Material Memory: How Found Materials Preserve Histories in New Works

What could better complement the illustrative nature of drawings than using a visual language to form the cohesive core of an artist's new creative phase? This is precisely what Kateryna explores in her first works in a new style, inspired by her preparation for the exhibition "Where Memories Live"

The artist turns to memories that capture a specific pause in time - illustrations without movement, frozen through the technique of "foiling" paintings. This method is better known as "oklad" or "riza" in Slavic countries, while in Mexican culture it is called "retablo".

Wrapped in metal, the works seem to balance between cold foil with sharp framing, which enters into a dialogue with the paintings' limited palette. The images themselves appear as if they have accidentally fallen from a forgotten notebook discovered in a pile of old things.

One of the artist's thoughts goes like this:

Remember your memories and the movements that turned into rituals. Playing with flowers and the imagination that these flowers are magical. Or the things your grandmother or grandfather used. Often, older people have a different attitude towards objects, and for them, certain things can be ritualistic. You observe this and become enchanted by the details of objects that grow closer to you. At that age, it's difficult to comprehend that these things were made by human hands. It is precisely this combination of affect and lack of experience that makes this object wonderful to you. This is how I try to convey this 'flavor' of memory.

The artist's idea about the materials of memory oscillates between the physical image and the imagined, intensified by the memory itself and the threat of loss not so much of the object itself, but of the place, the city, the country. However, instead of a global perspective, the artist focuses on details, emphasizing that the personal can be painful and, at the same time, reflect universal human experiences.