currently providing pro bono assistance to the UK branch of ICOM (International Committee of Museums), helping to coordinate initiatives that support museums in Ukraine.

Lia Dostleva

Lia Dostlieva is an artist, cultural anthropologist, essayist. Primary areas of her research include the issues of trauma, postmemory, commemorative practices, and agency and visibility of vulnerable groups. As an artist, she works across a wide range of media including photography, installations, textile sculptures, interventions into urban space, etc. since 2012.

Tetyana Filevska

Tetyana Filevska is a creative director of the Ukrainian Institute, Ukraine’s cultural diplomacy organisation. Art-manager, curator and writer. Her background is in philosophy with experience in contemporary art and Ukrainian art history of the 20 century. Author of the books “KAZIMIR MALEVICH. Kyiv Period 1928-1930″, “Kazimir Malevich. Kyiv Aspect” and ” Dmitro Gorbachov. Sluchayi “. Worked in various art institutions in Ukraine. Tetyana is curating a public programme of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale dedicated to decolonisation.

Film screenings within the programme

The programme also included several film screenings:

  • Peace and Tranquility by Myro Klochko and Andriy Bondarenko (11’)
  • Furqat Palvan-Zade. The Ball and the Polo Stick, or the Book of Ecstasy (rough cut) (23’) followed by Q&A 

How Do We Decolonise Art? 

This first of the series of events within the programme took place on 2–4 September and was streamed online on the Ukrainian Institute Facebook page.

2 September

Opening discussion: russian war against Ukraine, decoloniality and art.

 

Speakers – Vitaliy Chernetsky, Anna Lazar.

Moderated by Kateryna Botanova

Chernetsky Vitaliy

Chernetsky Vitaliy is a Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures at the University of Kansas. He is the author of Mapping Postcommunist Cultures: Russia and Ukraine in the Context of Globalization (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2007; Ukrainian-language version, 2013) and of articles on modern and contemporary Slavic and East European literatures and cultures where he seeks to highlight cross-regional and cross-disciplinary contexts. 

He is a past president of the American Association for Ukrainian Studies (2009–2018) and the current first vice president of the Shevchenko Scientific Society in the U.S.

Lazar Anna

Lazar Anna is a curator at the Museum of Art in Łódź, publicist working with “Nowa Europa Wschodnia” and “Czas Literatury”, translator (Oksana Zabuzhko, Illya Kaminsky, Kateryna Dysa). Worked in the field of public diplomacy at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as deputy director and acting director at the Polish Institutes in Kyiv (2008–2014) and St. Petersburg (2015–2018).

Botanova Kateryna

Botanova Kateryna is a Ukrainian cultural critic, curator, and writer based in Basel. She is a co-curator of CULTURESCAPES, a Swiss multidisciplinary biennial, and an editor of the critical anthologies that accompany each festival, among them Culturescapes 2021 Amazonia: Anthology as Cosmology; On the Edge: Culturescapes 2019 Poland; Culturescapes 2023: Sahara (upcoming). 

She is a guest curator for the opening of the Jam Factory Art Center in Lviv, Ukraine, that due to the Russian invasion was postponed to 2023. A member of PEN Ukraine, she publishes widely on arts and culture.

3 September

Key-note by Madina Tlostanova. Decoloniality: between a travelling concept, a propagandistic cliche and a relational onto-epistemic political, ethical and aesthetic stance.

Tlostanova Madina

Tlostanova Madina is a decolonial feminist author and professor of postcolonial feminisms at the Department of Thematic Studies (Gender studies) at Linköping University, Sweden.  She focuses on decolonial thought, particularly in its aesthetic, epistemic and gender aspects, on postsocialist human condition, culture and art, and on critical future studies.

3 September

Discussion: How do we decolonise art?

 

Speakers – Madina Tlostanova, Kateryna Botanova, Misho Antadze.

Moderated by Tetyana Filevska

Botanova Kateryna

Botanova Kateryna is a Ukrainian cultural critic, curator, and writer based in Basel. She is a co-curator of CULTURESCAPES, a Swiss multidisciplinary biennial, and an editor of the critical anthologies that accompany each festival, among them Culturescapes 2021 Amazonia: Anthology as Cosmology; On the Edge: Culturescapes 2019 Poland; Culturescapes 2023: Sahara (upcoming). 

She is a guest curator for the opening of the Jam Factory Art Center in Lviv, Ukraine, that due to the Russian invasion was postponed to 2023. A member of PEN Ukraine, she publishes widely on arts and culture.

Tlostanova Madina

Tlostanova Madina is a decolonial feminist author and professor of postcolonial feminisms at the Department of Thematic Studies (Gender studies) at Linköping University, Sweden.  She focuses on decolonial thought, particularly in its aesthetic, epistemic and gender aspects, on postsocialist human condition, culture and art, and on critical future studies.

