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Etching technique nowadays. An interview with Agnieszka Pestka Paulina Brelińska

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Paulina Brelińska

Etching technique nowadays. An interview with Agnieszka Pestka

Agnieszka Pestka is a Polish visual artist based in New York whose works reflect personal stories from the perspective of a young and open-minded woman, a traveller. I talk with her about how she draws inspiration from the feminine power and why she decided to make the etching technique up-to-date.

 Could you say a little more about your creative path, where did you learn the graphic techniques?

 It all started when, living between Tokyo and Sydney, I decided to take a risk and go for my dreams. I know it might sound simple but it wasn’t. If I had to explain it briefly, I would say that I went to New York, where I rented an art studio and learned all the techniques I wanted to. Of course gaining knowledge was connected with my studies at the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan. It all started with a four-month course in screen printing, but discovering etching was the moment when I found the satisfaction and need for further artistic action. I enrolled in a course in etching and metal furniture making at the same time. However, once I had learnt the basics I started to follow my own creative path.

Exhibition “I don’t want to lose her“, La Vie Gallery, Warsaw 2020 fot. Nel Niezgoda

Who is your mentor? Did you meet him/her during studies?

 Larry B. Wright! I absolutely have to start the whole conversation with this personality. He was one of the lecturers at the School of Visual Arts in New York (SVA) and Robert Rauschenberg’s personal assistant. He wasn’t my teacher directly, but the one who gave all the students the incredible energy to create, get inspired and motivated. He gave me the feeling that everything is possible through hard work. I can’t wait to get back to the studio and hug him! What an amazing man!

When I look at your works I notice that you go beyond paper and prints and focus on the spatial aspects of etching, which might draw me to the conclusion that you draw inspiration mainly from the graphical matrix?

 Sometimes I do paper prints and I really appreciate paper, especially rice paper for its softness and strength at the same time. However, as I said before, metal chose me and vice versa. What appeals to me most is its coldness, strength, weight I have to handle while working on spacial forms. I knew from the first moment I entered the studio that I was in the right place. I touched the metal plate and started imagining how I can shape it. I tried working with paper several times, but it wasn’t the same as working with plates and seeing a three-dimensional form. Imagine that the viewer is inside your sculpture, hidden in the polished surface, and the acid-washed indentations can be seen not only on the work but also reflected in the space where the work is exposed. I perceive light, movement and the ever-changing space as a crucial part of my work.

What do you mean by this?

 I have shown my work in various places and in various configurations.

Agnieszka Pestka, She comes to me at night (and take me in her arms), print on rice paper, 100cm x 183 cm

What is etching to you? Do you think the art and design market is open to this technique?

 Of course it is! When it comes to the sphere of openness, I believe that art is a place of freedom! As artists, we should not look for limits but for solutions in order to exist. This is the role of the brave artist in a rapidly developing capitalist world. Of course, there are trends in art and at the moment there is certainly a lot of colour, in my opinion. But the world is always looking for new fresh looks, even when you use old techniques. Etching is a rather forgotten technique and that is why I have decided to bring it back to life. I want to represent a fresh approach. Usually my work ends up on a polished cool piece of zinc plate. Prints are created rarely or as an addition. For me, etching is unpredictable, surprising, painstaking, unlimited, but also very mine. It is the method that defines me at this moment.

You often pose with your works, how do you consider them? Are they a record of your thoughts and feelings? Do you have a problem with parting with your works?

 My life is quite intense. I am an artist but also an activist. I have lived in 14 countries, travelled a lot and always wanted to experience a lot. I met many people and interesting stories on my way. „Jasmine“ is about an American-Egyptian woman who worked for the pentagon and while washing my face, tells me about the death of her father. The sculpture „River of Blood“ brings me back to memories of watching someone strip the fur from a fox that was still alive, the canvases „Carmen“ are dedicated to the female prisoners I sat with in immigration prison, it tells of women’s freedom. „She comes to me at night (and takes me in her arms)“ tells of my temporary loss of sight. „Let me love things in you that don’t exist“ is about love, the community of women, it answers the question of how women complement each other when they connect on different levels and in many situations. The topics look very disparate but they are a whole and they are united by one common female view of reality.

