Oleg Kostyuchenko

Pure and White.
Painting: 180х130. Oil, canvas. 2019
Installation: frozen water, a lock of hair. 2019

Artist is talking not just about human’s trauma but about the world’s wound.

Ice is a symbol of closeness, fluidity, transparency, fragility. This project is about world’s issues which must be revealed, it is about the truth which finally comes out. Ice melting represents issues connected with humanity, issues which, in the course of time, come to light like a hair hidden in the ice column.

As this project was implemented in Armenia, local water and hair were used for its creation, but the idea is to tell not only about Armenian genocide but also to tell about other global catastrophes, to draw public attention to them and to reveal them to the world telling how they happened and to urge not to repeat these mistakes at present and future. This is a part of one big project named “Single – handedly”. It is the project about the belief in vertical of authority and hierarchy in the world.

This stitch on canvas can be considered as the metaphysical embodiment of injury. It’s like a scar,  which remains forever with a carrier and reminds him/her of the past, but, at the same time, it only symbolizes what happened without any details. We can assume that the artist wants to conduct a trauma therapy session. The renovation of the stitch means repeating the once made action, reacting that causes a wave of memories of the past and makes the participant of the events draw the line between the past and the present, and thus, break the vicious circle.