Antadze Misho

Antadze Misho is a filmmaker and artistic researcher from Tbilisi, Georgia. He holds a BFA in Film/Video from CalArts, and an MA in Artistic Research through Cinema from the Netherlands Film Academy. As a practitioner and researcher, his interests include the meeting and departure points of cinema and history, as well as animal and non-human perspectives.

His works have screened at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, Ann Arbor Film Festival, Full Frame Film Festival, DocLisboa amongst many others. The Harvest was awarded at Jeonju International Film Festival and at Palic European Film Festival and was screened online on e-Flux.

Filevska Tetyana

Filevska Tetyana is a creative director of the Ukrainian Institute, Ukraine’s cultural diplomacy organisation. Art-manager, curator and writer. Her background is in philosophy with experience in contemporary art and Ukrainian art history of the 20 century.

Author of the books “KAZIMIR MALEVICH. Kyiv Period 1928-1930″, “Kazimir Malevich. Kyiv Aspect” and ” Dmitro Gorbachov. Sluchayi “. Worked in various art institutions in Ukraine. Tetyana is curating a public programme of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale dedicated to decolonisation.

3 September

Discussion: Decolonising art institutions.

 

Speakers – Alex Halberstadt, Angela Vettese, Jurriaan Cooiman.

Moderated by Maria Isserlis

Halberstadt Alex

Halberstadt Alex is Senior Writer at the Museum of Modern Art. His most recent book, a family memoir titled Young Heroes of the Soviet Union, was a New York Times Critics’ Top Book of 2020. He contributes to the New York Times Magazine, the New Yorker, and other publications, and teaches at New York University.

Vettese Angela

Vettese Angela is associate professor at Iuav University in Venice, Faculty of Arts and Design, where she is the founder and director of the Visual Art Graduate Programme. She has been curator of the Advanced Course in Visual Arts at the Fondazione Antonio Ratti (1995–2003), director of the Galleria Civica di Modena (2005–2008), director of the Fondazione Arnaldo Pomodoro, Milan (2008–2010), president of the Fondazione Bevilacqua La Masa, Venice (2002–2013), director of Arte Fiera, Bologna (2017–2018).

Her main research interests have been: The art world and its relation with the market; the development of art languages and techniques, with special attention to the use of the body; the educational system in contemporary art; the National Pavilions at the Venice Biennale.

Cooiman Jurriaan

Cooiman Jurriaan is a Founder and Director of CULTURESCAPES, a Swiss multidisciplinary biennial. Recent focus of the Biennale were 2021 Amazonas, 2019 Poland, 2017 Greece, 2015 Iceland. Now he is working on the 2023 edition on Sahara and the 2025 edition on Himalaya.

Maria Isserlis

Maria Isserlis is a curator, art historian and co-founder of the curatorial platform A:D:curatorial based in Berlin and Dresden. Since 2013, Maria has been working as the General Coordinator of MANIFESTA 10 (St. Petersburg, RU). Following Manifesta 11 (Zurich, CH), she joined the curatorial team of the biennial.

In 2019, Maria joined the curatorial team of the museum Albertinum (Dresden, GER) and in 2021 she curated the show ‘Whatever happens, we must be prepared’ by Alban Muja at the National Gallery of Kosovo (Pristina, KOS).

4 September

Lecture by Kateryna Botanova. On European Orient: Ukrainian Twofold Decolonial War  

Botanova Kateryna

Botanova Kateryna is a Ukrainian cultural critic, curator, and writer based in Basel. She is a co-curator of CULTURESCAPES, a Swiss multidisciplinary biennial, and an editor of the critical anthologies that accompany each festival, among them Culturescapes 2021 Amazonia: Anthology as Cosmology; On the Edge: Culturescapes 2019 Poland; Culturescapes 2023: Sahara (upcoming). 

She is a guest curator for the opening of the Jam Factory Art Center in Lviv, Ukraine, that due to the Russian invasion was postponed to 2023. A member of PEN Ukraine, she publishes widely on arts and culture.

4 September

Closing discussion: Can Art Fix the Collapsed World?

Speakers – Vitaliy Chernetsky, Misho Antadze, Anna Lazar.

Moderated by Tetyana Filevska

Chernetsky Vitaliy

Chernetsky Vitaliy is a Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures at the University of Kansas. He is the author of Mapping Postcommunist Cultures: Russia and Ukraine in the Context of Globalization (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2007; Ukrainian-language version, 2013) and of articles on modern and contemporary Slavic and East European literatures and cultures where he seeks to highlight cross-regional and cross-disciplinary contexts. 

He is a past president of the American Association for Ukrainian Studies (2009–2018) and the current first vice president of the Shevchenko Scientific Society in the U.S.