Pestka Agnieszka, Water, fot. Nel Niezgoda

Exhibition “I don’t want to lose her“, Gallery La Vie, Warsaw 2020 fot. Nel Niezgoda

Agnieszka Pestka, Water, fot. Nel Niezgoda

Could you tell us more about American art world? How would you describe it?

 The United States is a big country. In Miami, New York or Los Angeles there are different rules and trends. But in general Americans are open to the art market and novelties. They appreciate handmade things, work input and personal touch of the object. You could say they are familiar with art galleries. In New York, we often go to a gallery on our way to a restaurant or during a Saturday afternoon walk. Art is really a part of big-city everyday life and thus it’s easier to be artistic and notice other artists.

Instagram: Agnieszka Pestka @peeestka
Web site:Agnieszka Pestka www.apestka.com

Interview “Cecil Beaton. Celebrating Celebrity”

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Interview “Cecil Beaton. Celebrating Celebrity”

An exhibition of works by British photographer Cecil Beaton will be held at the General Staff of the Hermitage from 9 December 2020 to 14 March 2021. 

Cecil Beaton (1904-1980) is among the most celebrated photographers of the 20th century. After the Second World War he became the official photographer of the British Royal Court; in 1964 he was awarded an Academy Award for his work on the film My Fair Lady. In 1972 he was honored with the title of Sir. Over a career spanning more than fifty years, he has created a portrait gallery of great personalities, from Hollywood superstars to bohemian artists, from surrealist figures to a young Elizabeth II. Beaton described his main task in portraiture as staging an apotheosis – an arrangement of a spectacular appearance of a person in high society. The exhibition “Cecil Beaton. Celebrating Celebrity” presents over 100 portraits taken by Beaton over the years from the photographer’s studio, the V&A, Vogue magazine and Vanity Fair archives. The focus will be on Russian expatriates who have defined fashion culture and posed for Beaton’s portraits.

PurpleHaze team held a short interview with the creators of the exhibition. So, the questions are answered by Julia Napolova, architect and creator of the architectural bureau PSCulture, and the curator of the exhibition “Cecil Beaton. Celebrating Celebrity”, and researcher at the State Hermitage Museum Daria Panayotti.

Hello Julia and Daria, thank you for taking time for that interview. Let’s start with a first question.Please tell us about the PSCulture Bureau, the projects it is involved in and its creation?

Julia Napolova: PSCulture was founded in 2014. From the beginning, the objectives of the Bureau have been positioned in the field of culture, and since then, the company’s course has not changed. Despite its narrow specialisation, the projects are really diverse: concepts for new museums, design of temporary exhibitions, design of international exhibitions. Each new project gives us a new perspective on the multifaceted nature of the subject we deal with. Following a professional challenge, we have put together a team according to the same principle: everyone at PSCulture has their own unique experience and style. At the moment the bureau is working on projects such as the Regalia of the Moscow Kremlin, the Moscow Planetarium exhibition and the Polytechnic Museum. In 2020, in spite of the pandemic, we opened not only Cecil Beaton in the Hermitage, but also exhibitions about Alexander III in the State Historical Museum and Yesenin in the Literary Museum named after A. Dahl. Dal.

The exhibition “Cecil Beaton. Celebrating Celebrity” was launched at the State Hermitage Museum – a project dedicated to the absolutely legendary twentieth-century photographer. Please share what it was like to organise an international exhibition amidst the pandemic?

Daria Panaiotti: At various stages of the project, the participants were required to show very rare qualities that require great composure: a blind faith that the project will happen and a desperate will to keep working at the same level of mastery; optimism in the face of logistical and other difficulties that at first seem insurmountable; the ability to mobilise quickly and start working at maximum capacity when confirmation finally comes about deadlines and the completion of the various stages of the project.

What exactly fascinated you about Cecil Beaton’s work? And why has he become the central character of this new project? Could the theme of secular photography from the turn of the century be of interest to today’s viewers? 

Daria Paniotti: Beaton can be called one of the creators of the culture in which we all live today: the culture of the celebrities, which is based on an avalanche economy of visual images. We all create our public image with selfies on social media today; Cecil Beaton formulated many rules that remain unalterable to this day. 

