Lokakuun näyttelyiden avajaiset

Vieraile Vapaakaupungin galleriassa lokakuussa! Näyttelyt 3.10.-27.10.2024

Ukrainalaisten taiteilijoiden ryhmänäyttely War Is Not Over gallerian etuosassa ja pitkällä näyttelyseinällä, sekä Anni Peltolan Rakas päiväkirja -näyttely gallerian takaosassa.

Tervetuloa avajaisiin torstaina 3.10. klo 17-19!

In October The Gallery of Vapaakaupunki presents a group exhibition War Is Not Over by Ukrainian artists and Anni Peltola’s exhibition Rakas päiväkirja. Vernissage 3.10. 5pm-7pm, welcome!

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■ Ton Melnyk, Masha Ravlyk, Nataliia Deineka and Kateryna Harahulia: War Is Not Over

We are Ton Melnyk, Masha Ravlyk, Nataliia Deineka and Kateryna Harahulia (Dextrum Methodo) – artists from Ukraine who decided to join efforts and make an exhibition at Vapaakaupunki together.

Like artists we have different topics, styles, media, ways to work. But all of us link to the topic of war. We arrived in Finland in spring-summer 2022 like refugees and have been living here under temporary protection till now. Despite that we live and work in a safe country, we are still partly suffering from war because of worries about relatives and friends in Ukraine, because of reading sad news every day, because of mental traumas that we have got.

We reflect the war through our art. For us it also contains criticism of this phenomenon which brings the death of people, animals and plants, massive man-made disasters and destruction of culture. And this is exactly what the Russian Federation is doing on the territory of Ukraine and people that live in Ukraine have no other choice than to protect themselves and fight back.

It is horrible that in the contemporary world there are war conflicts going on in more than 30 countries: Ukraine, Palestine, Myanmar, Sudan, Nigeria, Somalia, Burkina Faso, Mexico, Syria, Mali, Congo, Ethiopia, Yemen, Pakistan, Haiti, Colombia, Israel, Iraq, South Sudan, India, Afghanistan, Cameroon, Niger, Philippines, Central African Republic, Uganda, Mozambique, Chad, Benin, Russia, Ghana, Togo, Libya, Ivory Coast, Tanzania, Algeria, Mauritania, China, Tunisia.

By our art pieces we want to remind the viewers about war and its catastrophe.

The duo Ton Melnyk and Masha Ravlyk present: Anti-War Textile Banners – Homage to Maria Prymachenko, made after the series of works which the 20th-century Ukrainian artist dedicated to World War II; Textile Book of Items from an Emergency Bag, which illustrates the process of collecting things to take with you when leaving home, probably forever; Anti-war Embroidery, made after a child’s drawing.

Kateryna Harahulia (Dextrum Methodo) presents an anti-war manifesto – a graphic series of paintings “Revelation” in the author’s technique, telling about the horrors of war, war crimes, the consequences of war for humanity and nature, and about the personal experience and reflections of the artist.

Nataliia Deineka presents the “War Diary” paper and textile collage, three graphic works: “June 6, 2023”, “Ours”, “If houses like trees could bloom in spring” and the “Ukrainian Madonna” icon. All of these works are reflections on the theme of war and a kind of fixation of Russia’s crimes against the people of Ukraine, murders and destructions.

Tonya (Ton) Melnyk
Born in Kyiv, Ukraine, in 1988. Seamstress, artist, queer-feminist grassroots activist. Graduated from Kyiv National University of Technology and Design, Courses of Contemporary Art in Kyiv (2014) and School of Engaged Art in St. Petersburg (2014-2015). Their main mediums: textiles, clothes, theatrical and performative practices, street art, video, participatory practices. The main subjects treated are: fairly priced labour, alternative economy, issues of discrimination and ways to overcome it, illness and anti-burn-out practices, relationships between human and nonhuman creatures, climate change and anti-war topics. Ton is developing utopian projects about the world they want to live in: without violence or exploitation, built instead on horizontal relationships, mutual aid and the value of every living creature and surrounding.

Masha Ravlyk
Artist, queer feminist activist, born in Volzhsky, Russia, in 1987. Graduated from the Faculty of Liberal Arts and Sciences of St. Petersburg State University with a degree in art criticism (2012-2015) and the School of Engaged Art from the art group Chto Delat, St. Petersburg (2014-2015). Moved to Kyiv in 2016. They use diverse media like textiles, clothes, video, photography, dance, performance and collective practices. The topics treated therein: resistance against capitalism and patriarchy, labour rights, overcoming discrimination, migration, poverty, self-care and queer community subculture.

