Oksana Chepelyk
dates de séjour
discipline
Fonction d’origine
Institution d’origine
pays d'origine
lien internet
projet de recherche
Dead Zones
In “The Waters Come Into My Soul” project within IZOLYATSIA American Arts Incubator I examined water pollution in Ukraine along the Dnipro River. The industrial runoff and over abundance of phosphorus, nitrogen and phosphates cause active reproduction of blue-green algae provoking the “Dnipro Blossoming” phenomenon, which negatively affects the flora and fauna of the river as well as the physical and psychological state of the people living nearby. IMéRA that helps the artists to develop the project in contact with the scientific and cultural community can offer an influential impact into my research addressing social and environmental challenges.
During the residency I’m planning to develop my larger “Intermarium Odissea” research focusing on the Ecology Global Data and Local Ecosystem.
The bloom is toxic and likely to cause a marine dead zone, a region in the ocean depleted of oxygen, and thus devoid of most life. Behind these massive blooms is cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae, an ancient type of marine bacteria that captures and stores solar energy through photosynthesis like plants. In fact, oxygen levels in recent years here have dropped to their lowest levels in the past 1,500 years. Mysterious algae vortex the size of Manhattan can be seen from space also in the Baltic Sea. According to myth, Charybdis was a sea monster that consumed ships by sucking them into deadly whirlpools.
The researchers from Finland's University of Turku state, the dead zone this year is estimated to span about 27,000 km2. The algal blooms are also toxic, and beaches all along the Baltic Sea must be regularly closed due to their presence. Dead zones aren't just a problem in Dnipro River and the Baltic Sea. They're becoming more common around the world: in the Gulf of Mexico, at the mouth of the Mississippi River, in Arabian Sea and in China. Charybdis, it would seem, is multiplying. And as we continue to dump our waste into rivers around the world, we are feeding it with a conveyor belt of nutrients.
Research will investigate this phenomenon discussing the concept of psychogeography through global data, radical mapping, microscopy video, and sound. I try to understand society acting through the prism multifunctional model of the human existence.
biographie
As an Ukrainian artist, researcher and curator, of the New Technologies Department of the Modern Art Research Institute of Ukraine I’m focusing on the contemporary art and new technologies and their penetration into the architectural environment in order to uncover their structure as a social space. I try to understand society and social space acting through the prism multifunctional model of the human existence. I connect theories of the urban development with the economic, ecological, demographical problems and therefore come closer to the understanding of spatial relations, interactions between media flows and the human being. As an artist by means of my artistic message I embody the conception of the synthesis of architectural space, contemporary art, and new media. The themes that I develop are especially geared for dialogue and communication, open to the audience.
I'm working with installation, film, video, new media, photography and performance in order to explore ideas about architectural space, context and communication. In my approach I combine art and science, appealing to the idea of collider in physics, raises the questions:
is a person a particle in the system of accelerators of global forces, or the energy of interaction investigating new values, new forms of thought and new ways of existence in the world?
whether fluctuations, oscillations - turbulence in the social field will lead to the phase of transition?
the research of today’s algorithmic society from fake news, post-truth “data politics” perspective – what is the future of our social media? Is this a democracy? How many tipping points do we need before moving to reframe the system?
Мy book “The Interaction of Architectural Spaces, Contemporary Art and New Technologies” also reflects my experience as a curator of the International Festival of Social Sculpture in Kiev focusing on the city and new technologies.