At the same time, it is a special challenge for the curator. The terminology relating to fashion, secularism, and public culture is poorly developed in Russian. Beaton is part of the phenomenon of British culture, which is very difficult to explain and with which it is difficult to draw parallels in Russian culture. I found this task very challenging because it was a very interesting one.

What was your main source of inspiration in the visual design of the exhibition?

Julia Napolova: The main inspiration for us was Beaton himself, his personality and approach to his work. Cecil loved unconventional moves, provocation, irony – but his camera idolised its characters. We have tried to express this contradiction through the selection of materials. Lace, as the main leitmotif of the decoration, is meant to stun the viewer with its luxury and glitter, but these stars are just a background for the real, Hollywood stars hidden behind the shimmering curtain. The texture of the decorative plaster references the velvet of the Royal House, with which Cecil has worked for many years. The perimeter display is maintained in a more austere monochrome frame, emphasising the aesthetic of black and white photography.

Tell us about the organisers of the exhibition and the team. How did it come together? 

Daria Paniotti: The Contemporary Art Department team and the Hermitage team, which consists of many professionals in a variety of fields, had a lot of help from colleagues at the British Friends Foundation. I think they were also interested in bringing in such an important name, which for some reason has remained very little known to the Russian public.

Many people say that the Internet will soon replace exhibitions. Aren’t museum exhibitions a thing of the past?

Daria Paniotti: It was very important for us to bring exactly vintage prints to the exhibition; nothing can replace the materiality of an art object and a historical object. We’ll see what the long-term effects of the pandemonium will be. Before it, the example of Sweden’s Fotografiska, an ultra-popular museum that actually takes vivid photography from the pages of creative content aggregator sites into physical space, offering a cultural experience of encountering art, a kind of accessible form of high-end consumption, shows that museums cannot replace the Internet.

What is the portrait of your target audience? In your opinion, what and how can you draw the audience’s attention and interest these days?

Daria Panayotti: The Hermitage is one of the main museums in the country, so we always have a task to work with the widest audience. We have tried to select works and compose texts accompanying the exhibition in such a way that it should also attract people, who actually came to see their favourite impressionists and to look at their works.

How do you think the art world will be in 5-10 years?

Daria Paniotti: I think there will certainly be fewer blockbuster exhibitions, and museums will work more with their collections, discovering new things and rethinking old ones. This trend, even before the pandemic, began to be set when MoMA was reorganised. Museums, even the largest ones, will turn to local, urban audiences. Curators will have to look into the eyes of their audience and learn to apply the good old laws of rhetoric, whereas before it was accepted that the curator would create meanings in cooperation with art, while the spectator was often excluded from this dialogue. In Russia, this means that the language of art talk will change in a major way; it will become more transparent, more accessible, and in big cities, it will have to be done without simplifying the content. In my opinion, a very noble task!

What are the three components of a successful exhibition? What is the best way to attract the attention of a person interested in art nowadays?

Daria Paniotti: I think this will vary greatly from country to country. The content of the exhibition needs to resonate with certain social attitudes (strangely, one of the most popular pieces in Cecil Beaton’s exhibition was a portrait of Aldous Huxley; it is a rich source of thoughts! For the Russian viewer, an introductory text which sets the modus vivendi of the art perception is very important (even if it has to be intuitive, rather than intellectual – it had better be spelled out). And, of course, the very organisation of the exhibition must „draw“ you in; it is clear that just displaying the objects in the showcases is not enough; you have to create an environment that will entice the visitor to stay longer, to extend the physical and social experience of going to a museum.

Instagram PSCulture studio @psculture_studio
Facebook PSCulture studio PSCulture.studio
Facebook Dasha Panayotti dasha.panayotti
Instagram Hermitage Museum @hermitage_museum
Instagram Hermitage 20/21 @hermitage20_21

Interview with visual artist Folrry

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Interview with visual artist Folrry

How did you get into ART ?  

I got into art literally by studying other visual artist’s artwork. I loved what they created, and I wanted to create. So, I learnt and started creating my artworks.

