Please join us to celebrate the opening of Evgeniya Martirosyan's solo show titled ‘3+5’ at LHQ Gallery this Thursday at 6pm
Caption: 3+5 (detail), 2024, sculptural installation: metal, aged wood, books, personal prints and photos, rust and organic staining. Photo by Chris Hurley
'3+5' presents art works that look at knowledge manipulation and re-framing of history. Coexisting or opposing versions of 'truth' become more apparent in the times of conflict. The themes of censorship and contamination of information are explored by the artist, who uses books in various languages and other printed materials (maps, personal documents, photographs) to build up a sculptural installation, suggestive of a classroom environment. One of the books cited in the exhibition and on display is George Orwell’s '1984', where an omnipresent Ministry of Truth is tasked with erasing unsuitable knowledge and replacing it with its own version of reality.
The exhibition title '3+5' refers to the ongoing events in the artist's country of origin, Russia. “Since the outbreak of the conflict with Ukraine, the word 'war' has been replaced with the phrase 'Special Military Operation'. A simple mathematical formula, '3+5' (нет войне, rus. 3+5 letters), became a coded message, a substitute to the punishable 'No To War'. In 2023, Russian school history books were rewritten, many other books are either banned or sold under restrictive rules”, explains Evgeniya.
The installation is accompanied by a wall sculpture, which at a first glance appears like a stain on the wall of the gallery. The 'stain', in fact, is in the shape of the map of Russia. Photographic wall prints (by an anonymous Russian photographer) document the everyday reality in the artists home city: dilapidated areas, marching youth, theatre announcements, state celebrations, police gatherings, military recruitment officers, propaganda signs emerging in the playgrounds and on the walls of the various buildings, etc.
All printed materials in the exhibition have been manipulated by the artist, stained with rust and organic matter. Rust, a chemical process evoking inflammation and wounding, is a unifying visual element spreading across the room, infecting all the objects and surfaces, and corroding the information. Some of the text and imagery becomes totally obscured, almost eliminated, while remaining visible words and images can generate unexpected meanings and thematic associations.
The exhibition will be opened on Thursday 22nd February at 6pm by Michael Waldron, Curator of Collections and Special Projects at Crawford Art Gallery. It runs until 22nd of March, Monday to Friday 9am-5.30pm.
'3+5' body of work is funded by an Arts Council Bursary Award, supported by National Sculpture Factory, with the assistance of Zbygniew Owczarek. The LHQ Programme is supported by the Arts Council/An Chomhairle Ealaion.
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