Structures of power

Structure of Power is a series of works exploring the mechanisms of power and different forms of domination that exist both in human society and in nature. Through grotesque figures, animals, workers and political characters I explore a recurring structure: someone occupies the top, someone sustains the system, and someone becomes its foundation — often without the possibility or ambition to claim power themselves.

I am interested not in a particular political system, but in the recurring patterns of hierarchy itself: ambition, submission, force, propaganda, exploitation, institutional power, and the dependence of one individual on another. Within this structure each character performs a particular function — from the police officer and the worker to the military figure, the political spokesperson, or the person who literally becomes a support for those above them.

The series deliberately uses absurdity and grotesque imagery. Humour becomes both a way of coping with violence and a part of the system itself: even in a vulnerable position, people can turn their own trauma into jokes or entertainment in order to make reality more bearable.

At its core, the series is about how hierarchy reproduces itself through different bodies, roles and systems, where each level can simultaneously be subordinate to someone above and dominant over someone below.

«Fun Until Further Notice» depicts an injured horse with bright, almost entertaining elements embedded into its body. For me it reflects something about Ukrainian society: we try to attract attention to our pain, but at the same time we resist exposing the pain too directly. We surround it with colour, humour and spectacle, making it possible to look at something that would otherwise be unbearable.

«This hand had never stolen anything» refers to a well-known phrase by Viktor Yushchenko, said during the 2004 presidential debates with Viktor Yanukovych. In the work the hands appear as a separate image of power. They seem to have grown together and are stitched to one another, forming a single shared pose. This gives the phrase about «hands that stole nothing» an ironic meaning — the hands that are meant to demonstrate honesty and innocence become an image of power and its interconnected relationships.