Press releases

MINSK, 25 August (BelTA) – The Zabor art project is coming back to Minsk after a two-year trip across Belarus and other countries, BelTA learned from the organizers of the project. The exhibition of works by modern Belarusian artists will open at the National Art Museum on 8 September.

The exhibition will be open for a month. Visitors will be able to see works by ten contemporary Belarusian artists representing not only the capital city, but also all the regions of Belarus. “We sought to highlight various genres and styles in modern Belarusian art. Here one will see naive art of Sergei Kaval, abstract painting by Vitebsk artist Alexander Dosuzhev, a conceptual project by Ruslan Vashkevich and surrealistic etchings by Yuri Yakovenko from Grodno,” director of the art project Antonina Seryakova said.

In her words, while elaborating the concept of the exhibition, the organizers wanted not only to display the works by contemporary artists; they also sought to create some atmospheric environment for each of them. To achieve that, the organizers used installations and multimedia technologies. For example, the area where Sergei Kaval’s works will be displayed will turn into a children’s room where special children’s workshops will be available. Volunteers will engage children in painting, molding and craftwork. Besides, a young director Roman Burmakov has “revived” the picture Old Vitebsk for the exposition.

A video installation will be arranged in the section where Yuri Yakovenko’s etchings will be displayed. “Yuri’s surrealistic series titled Hitchcock and Dali will be presented at the exhibition. We would like to re-produce this surrealistic atmosphere of the etchings on a bigger screen. While discussing this idea with Yuri Yakovenko, we came up with a very unusual, theatrical setting that will make visitors lose the sense of reality as they enter this space,” Antonina Seryakova said.

The bulk of the paintings belong to the Zubr Capital private equity firm, which is the organizer of the project. “The firm’s collection features over 350 paintings, which is one of the biggest private collections of contemporary art in Belarus. Our mission is to support, preserve and promote modern Belarusian art. The exhibition at the National Art Museum is part of the efforts,” Zabor art director Irina Kondratenko said.

Visitors to the exhibition will be offered an extensive educational and entertainment program: lectures about modern art, excursions led by the artists taking part in the project, movie screening, master classes in painting, excursions for children and other interesting events. The Zabor exhibition will stay open at the National Art Museum until 3 October.

The Zabor art project was the first one to display reproductions of paintings by contemporary Belarusian artists on central fences of Belarusian cities. The project kicked off in the Chelyuskinites Park in Minsk in July 2012 and toured all the oblast centers, was exhibited in Warsaw and will be presented in Paris in September. The objective of the project is to introduce people to modern Belarusian art.