How would you describe your creative process?  
I spend a lot of time thinking about concepts sometimes and I start creating parts of the artworks bit by bit. I start with space; what do I want the space to look like, what goes into the space, what story am I trying to tell, or am I even trying to tell any story? I must say, I view every artistic element that I create to make up the final artwork in a singular and standalone form. They all come together in a pluralistic manner to form a singular masterpiece, which is interesting, and at the same time challenging because I am working with shapes, characters, forms, objects, and most importantly translational human experiences; be it my personal experiences or those that I have witnessed.
Most times the process takes weeks or months and sometimes it is rapid. I might be sleeping and here comes the idea, the concept, I get up at midnight and I start creating the piece of art and I don’t stop until I finish it.
What was the key influence that led to the development of your process and style?  
Shapes, forms, objects,colours, their relatedness and relativity to human experiences, emotions and feelings. You get into a spacious room and the way it is set up really makes you feel some kind of way, sometimes you understand it while sometimes you can’t really grasp it, or wearing or choosing colours for an outing or occassion, loving a car because of how it looks on the external and the aftereffect it has on you depending on what you feel at that particular or prior to it. It is fascinating, the human nature and reaction to these things and this has in turn been an integral part of what influenced my art process and style. It is a very multiplex influence translated into a simplistic metaphor of beautiful artwork.
What does art mean to you personally? Is there a goal you’re trying to accomplish?  
To me personally, art means experiences. Be it from artist perspective, or viewer perspective. Spoken or unspoken experiences, tasteful or distasteful. As far there is an experience, then there is art.  Every art I make accomplishes a goal, because I didn’t keep this thought, experience and concept to myself, I shared it in a form of art piece. Hopefully, someone or group of people somewhere can relate with it. I feel that’s the ultimate goal, because from it springs other goals.
How has covid affected you and your art?
It gave me time to create and made me come to the full realisation of art as a product and service. Create the best, be better than the previous best, ask for the best. Covid effect on me personally, is anything could happen anytime but don’t stop believing in yourself.
What’s next? 
You will see…smiles☺ 

Instagram: @folrry
Behance: folrry

Interview with artist Andrea Familari

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Interview with artist Andrea Familari

Dear Andrea, thank you for taking time for an interview with us!

Your work is very diverse, expressing itself through the use of various media. Tell us about the creative process behind it.

It’s true, it is really diverse, it combines a lot of practices in one single person. For Tribute to the Noise, the latest series I am developing since two years and a half, I focused on representing the randomity of the behaviour and the constant that in a lot of studies is described as “random variable”: something that you must calculate in all scientific studies, and the one that if you wish to avoid, it will always be there.

In my work, I am translating this random variable into a video with the use of the noise, the video noise. Each video relies on its own rules but, from the audience point of view, it can be perceived differently: you can feel it, understanding its substance immediately. The results can be described as “chaotic”. As an outcome of these explorations, I have developed an original code in GLSL that uses a random value generating the noise itself.

With this process in mind, applied to my personal aesthetic and colours research, I wanted to push my practice forward and use this palette in the most various way possible, therefore experimenting with lots of different media. I wanted to constantly practice by generating and developing different artworks with the same “random” variable, permeated by the same aesthetic: from a big LED wall to a more conventional FULL-HD screening, from different dimensions and aspect ratio of screens to a LED Fan Display, from Prints to 3D Sculptures.

My palette of colours and video movements is definitely evolving with time, but the core remains the same and it is applied in everything that can be produced in the arts – following the daily growth of possibilities found in old, new and future media.

I am very critical towards the rush to the new technologies, the risk to create the first installation that comes to mind, or use them in a simple way without questioning them enough, using them only for the reason of their novelty. To me, time is of vital essence to allow new technologies to sediment and find a truthful, artistic meaning, not only using them for the pure rush of being the “first”.

Right now I’m focused on developing a VR installation and continuing my research on printing techniques, testing different papers, aluminum and 3D sculptures.

At the same time, I’m producing a new show with Fronte Vacuo (frontevacuo.com): an artists group which I co-founded with Marco Donnarumma (marcodonnarumma.com) and Margherita Pevere (www.margheritapevere.com).

The group was born with the aim to address the current convergence of ecological disruption, socio-political polarization and technological advance. We are working really closely in order to achieve a shared, collective critical thinking flux, each of us with their own expertise but in a continuous exchange of ideas. I’m really glad and proud to have found this sinergy.

What is the main idea you want your audience to take with them?

