Zhanna Kadyrova: Flying Trajectories

Flying Trajectories opens with a double horizon over Ukraine: one that comes from the past, and another that drives the present.

The exhibition travels, through geography and time, systematically embodying a shared historical past that inhabits Ukrainian public space. It addresses Ukraine as a country in a process of self-definition. Giving way to different trajectories that simultaneously come into existence often going through acts of destruction or violence.

This leads to one of the most central rooms in the exhibition dealing directly with the reality of physical violence. It shows a horizon of Shots (2022–2023) displayed together with the work Harmless War (2023), white-painted geometrical forms using metal sheets that have been pierced by shrapnel. The metal plates are evidences of war. Kadyrova reduces those material evidences to forms which are welcomed by the traditional gaze of a Western art audience. It becomes one of her most provocative gestures.

The final chapter of the exhibition could as well be a beginning. It addresses the position of the artist herself when, in the beginning of the full scale invasion, making art felt useless.

It leads us to the Carpathian mountains where Kadyrova defined her own place in the war. It created a new line where through art, Kadyrova can speak about Ukraine around the world while defending it and bringing monetary contributions back to her country.

The exhibition Zhanna Kadyrova: Flying Trajectories is made in collaboration with the Kunstverein Hannover, Germany, where Daily Bread, Kadyrova’s first retrospective, was shown earlier this year.

The exhibition is curated by Björn Geldhof, Artistic Director of the PinchukArtCentre.

Bio: Zhanna Kadyrova
Zhanna Kadyrova was born in 1981 in Brovary, in the Kyiv region, Ukraine. She currently lives and works in Kyiv, Ukraine. Member of “R.E.P.” group (Revolution Experimental Space). After graduating from the Taras Shevchenko State Art School in 1999, she received the Kazimir Malevich Artist Award and the Grand Prix of the Kyiv Sculpture Project (both 2012). She was awarded the Special Prize (2011), Main Prize (2013) and Special Prize – Future Generation Art Prize (2014), all by PinchukArtCentre; Miami Pulse Prize (2018).

Selected solo shows
Daily Bread, First retrospective. Kunstverein Hannover, (Germany), 2023
Palianytsia, Riva San Biasio, Venezia (Italy), 2022
Alterations, Kunstraum Innsbruck, Innsbruck (Austria), 2015