Masha and Ton are both co-founders and participants of Shvemy Sewing Cooperative (since 2015, Ukrainian-Russian art group) and ReSew sewing cooperative (since 2016, experimental economical and community project). They have worked as an artist duo since 2016 and realize projects together as well as their own individual artistic pieces. Currently, Ton and Masha have temporary protection in Finland and live there.

Kateryna Harahulia
Born in Kharkiv, Ukraine in 1999 and studied at the Kharkiv State Academy of Design and Fine Arts and the National Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture in Kyiv (Ukraine). She has master’s degree in Fine Arts and working on her PhD research. She is a versatile visual artist and designer who has exhibited in major cities in Ukraine, Finland and Europe.

She is a member of Finnish Painters Union and Finnish Design Union “Ornamo”
In her art she prefer to explore the themes about protecting nature, admiring its uniqueness, calling for the defence and protection of natural resources. Also in her work there is a place for reflection on the achievements of humanity , importance of human’s mind, the development of science and its discoveries, as well as the mythology of different countries and cultures. Symbolism has had a huge influence on her work.

Kateryna considers it important to touch upon the topic of war in her projects; she strongly advocates for ending wars and striving for peace; in her works she draws attention to the topic of social inequality and is a fighting for women’s rights.
She projects her view through the vision of her method of right hemisphere on different genres of art, such as graphic art , digital art, oil painting, watercolour, stage design , costume art, filmmaking, photography, as well as murals, installations, illustrations and other types of visual art.

Nataliia Deineka
A visual artist and illustrator (b. 1983, Ukraine). Graduated from the Faculty of Ukrainian Philology of Lesya Ukrainka Volyn National University in Lutsk and from the Faculty of Decorative Applied Arts in Rivne State University of Humanities.

Till 2022 Nataliia worked as an artist and a teacher of Arts in her studio in Rivne. She appreciates working with children and for children, as she considers it the most interesting and important. In her works, she addresses the fabulous imaginary world of the inner child that lives in everyone. Nataliia mostly chooses naive art to express a child’s perception of the world and the pointillism technique for a meditative painting process.

During the last year Nataliia has been highlighting the topic of self-identification, spirituality and national identity in her works, and returning to her children’s theme, she is starting work on bilingual Finnish-Ukrainian books for children.

Links:
Tonya (Ton) Melnyk:
Instagram: @svitlechko , @resew_cooperative
Masha Ravlyk:
Instagram: @masha_ravlyk , @resew_cooperative
Kateryna Harahulia ( Dextrum Methodo ):
Instagram: @dextrum_methodo_art
Website: dextrummethodo.com
Nataliia Deineka:
Instagram: @ma4yrura

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■ Anni Peltola: Rakas päiväkirja

Miltä tuntuu synnytyksen jälkeinen masennus, miltä näyttää onni? Minkä väristä on suru? Miten tunteita voi kuvittaa ja unelmia visualisoida?

Sanotaan, että kuva kertoo enemmän kuin tuhat sanaa. Taidepäiväkirja on luovuutta ruokkiva visuaalinen menetelmä, johon ei tarvita taiteellista lahjakkuutta tai taitoja. Se on päiväkirja, jonka parissa voi esimerkiksi reflektoida arkea, tallentaa tärkeitä muistoja ja tapahtumia ja ilmaista tunteita.

Rakas päiväkirja-näyttely kokoaa yhteen taiteilija Anni Peltolan henkilökohtaisia art journaleja eli taidepäiväkirjoja vuosien varrelta. Monimuotoiset, intiimit päiväkirjat on tehty sekatekniikalla esimerkiksi piirtäen, maalaten, kirjoittaen ja kollaasityöskentelynä.

Anni Peltola on entinen toimintaterapeutti, jonka elämä johdatteli yrittäjäksi taidealalle. Taidepäiväkirjametodiin voi tutustua lisää Annin tuoreessa kirjassa Lupa luovuudelle, lempeä taidepäiväkirjaopas (Cozy Publishing, 2024).

www.instagram.com/anni.peltola.art

 

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