Lazar Anna

Lazar Anna is a curator at the Museum of Art in Łódź, publicist working with “Nowa Europa Wschodnia” and “Czas Literatury”, translator (Oksana Zabuzhko, Illya Kaminsky, Kateryna Dysa). Worked in the field of public diplomacy at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as deputy director and acting director at the Polish Institutes in Kyiv (2008–2014) and St. Petersburg (2015–2018).

Antadze Misho

Antadze Misho is a filmmaker and artistic researcher from Tbilisi, Georgia. He holds a BFA in Film/Video from CalArts, and an MA in Artistic Research through Cinema from the Netherlands Film Academy. As a practitioner and researcher, his interests include the meeting and departure points of cinema and history, as well as animal and non-human perspectives.

His works have screened at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, Ann Arbor Film Festival, Full Frame Film Festival, DocLisboa amongst many others. The Harvest was awarded at Jeonju International Film Festival and at Palic European Film Festival and was screened online on e-Flux.

Filevska Tetyana

Filevska Tetyana is a creative director of the Ukrainian Institute, Ukraine’s cultural diplomacy organisation. Art-manager, curator and writer. Her background is in philosophy with experience in contemporary art and Ukrainian art history of the 20 century.

Author of the books “KAZIMIR MALEVICH. Kyiv Period 1928-1930″, “Kazimir Malevich. Kyiv Aspect” and ” Dmitro Gorbachov. Sluchayi “. Worked in various art institutions in Ukraine. Tetyana is curating a public programme of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale dedicated to decolonisation.

Film screenings within the programme

The programme also included several film screenings from different parts of the world, namely “Peace and Tranquility” by Myro Klochko and Andriy Bondarenko, “Sometimes It Was Beautiful” by Christian Nyampeta and “3 Songs for Saturn” by Misho Antadze.

Screening: Myro Klochko and Andriy Bondarenko. Peace and Tranquility (11’), 2022

Myro Klochko and Andriy Bondarenko. Peace and Tranquility (11’), 2022

As Russian troops were crossing into Ukraine, Andrii Bondarenko wrote a play that looks back on a life bookended by conflict.

Two weeks after Russia invaded his country, acclaimed playwright Bondarenko focused on the life he has lived. A peaceful childhood had followed bloodshed. And now, in adulthood, he faced the threat that previous generations of his family had witnessed. These thoughts took form in a one-act play, written in response to events as they were unfolding. To accompany this filmed version of the play, director Myro Klochko draws on photographs from Bondarenko’s life, conjuring up the people who have populated it and, by extension, the people of Ukraine. The result is an act of artistic expression, of remembrance and, ultimately, of resistance.

Screening: Christian Nyampeta. Sometimes It Was Beautiful (38ʼ), 2018

Christian Nyampeta. Sometimes It Was Beautiful (38ʼ), 2018

The film features an unusual group of friends who gather to watch and critique films made by Swedish cinematographer Sven Nykvist in the Congo between 1948 and 1952. Their discussion highlights enduring tensions surrounding social transformation, cultural property, and who has the right to representation.

Screening: Misho Antadze. 3 Songs for Saturn (11ʼ), 2021

Misho Antadze. 3 Songs for Saturn (11ʼ), 2021

In May 2020, an alligator died in the Moscow zoo. What did he remember? 3 SONGS FOR SATURN uses found-footage from cinema history and YouTube to reconstruct the journey of a real-life alligator, whose biography echoes a lesser-known mass deportation of the 20th century.

The opening discussion “How Russian war against Ukraine changed the [art] world”

How Russian war against Ukraine changed the [art] world” took place on 22 April, 2022, at 15:00 and introduced the programme. Participants of the discussion: 

  • Borys Filonenko, Co-curator of the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, Editor-in-Chief of Ist Publishing (Kharkiv, Ukraine)
  • Alevtina Kakhidze, Artist. Artist at War (Kyiv, Ukraine)
  • Serhii Plokhii, Historian, Director of the Ukrainian Research Institute at Harvard University (USA)
  • Olesia Ostrovska-Liuta, Director General of the Mystetskyi Arsenal National Arts and Culture Museum Complex (Kyiv, Ukraine)
  • Tetyana Filevska, Creative Director of the Ukrainian institute (Kyiv, Ukraine)

The programme is an integral part of the Ukraine Pavilion exhibition project, supervised by the Commissioner Kateryna Chuyeva, Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine and curated by Lizaveta German, Maria Lanko, Borys Filonenko and will be held in collaboration with the Ukrainian Institute, the participating artists and curators of other national pavilions. 

The project will target a wide audience of Biennale Arte 2022 visitors, accredited professionals, and media. 

Hosted by La Biennale di Venezia.  

 

Organised by

  • Ukrainian Pavilion
  • Ukrainian institute

Partners

  • Ukrainian Pavilion International Renaissance Foundation 
  • House of Europe 
  • Ukrainian institute Platform for interdisciplinary practice Open Place