Installation. Two one-channel videos, concrete sculptures (6 in the series) 2012 - 2013 This work consist of three corresponding elements: two short films and a series of sculptures. The main object in the short film Shelter is an underground
shelter repurposed for a kind of school that delivers pre-service training. The
main character, an elderly teacher, also an archetype of Soviet ideology, does
not seem to care about the contemporary political situation, instead opting to
stay true to his own principles that have been inculcated into him through
military service. His students could care less about the patriotism promoted in
the schoolbooks from their teenage years; instead, they reserve their passions
for the shooting ranges, inspired by computer games and Hollywood action
movies. During the Cold war the political propaganda of the USSR and US produced a social phobia connected to the threat of nuclear war and the cult of defense. In modern Ukraine, many fallout shelters from the past have since been sealed. A few have been converted to serve new functions, adapted to different needs through individual creativity, spurred on by an overall lack of facilities. For the short film Father's story Ridnyi asked his father to make a video tour of the cellar beneath the rural house in which his family used to live. A voiceover features Ridnyi’s father describing objects in the dark cellar such as jars with homemade vegetable preserves, glasses for moonshine, old newspapers with pictures of Lenin and the proletariat, all of which surface old memories about his parents and nostalgia for a Soviet childhood.
Two films are accompanied by a series of objects: architectural models of hidden spaces constructed as shelters in the Soviet era. In this context, structures from the built environment are transformed into concrete sculptural forms. This complex of works made in 2012-2013 featuring shelter as both a relic and a phenomena acquired new meaning in 2014. Upon the invasion of East Ukraine many shelters were converted back into their original function; many high-school graduates were drafted into the army, while others joined volunteer military battalions.       "Shelter", stills from video, 6:13 min., 2012    "Father's Story", stills from video, 03:34 min., 2012   "Shelter" (National Pavillion of Ukraine at the 55th Venice biennial for contemporary art, 2013)  "Father's Story" (Visual culture research center, Kyiv, 2014. Photo: Oleksandr Burlaka) |