EXIT - National Pavilion of the Republic of Belarus at the 58th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia

11.05 - 24.11.2019

The main topic of the 58th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia in 2019 is the study of
life in an era of change, the place of a man and art in it. Belarus National Pavilion presents the project
Exit, created by the curator Olga Rybchinskaya and artist and sculptor Konstantin Selikhanov. The
project will be implemented with the support of the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Belarus and the
National Center for Contemporary Arts of the Republic of Belarus, Commissioner Siarhey
Kryshtapovich.
The exposition of the project Exit is organized around the space interaction of five multimedia objects,
each capturing certain moment with its state of mind. The human sculptures interact with ready-made
objects and forms: a working TV-sets, a neon sign, glasses with milk on a tray, a banner with slogan,
packaging boxes.
This total installation format forces all elements to mingle into a homogenous whole, producing an
unique aura of the important message and indirect statement. It designs the views’ reaction within the
semantic space by setting up individual light zones around meaningful objects sublimed in the overall
darkness, thus generating nonlinear narrative structure.
The project exists in many dimensions. It engages time and history to mark the period of change and
redefine a man’s place in it. This is a protracted "transition" process. This transformation is perceived by
some as a post-cataclysm, and as pre-catastrophe by the others.
Future is unpredictable. It feels like an accelerating motion with no signposts and mapped routes. It
becomes the dominant experience to the world. Not only it modifies the environment; it distorts the very
human being, displacing him into the new sort of space “between”. His depersonalized figure celebrates
the paradigm shift: from soviet to post-soviet, from local to global etc. Truth and lie, evil and good,
happiness and unhappiness – the opposites comprising one’s life gradually blur and mingle.
Unsupervised by history, the time arouses unrest, mistrust and simplification. This new power shapes
anonymous figures, post-images, producing a “no-face” effect.