Exhibition '42.3 Art Objects in Park Kovcheg XXI'

CK19 Cultural Center presents an exhibition by Alexey Smirnov and Yulia Dontsova, '42.3 Art Objects in Park Kovcheg XXI' — a 1:20 scale model of the park that features several large art objects of abstract forms.

According to architect Alexey Smirnov, this model is not just a park but a true 'contemporary art gallery,' the full-scale original of which should be located exclusively in a natural environment.

Some of the art objects were developed for the landscape design of outdoor spaces, while others are products of the authors' free creativity. Not all works are straightforward or easily understood, which is in line with the artists' intent — thus they symbolically challenge archaic culture in favor of the contemporary.

The characters and selected images that served as inspiration and prototypes for the art objects are not related to one another. In the architect's view, this corresponds to and vividly expresses the degree of absurdity of modern realities that an ordinary person has to face daily: all of this has somehow ended up here, 'in a heap,' at the same time, which at first may be hard to grasp.

"An art object is, of course, by no means a sculpture, in a certain respect. For the most part, ideas circulating in the realm of sculpture tend to revolve around the image of the human being; they inevitably include elements of plastic expression. None of this is present in any of our models. On the contrary, we shift the focus of idealization from the human to other aspects of being, having greatly simplified the plastic means of expression," notes Alexey Smirnov.

The exhibition includes art objects: 'Don Quixote Picasso,' 'Tribute to L. Lissitzky,' 'The Crow,' 'The Goldfish / Automonsters Series,' 'The Bottle,' 'Compass,' 'Ryba-Altika,' 'The Diver,' 'Wind of Change,' 'Pig-Gazebo,' and others.

6+

The exhibition will open on December 19 and run through January 19, 2025.