It’s not really an idea, but feelings. I’ve always appreciated standing in front of an artwork and understanding my own version of it without even reading the description, sometimes not even the title. And I have always remembered the feelings that I had, stronger than the idea that the artist wanted to share. Sometimes these two might overlap, but not always.

When you find yourself in front of an artwork with no coordinates to follow or over explanatory labels, you will try to reflect on something starting from it, and that will probably carry your mind somewhere else. That’s the journey I am interested in. By allowing yourself into my artworks, I am sure half of the meaning resides already there in yourself: then a part of the audience will maybe reach my idea, or not. And it doesn’t really matter in the end.

How would you define your personal aesthetics?

In a few words I would say a raw, hardcore grudge.

Naturally it’s not just that, but I would love this to be the only and final definition. I am focused on the grotesque that you can extrapolate from the use of the colors and shapes.

Tell us about the spaces within which you work.

It’s been two years since I started working in my current studio in Mitte. It’s a shared space with four artists – visual artists, sound artists and film directors. It’s basically divided into two different spaces: one which is more like an office with desks, computers, electronics and so on, and then a basement/atelier/tryouts space. Usually, most of the time, the only thing I need is my computer. But it is not the typical space where everyone has their own desk and we are by ourselves. We all have a good alliance and are really close, we are friends. We are trying to maintain an environment where mutual help and exchange are fundamental values at the core of our shared practice and space.

Have you ever had a moment when you questioned your career entirely?

Yes of course, during the last nine years it happened more than once. I guess every artist, every year, questions themselves.There is a moment, when you perceive the shadow of futility, looking at years and years of practice and feeling completely out of time or without a clear message for your audience…

From my perspective, it comes down to the fact that, in the end, we are human beings. With all the feelings and implications that derive from it. The most important part, though, is to get through these bad times. No matter what or how. I am usually getting over these moments by working harder.

Do you find that Berlin’s art scene inspires or influences your art?

Definitely. At least, when I moved here for sure. I moved to Berlin because of the incredibly nuanced and growing media art scene. A lot of artists from the past that inspired me were living here or their works were “born” and exhibited here. I wanted to see them live and not just on the web. After seven years of research and investigations, I found my own aesthetic and the aim in my work; what defines my “brush”. Even today, Berlin is still a place where I am intrigued by the art that is constantly in the making and the community surrounding this production. There is still a good exchange and knowledge sharing in the artistic community. It’s something that I have and I will always appreciate.

What advice would you give to a young artist following your steps?

The best advice that I continue to believe in and follow everyday is to “never give up” and “work everyday”. It sounds obvious and cheesy, but it is the fundamental part of every practice. As I said before, there will be dark times where you will question your entire career, but staying focused and continuing to believe in it, after years of trying and changing, and changing again, you will achieve what you have in mind. From my experience and encounters of my career, I didn’t find only one path to follow, no one can direct you where to go.

A good piece of art or, actually, any kind of job requires hard work before achieving the ideal results. It’s not something that appears overnight, but after years, and it may never do. And we need to keep on creating, being at peace with it. Everything needs time, and everyone has their own times.

Instagram Andrea Familari: @famifax

Barbara Gabrielle „next society“

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NEXT SOCIETY

Photographer: Barbara Gabrielle @barbaragabriellee
Model: Ryan Conway @ryogothacked
Styling assistant: Alex Adams @alexdwams
Makeup Artist: Amanda Berlinski @amandaberlinski
Choreographer: Kelci Greenway @brocnotcauli
Model: Kaiden Ford @iamkaidenford
Female Model/Creative Director: Yanran Xiong @pistachica
Wardrobe Stylist: Emily Bogner @emily_bogner_

Pants: Arc Luo; Pearl Bracelet: SOLOMEINA; Top: Alessandro Trincone; Hat: Alessandro Trincone

Full look by Alexandra tricorne; Necklace and hat  – BHAVYAA

Belt: Zara; Top:  Sultry Affair; Jacket: Alberta ferretti; Full look by Alexandra tricorne

Pants: Arc Luo; Pearl Bracelet:  SOLOMEINA; Top: Alessandro Trincone; Hat: Alessandro Trincone; Necklace and hat  – BHAVYAA

