“First of all, I’m both excited and horrified by the war that’s going on now. Almost every night I hear the sounds of air raids and explosions from Russian missiles being shot down on my city. It’s awful. Last year, not far from my city, on the outskirts of Kiev, there were military operations, explosions were heard day and night, and the whole city was covered in smoke. A couple of tens of kilometers from my city was the city of Irpen, completely bombed and destroyed by Russian soldiers. Today I woke up again from the air raid alarms… This nightmare continues, it is impossible for the inhabitants of Europe to understand and imagine…”
ANDRII STRAKHOV (b. 1973) is a Ukrainian artist who mostly works through the medium of collage. After a childhood spent in the Urals, at the age of 13 he moved to Boyarka, near Kiiv, where he still lives, just in time to be affected by the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. He has since been involved in music and in the Ukrainian underground culture.
Resources: Claudio Parentela, IYE Zine & The Philosophical Research Society
Can you describe your path to becoming an artist? When did you actually enter it?
I created my first visual works in 1989. They are made with the “application” technique (I don’t really like the word “Collage”, this word is too often used by artists). It was the time of the Soviet Union. I created figurative images full of black humor and mockery of Soviet ideology and way of life, using Soviet newspapers and magazines. A frequent element of the image were cuts from the headlines of newspaper articles. These names gave the picture a touch of absurdity and profanation of human ideals and optimism. From a series of paintings, I made art notebooks and then replicated them on a copier in the form of a zine. At the same time, I bought a portrait of the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the USSR Gorbachev and painted him, presenting him as a transvestite. For this portrait I could be arrested, it was a dangerous occupation and the police came to me – someone reported me. I didn’t feel like an artist, just doing what gave me pleasure and enjoyment. In general, my creative position has always been and will be antisocial.
Describe your ideals and how they manifest in your work.
For several years I have been developing my own mythology and demonology. I create thematic series of works dedicated to a single bestiary. These can be images of forest spirits, imaginary creatures, monsters. Everything that is alien to nature and human civilization. At the same time, I am making works dedicated to monstrous robot-human hybrids, giving these images the signs and characteristics of a catastrophic and impossible existence. Motives of decay, trauma, isolation often manifest themselves unconsciously in various art forms. I use old original medical photo archives, 19th century astronomical atlases or mid 20th century matte journals as material for these works.
I like working with old paper or fabrics. From fabrics, I create works in a style close to folk art with decorative elements. For them I use Ukrainian scarves and suit fabrics, as well as oriental shrouds. In my work there is a remarkable connection with European literary sources and mythological cultural heritage. I want to tell a story using visual methods and techniques and immerse the viewer in a fantasy world.
Is music part of your studio time? What are you listening to?
Music is part of my life. I graduated from a music school in the piano class and then continued my education at the Kiev Conservatory in the classical guitar class. Now I am a member of the collective “Svitlana Nianio Band”. In the process of creating visual works, I often listen to music. It can be classicism, baroque, revival or modern neo-folk, dark ambient, noise, drone. I like composers Scarlatti, Lully, Frescobaldi, the modern ones are: Cukor Bila Smert, Olexahdr Yurchenko, Death in June, Lustmord, Blood Axis, Les Joyaux De La Princesse, Current 93, Nurse With Wound, my literary activity is indirectly connected with music.
I wrote a novel about the musical subcultures of Kyiv in the late 80s and early 90s of the 20th century. This and other books and zines, I publish them in my independent publishing house “Stavok Press”. A group of like-minded people and our club hold regular literary readings which take place in a neo-pagan forest temple. Our training is called “Pamoroka”. At these events, we only read our literary texts.
Influences?
It seems to me that I have not been subjected to direct stylistic influences. I like these artists: Lawrence Stephen Lowry; Gustav Adolfo Mossa; Edward Burne Jones; Frank Bernard Dixie; Theodore Severin Kittelsen; Alfred Kubin; Touko Valio Laaksonen. The writers who influenced me the most were: Ernst Theodor Wilhelm Hoffmann, Gabrielle Wittkop (Ménardeau), Robert Walser, Gustav Meyrink, Arthur Machen, Isidore Ducasse. Mircea Eliade.
“I created the Graces series between 2021 and 2022. It was made in a few days before the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The last works in the series contain features of disturbance and are filled with melancholy.
The Graces series is part of an archive of my works which was sent, after the beginning of the war, to Ireland to GalleryX and saved by Giovanni Giusti. The series “Graces” is an expression of my ideas associated with the horror of modern life and with the embodiment of mystical aspirations. I tried to transform my nightmares and dreams into weird images touched with visual poetics and sympathy for the grotesque. In this way, the image of the Greek Chimera is close to me. It was not aware of its own ugliness and suffered from the general hatred of others. For me, the image of the Chimera is not just a monstrous creature, but a living, gentle and wonderful being that has no place in this cruel reality.”
Describe your process for creating a new job.
The impetus to create new work can be a small sliver or fragment of an image. From this fragment, I gradually form a new image and build a texture. I give the image depth and detail, I create the effect of superimposing different spaces and times, making it voluminous. “I give the image the genre characteristics” as my friend put it well.
What advice do you have for artists who want to showcase their work?
I can advise artists to be very demanding of themselves, be honest with themselves and express what they want. But also following a momentary impulse, inspiration. It is necessary to destroy in oneself all social norms and principles that live in the mind of every person, to make a strategy out of them. In this practice, you get a new experience. The artist himself can create an artistic space where he announces it. The artist needs to get rid of his internal censorship. It may not be easy.
GalleryX is a new gallery in Dublin, Ireland specialising in figurative and surrealist art. Their focus is on the fantastical, the sensual and the macabre; on alternative desire and tormented bodies; on the bizarrely beautiful, the unsettling and the grotesque. Our intent is to facilitate, curate and showcase new alternative work from emerging Irish and international artists and to host visiting artists from the global community.
galleryx.ie
What are you really excited about right now?
First of all, I’m both excited and horrified by the war that’s going on now. Almost every night I hear the sounds of air raids and explosions from Russian missiles being shot down on my city. It’s awful. Last year, not far from my city, on the outskirts of Kiev, there were military operations, explosions were heard day and night, and the whole city was covered in smoke. A couple of tens of kilometers from my city was the city of Irpen, completely bombed and destroyed by Russian soldiers. Today I woke up again from the air raid alarms… This nightmare continues, it is impossible for the inhabitants of Europe to understand and imagine…
What do you love most about the place where you live?
Where I live, I like my house and garden. I like walking the streets, looking at the old wooden houses built at the end of the 19th century. I feel good in the forest, where there are no people.
The best way to spend a day off?
For me, every day is a day off; it’s good to get together with friends and have a good glass of alcohol for a pleasant conversation.
Upcoming exhibitions/projects?
I don’t know my plans for the next exhibitions and exhibition projects yet. But the artistic process is ongoing. I am very grateful to my Irish friends and curators, from “Gallery X”, who have helped me maintain my art archive out of Ukraine. I am also grateful to the Philosophical Research Society of Los Angeles for organizing my solo exhibition.
Original Italian article by Claudio Parentela at iyezine
For more Strakhov Art on the web:
Strachovart
EXTRA:
- Страх и отвращение Андрея Страхова
- Потойбічні сутності
- портфоліо художника
- Χάριτες (Graces) by ANDRII STRAKHOV
LÖPÇÜK 