artwork prize exhibition delayed by Russian invasion opens in Kyiv

An exhibition of works by 21 artists shortlisted for the seventh version of the PinchukArtCentre’s Future Era Prize, which was delayed by Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, opened immediately (4 October) in Kyiv. The prize, open to artists aged 35 and below, sees $100,000 awarded to 1 general winner, with a further $20,000 awarded to as much as 5 of the shortlisted artists.

The exhibition was initially scheduled for October 2023, with the prize ceremony because of happen in December of the identical yr, however was delayed till August 2024. Russia’s bombardment of Kyiv and Ukrainian vitality infrastructure then led to a different postponement. The awards ceremony will now be held on 29 October.

Whereas the struggle has disrupted the prize’s rhythm—it ought to have been tied to this yr’s Venice Biennale—it has additionally turned this version into each a fifteenth anniversary celebration, and an affidavit to Ukrainian resilience.

The affect of the full-scale invasion

The PinchukArtCentre was closed for a number of months after the 24 February 2022 invasion. Bjorn Geldhof, the centre’s creative director, recollects when “Kyiv was threatened by Russian forces that have been at lower than 20 km from the town”. The centre reopened in June 2022, however not with out challenges.

“We mainly got here to a scenario the place we didn’t have any electrical energy for a really very long time,” Geldhof advised The Artwork Newspaper forward of the exhibition’s opening. With web entry nonetheless intermittent in Kyiv, Geldhof’s group determined to put in a generator to permit employees to work. This “additionally implies that the artwork centre can change into a hotspot for folks” to serve the neighborhood, the creative director explains.

Curiosity within the prize has solely grown lately, with over 12,000 folks making use of from 177 international locations—up from 5,000 in 2009. There isn’t a pre-selection and all candidates are welcome—with one exception: artists who’re residents of Russia and Belarus, which supported the invasion. “We can not permit them,” mentioned Geldhof. “I feel that might be deeply disrespectful for Ukrainian artists, and deeply disrespectful for all Ukrainians.”

Regardless of this restriction, there isn’t a expectation that the prize winners shall be Ukrainian. Geldhof considers the truth that artists from around the globe, together with “many extra localities that reside in battle”, need to take part within the prize to be a type of help for Ukraine.

“It’s not essentially talking about Ukraine, however it tells Ukrainians that there are different struggles that Ukrainians can and may relate with,” he mentioned. “I feel that’s crucial, to maintain an openness in thoughts, even if you’re at struggle, to grasp that there’s a broader world on the market, that you simply’re related with that world, and that your struggle isn’t solely your struggle, it’s additionally a struggle that others are having, for generally different causes or comparable causes.

“And I feel that’s one thing that makes the prize this yr in Ukraine notably particular. This openness that it’s going to give to the society is vital. But additionally the truth that these artists who’ve actually different struggles discover it nonetheless extraordinarily vital to come back to Ukraine and talk about it.”

Winners from around the globe

This yr’s shortlisted artists embrace Palestinian artist Dina Mimi, who splits her time between Jerusalem and Amsterdam, Sinzo Aanza from Congo, and two Ukrainian artists: Krakow-based Veronika Hapchenko and Dana Kavelina. The latter was winner of the primary prize of the seventh version of the PinchukArtCentre Prize 2022 for Ukrainian artists aged 35 and below, and so was mechanically shortlisted for the Future Era Artwork Prize.

Hapchenko, who spoke with The Artwork Newspaper from her studio in Krakow, mentioned she is impressed by the Soviet-era work of Ukrainian mosaic artists Mykhailo Boychuk, Alla Horska, and Ivan Lytovchenko, who expressed Ukrainian nationwide and dissident concepts in state-commissioned works. Horska, whose work was influenced by Greek mythology, was energetic within the human rights motion and was brutally murdered close to Kyiv in 1970.

Hapchenko’s work, reflecting her “curiosity within the mythological legacy of the Soviet engineering initiatives of the Thirties,” corresponding to redirecting the outflow of Siberian rivers, was proven earlier this yr on the Brazilian Mendes Wooden DM gallery’s area in New York’s Tribeca. She is displaying comparable works on the PinchukArtCentre, as she continues her creative investigation of the affect of Soviet mythology.

“I feel in a manner it was a really incorrect notion of the USSR,” she mentioned. “We didn’t see it as an imperialistic being, with colonies in several states. We perceived it falsely like this connection of nations, and it didn’t exist like that. So, we need to redirect this considering.”

Dare to dream

Ukrainian businessman and philanthropist Victor Pinchuk established the PinchukArtCentre Prize, which has a roster of worldwide names on its board together with Damien Hirst and Sir Elton John, in 2010. He based the artwork centre in 2006.

Talking on the opening of From Ukraine: Dare to Dream, the PinchukArtCentre’s collateral occasion on the Venice Biennale 2024, Pinchuk addressed the hazard of colonial powers destroying civilizations and spoke of the ability of artwork: “I don’t need to have a scenario when nice artists are impressed by nice Ukrainian tragedies, we want your inspiration now.”

The earlier Future Era Prize, of which $60,000 was a money prize with the remaining put aside to fund the winner’s creative observe, was awarded in December 2021 to Afghan artist Aziz Hazara, in a pre-war, pandemic-era on-line ceremony. Because of the struggle and the issue of travelling to Ukraine—it takes at the least 24 hours from Brussels to Kyiv, Geldhof says—this yr’s award ceremony will even be a hybrid occasion.

Along with Geldhof, this yr’s jury members embrace Italian curator Cecilia Alemani, curator of the Venice Biennale in 2022, and Brazilian feminist curator Diane Lima. Choice committee members included Egyptian curator Mariam Elnozahy, who’s now director of Konsthall C in Stockholm, Sweden and Raphael Chikukwa, government director and chief curator of the Nationwide Gallery of Zimbabwe.

The prize is considered a soar begin for creative careers. Lynette Yiadom-Boakye was awarded the primary prize in 2012. Her acclaimed present of portraits ran on the Tate in 2023-2024. Aziz Hazara’s work was commissioned for the 58th Carnegie Worldwide in 2022.