Deconstructed
type: Installation
location: Venice, Italy
year: 2023
status: Competition
authors: Nikita Bielokopytov, Daria Borovyk, Dmytro Gurin, Anton Oliynyk, Mariia Pakhomova, Oleksii Pakhomov
Brief
We have reached the point where every question only begets new ones. But, if questions are all we have now, perhaps they themselves can be our building material?
The project deconstructed is devoted to the reconstruction of Ukraine and aims to facilitate an intensive exchange of opinions and questions about future decisions and actions. Today, there are different points of view on exactly how reconstruction should develop—depending on experience, context, and professional capacities. Our project invites the visitors of the Biennale to answer questions and ask their own.
Giardini
An installation in the form of a camouflage net will be hung between two of the earthen mounds of the pavilion’s construction. At the opening, the net will already be half-filled with ribbons woven into the grid containing the questions we ask, but leaving space for visitors to contribute their own answers and/or new questions.
The thoughts of the public will thus be gradually recorded onto the ribbons over the course of three weeks in August, covering and supplementing the existing architectural installation. The process of weaving camouflage nets since the beginning of the war has become a symbol of joint action, unity and active participation. At the same time, for many it has become a meditative practice and a time for contemplation.
The net is hung with steel cables attached to anchor points on the earthen mounds, drilled at 4 meter increments, according to the "soil screw" principle. The net is suspended at a height allowing an average adult to tie a ribbon over their head. A vertical net segment of the net allows for inclusive participation by children and people with disabilities. The ribbons are freely available to the visitors under the tables, and they are pre-cut and prepped with punched holes for weaving them into the net. After deinstallation, the ribbons containing texts contributed by the public will be used for further research by the collective.
Brief
Tablets will be available on the benches in the space for visitors to pick up and watch video interviews in the space. The videos become a kind of immersion in the perspectives of Ukrainians, who detail their visions of reconstruction, while sitting in a dark space watching a phone/tablet simulates the experience of waiting in a shelter during an air raid.
In the videos displayed on both the tablets and TVs, the interviewees come from various sectors and fields, and thus represent a kind of status quo. Their comments also demonstrate the situation in which Ukraine and Ukrainian Architecture finds themselves today. Together the interviews form a composite discussion showing different views on the same topic—Reconstruction.