Art Resistance against Russia’s “Non-Invasion” of Ukraine
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21239239 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Nazar Kozak (0000-0002-9089-3820, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2022 |
| Volume | 9 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 67-104 |
| Publication date | 2022-03-30 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | East/West: Journal of Ukrainian Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2292-7956 • E-ISSN: 2292-7956 |
| Publisher | University of Alberta Libraries (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.21226/ewjus585 |
| OpenAlex | W4220763173 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 8 |
When Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014, the Russian media ran what I propose to call a simulation of “non-invasion”—a spectacle aimed to distance Russia from the war. This essay explores activist art resistance against this simulation. Specifically, I discuss three art projects that were staged during the first, most violent year of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict: Mariia (Maria) Kulikovs'ka’s performance at “Manifesta 10” in St. Petersburg, Serhii Zakharov’s guerrilla installations on the streets of occupied Donetsk, and Izolyatsia’s #onvacation occupation of the Russian pavilion at the 56th Venice Biennale. These art projects, I argue, not only attacked the simulation from the outside as independent entities, but, by penetrating the simulation on site and online, they disrupted it from within. I offer three reasons to support this claim. First, these art projects superimposed images of the invasion over the physical sites where the “non-invasion” simulation dwelt and, in this way, not only made the war visible but also produced “a glitch in the matrix” effect—a conflict within the simulation visual regime that was inconsistent with its concealment function. Second, they “hailed” (in Louis Althusser’s terms) actants of the simulation as subjects of Putin’s regime, provoking suppressive reactions that proved Russia’s participation in the war—which the simulation, thus, failed to downplay. And third, with carefully orchestrated strategies of online outreach to the public, these art projects attached themselves to the media dimension of the simulation, making the simulation’s media proliferation work against itself
Art · Citizen journalism · Media studies · Outreach · Political science · Sociology · Spectacle · Ukrainian · Visual arts · Eastern European Communism and Reforms · European and Russian Geopolitical Military Strategies · History · Law · Philosophy · Security, Politics, and Digital Transformation
The Performative Stills of Early Moscow Actionism
Worldmaking and Worldbreaking
Unraveling Disinformation
Conceptualizing social protest and the significance of protest actions to large projects
Authoritarian regime stabilization through legitimation, popular co-optation, and exclusion
The Trial
Hearing the voice of Donbas
The three colors of Novorossiya, or the Russian nationalist mythmaking of the Ukrainian crisis
| Citations per year | 0.5 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2022 - 2024 (3) |
| Highly cited | No |