What is a body? In what relationship is a person to the body? These ontological questions always hover over us, but the sound of an air alert or an explosion translates them into practical space. A person begins to look for shelter — technically speaking, moves their body to a safe place. The body is not only about the flesh but also about existence in the political space.
In interwar Europe, Ernst Friedrich wished to convey this to his audience, so that they look at the body not only as a biological but also as a political construct. In his book War Against War! [Krieg dem Kriege!], where the horrors of the First World War are imprinted on human bodies, he juxtaposes some gruesome photographs of injuries, mutilations, and mass executions with chauvinist slogans and quotes from marshals.
The nerve of contemporaneity resonates in Petrov’s new project on bodiliness. He does not depict war, and, in general, rarely works with current events, but each of his works is permeated with tension. The heroes seem to be trying to find a way to peace: they practice yoga and hold various asanas, making great efforts for this. This point of frozen movement is a reference to Petrov’s previous project “Keep it up!”. He seems to be conducting an immanent argument with himself in the language of watercolours and sculptures. Whereas “Keep it up!” mostly ironically reflected the established practices of professional team sports, here the artist focuses on the theme of the relationship between the strength of the spirit and the body.
It is the juxtaposition of watercolour and sculpture, the practice of viewing objects in two-dimensional and three-dimensional planes that gives such projects their uniqueness. In the exposition of this exhibition, viewers quickly adapt to the perspective and presentation of unnatural human poses on the canvas, while the bodily distortions frozen in the sculpture weigh on them upon prolonged examination. Everyone understands that a person can remain in this position for a limited time only thanks to willpower, so a posture frozen in time can already be perceived as anomalous upon long viewing. And this feeling resonates with the social background and experience, both personal and collective, in which the Ukrainian artist is now.
The project consists of 11 works where watercolor complements sculpture and vice versa. Connoisseurs of sculpture will see a connection with such masters as Umberto Boccioni and Alberto Giacometti, whose works are known for their pronounced dynamism of movement. Petrov works in mixed media with various modern materials and textures: ceramics, epoxy resin, and crystalline rubber.
In such an anatomical project, Petrov perfectly manages to show the process of human change itself and how bodily existence becomes an object through the assimilation of specific cultural bodily practices. Even if it’s just yoga on the beach.
Sasha Geller