Necklace and hat  – BHAVYAA

Interview with artist Ewa Doroszenko

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Interview with artist Ewa Doroszenko

Description of the project

Body Editor

photographic project (a series of photographic prints and GIF files)
Link to the full project: ewa-doroszenko.com/bodyeditor

The project was inspired by the failures and bugs in the popular beauty apps, where unnatural bodies get distorted. While the Internet can seem like a place disconnected from the physical world, much of the activity that occurs there deeply affects how we feel outside of it. In the age of social media, technology provides women with tools that allow them to quickly create dream digital images of themselves. Using various beauty applications, they can smooth, contour their faces, whiten their teeth, add a few centimeters of height, enlarge their eyes, choose different mouths, and use many other options. Digitally edited images can serve as aspirational fantasies and occasionally they even can have a positive impact – when they are just effects of joyful entertainment. But can the game in which your body is a battleground be truly enjoyable? The phrase from Barbara Kruger’s iconic work has just as much resonance today as it did more than a quarter of a century ago.

While preparing the project I used photography as a starting point, alongside digital tools to create an expressive project that is both a critique and a celebration of the ongoing progress in contemporary technology and culture. I employed many methods of creating images: preparing three-dimensional collages constructed from free stock images and my portraits, photographing the scenes, printing in large sizes, physically manipulating prints, and digitally editing selected photos. In the final work, I tried to leave visible traces of digital processing, partly revealing my working methods to provoke discussion about contemporary photography.

How did you get into art?

I never doubted that I wanted to be an artist. Even as a child, I heard very often that I am very talented in drawing. Although my interests were quite broad and I liked science very much, the desire to create my own reality through art eventually won. I studied painting, which quickly became a basic medium in my projects, and finally, I got my doctoral degree in fine arts at the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Torun. During my studies, I also began to experiment with a conceptual approach to photography. I started to understand photography not as a single act of liberating the shutter, but as a sequence of resulting actions, which extends from aesthetic choices, the staging of scenes, physical and digital manipulation of images to the final arrangement of the exhibition. Currently, in my work, I use the consonance of many media – from photography to sound. I am constantly fascinated by art and its use as a kind of language.

What does art mean to you personally?

First of all, I try to use art to create new worlds, a reality different from that which surrounds me. Art is also my primary tool for researching and describing the issues of contemporaneity. I am primarily interested in the meaning of the image in technological reality and the fluidity of beauty standards. My artistic explorations are not limited by any medium, either traditional or digital. Trying to express my thoughts, I experiment with various methods and technologies. Whenever I think about creating new works, I try to create structures with multiple layers of meaning. The material choices are calculated and meant to bring on the idea.

Is there a goal you’re trying to accomplish?

Sure, I usually try to have clearly defined goals. Of course, as I grow and respond to a changing situation, I modify my goals. This makes it much easier for me to make decisions. On the other hand, there is a lot of room for experimentation in my artistic activity, so I often don’t know where the whole creative process will lead me. That is why I try to maintain a balance between planning activities and responding flexibly to the situation.

At the moment, together with my husband Jacek Doroszenko, we are working on a new project entitled „Bodyfulness“, which, like our previous activities, is a creative experiment combining sound and visual art. My goal is to release the project this year in a form of the unique music album and present an exhibition which is an audiovisual study of how modern technology and culture change our intimate relationships.

Do you have a life philosophy?

Yes, I have a certain philosophy of life. In a nutshell, it can be described as follows: I try to concentrate my energy on the things that depend on me. If I do something, I want to do it in the best and most professional way possible, regardless of whether my action is appreciated or not.

How do you think the art world will shape in the future?

The ongoing pandemic and simultaneous digital transformation have a huge impact on economic and social development. There are also great changes in the field of culture and art. As reality is increasingly being challenged by the virtual world and technologies are developing so rapidly, I think that in the future artistic productions will become more engaging and interactive. These new approaches and tools will perhaps allow even more artistic freedom, offering completely new creative opportunities, including the possibility of mixing elements that were probably impossible to combine before. I think that in the future, the physical experience of the exhibition will continue to be strong. But galleries will expand significantly in ways that are not just physical, but also digital.

Ewa Doroszenko Instagram: @ewadoroszenko