Zhanna Kadyrova 

Instrument, 2024

An organ is an exceptional musical instrument. It is not only an instrument but also a form of architecture, and it even serves as a model of the living body as it is sustained by the breath of life. The organ is unique among musical instruments - capable of producing the entire range of audible sound, from the deepest bass to the highest notes. Its technological complexity makes it most suitable for cavernous churches, cathedrals and specially designed concert halls; the organ is far from an ordinary, everyday object.

Zhanna Kadyrova’s work often grows from simplicity, ”Instrument” involving such an intricate structure, might seem contradictory to this approach. Still, the inspiration for this work emerged from the simple resemblance of an organ’s pipes to the bodies of missiles launched by Russia into Ukraine - symbols of destruction and death. As Instrument demonstrates, art has the power to subvert, and to transform these metal shells into symbols of resurrection and hope.

Kadyrova’s Instrument juxtaposes culture and the brutality of war, the sacred and the profane, the static and the mobile, the aesthetic and the functional. This brings us to its most critical aspect: it must be used, activated, to remain alive. The modified organ is a piece of contemporary art, but it also functions as a musical instrument that demands to be played in order to sustain itself and contemporary Ukrainian culture.

Text by Pavel Sterec

Palianytsia, 2022-ongoing

Palianytsia means bread. In classical sense, it means large-sized round wheat bread, baked in an oven.
At the start of the war Russia unleashed against Ukraine, the word "palianytsia" became a symbol, since Russian occupiers are unable to pronounce it correctly. It became a shibboleth, distinguishing friend from enemy without mistake…

The project was inspired by the Transcarpathian region…There are many mountain rivers; their waters run fast and polish the stones. We started looking at them more closely and the idea just came to us. There was no time for distancing and analysis, there was a growing need to do something and be useful! 

We donate 100% of the money we receive for these artworks to volunteer organizations and friends who stayed in Kyiv and joined Territorial Defense forces there. For the first 2 weeks of the war, it seemed to me that art was a dream, that all twenty years of my professional life were just something I had seen while asleep, that art was absolutely powerless and ephemeral in comparison to the merciless military machine destroying peaceful cities and human lives. Now I no longer think so: I see that every artistic gesture makes us visible and makes our voices heard!
- Zhanna Kadyrova, 2022

Curator’s note: Kadyrova continues to make her Palianytsia sculptures from river stones. They are made in and from Ukraine (its rivers and stones) and embody Ukrainian resolve: stone bread that could break one’s teeth.