In the video "FLOW" the artist draws ornaments characteristic for the decorative and applied art of Chornobyl Polissya. Thin lines of patterns are ephemeral – they appear and disappear. The viewer can feel this almost imperceptible line between existence and non-existence.
Chornobyl is alienated land. A “white spot” of unexplored traditions and culture of Chornobyl Polissya was covered by a black spot of radiation. Years later, ethnographers, cultural scientists, and researchers returned to the exclusion zone to save what we have almost lost. To save for memory. To save in museum exhibitions. And Chornobyl Polissya will no longer exist as a daily cultural practice from the time “before the accident”.
Then why "Exists"? Because reproduction is also a kind of return to existence. How to bring back to life a culture that has disappeared as a practice and is only in memories? It is impossible to go back to the past. We can preserve something valuable and give it a new shape, viable in the new environment.
The visual reproduction of patterns is a reminder of this possibility. We will not find the authentic culture of Chornobyl Polissya in the radiation-covered area any more. But it exists.