Arkhiu of Belarusian Aesthetics
I’m an installation artist and designer working at the intersection of material research, symbolism, and public engagement. My background spans industrial design and socially engaged art, with a focus on post-Soviet identity, queer ecologies, and collective memory. I lead and curate interdisciplinary projects - recently including a digital archive of Belarusian aesthetics - often collaborating with communities through site-specific work. My projects have been shown across Europe, and I’m currently a resident at Viafarini in Milan.
(Archive of digitalised parts of Belarusian aesthetics in free access, based on residency at Mochnarte F. and collaboration with other Belarusian artists.)
It’s really hard to say what “Belarusian” means — even for Belarusians themselves.
By asking the question what it is, I began to understand that the idea of what is “Belarusian” is constantly evolving — especially now, when so many Belarusians have been forced to leave their homes, but we still have some common roots.
While living in Belarus, I didn’t appreciate our culture. That feeling, I now realize, was strongly influenced by Russian propaganda, which has been shaping our identity since Soviet times through manipulative national narratives and a similar agenda. It's a language almost impossible to discover for me due to the possibility of imprisonment. I haven't been in Belarus for almost 4 years.
The idea I’m applying with is the creation of an online Arkhiu of Belarusian Aesthetics, where I want to collect and share color palettes, 2D and 3D visual analyses, based on the cultural materials available to me. The project starts with a residency at Mochnarte Foundation, which is in Poland and on the border with Belarus.
By later inviting artists for collaboration, I can unite 'outside' and 'inside' Belarusian artists and designers, since it's a place for safe expression. Having a different opinion than the regime may be something of a luxury. I want to unite on other levels.
Apart from that, the available documentation will help to share and spread, like artefacts, some extracts from artists’ works.