I was born and raised in Novosibirsk (Siberia, Russia) and twice in my life I have relocated to another country and another culture away from my family. The immigrant trauma, loss of connections, closed borders, disappearing memories of motherland, trauma of attachment in a context of relocation – my background definitely plays a role in my practice.
I’ve chosen embroidery to be my dominant artistic tool because it is expressive, graphical, and rhythmic and allows me to highlight the texture of the artwork, make it voluminous and -at the same time- it’s tactile and allows me to attempt to form and expose the metaphorical “memories” in my work, to manifest the essence of the memory and include an emotional component into it. For me it is a serious practice which allows me to connect to my work on multiple levels. One of the materials which I use constantly is a thread, which helps me to “connect the time” in my work: past and present and highlight the importance of social connections for our existence.
The objects I create through embroidery and fabric often take shape of an imaginary landscape, reflected in a water. They are a metaphor for our partly erased memories, reflected in our conciseness distorted over time with missing details. Where made up by our past experience beliefs fill up the blanks and mixing the memories with illusions. I refer to my works as “Horizons” where the horizon line is often embroidered, balancing and shaping the connection between illusion and reality, between past and present. The word “horizon” is often used as a metaphor for future, for something ahead of us. My Horizons are the horizons of past, often overlooked, those that we leave behind, unseen and invisible, but also those that are shaping our present and future.
