2021

Site-specific multimedia installation
(metal constructions, LED panels, programming) dimensions variable

In 2019, The Open Group, preparing for the Venice Biennale, took a very courageous but utopian step – it tried to compile a list of all "living Ukrainian artists." Anyone who considered themselves part of the contemporary Ukrainian art scene was eligible to fill an open questionnaire to join this list. Those who filled it out were informed that: "officially you are an artist of the 58th Venice Biennale" and "a hard drive with the data of all project participants will be donated to the non-existent State Museum of Contemporary Art of Ukraine, and will actually start its collection." Therefore, 1143 people who filled out the form, on the one hand, desacralized the very status of the Venice Biennale participant, and on the other hand, legitimized their own role on the national art scene.

It is this open list of names that Sergiy Petlyuk takes as the basis of his new work, raising a question: who is a Ukrainian artist in the local and global context, what is her/his visibility, what is the art market (if any) in Ukraine, and what is the role of local art institutions in supporting the creation and forming knowledge on contemporary art?

A running text line with the above-mentioned list of Ukrainian artists encircles the gallery space. After each surname, numbers resembling the indexes of stock exchanges are illuminated, but unlike the latter, these numbers have no meaning - they are merely an imitation, an arbitrary set of numbers that the program randomly generates.