Karina Synytsia “It is impossible to repair cracks in a dry layer”

“It is impossible to repair cracks in a dry layer” is the concluding exhibition of Karina Synytsia’s two-month Lublin Station residency held at the Galeria Labirynt. 

Exhibition opening:
When: 23/02/2024  at 18:00
Where: Galeria Labirynt, Popiełuszki 5, Lublin
Accessibility: The exhibition is held on the ground floor. Mute earmuffs and a trolley can be borrowed free of charge from the bookshop. Quiet hours at the exhibition apply on Wednesdays from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. The gallery has portable induction loops. The opening is translated into Ukrainian by Volodymyr Dyshlevuk.
Exhibition on display: until 17/03/2024 (Tue–Sun: 12:00–7:00 p.m)
Admission: 8 PLN (free entry for the vernissage)

Curators: Waldemar Tatarczuk, Gabriela Gawęda

The starting point of the exhibition is the artistic practice of the Ukrainian artist Mykhailo Boychuk (1882-1937) and his students known as Boychukists. Boychuk was inspired by Byzantine art and combined its system of imagery with Ukrainian folk art. Together with his students, they wanted to create a single synthetic style of Ukrainian national art. Although their work did not contradict the ideas of the October Revolution of 1917, according to the Communist Party authorities, Boychukists’ style of painting was too independent, too pro-Western, too formalistic. Consequently, Boychuk’s school was deemed as harmful to the Soviet people. He along with his wife Sofia Nalepynska-Boychuk and students Ivan Padalka and Vasyl Sedlar were executed in 1937. 

The exhibition will feature paintings, an animation and photographs that juxtapose the stories of Ukrainian art in the 1920s and 1930s with contemporary times. Synytsia’s large-scale paintings refer to the monumental art of those years. Instead of heroic figures, the artist depicts deserted vast fields. The landscapes she creates are partially realistic and partially imagined representations of the battlefields happening on Ukrainian territory. She replaces the propaganda slogans known from Soviet times with emptiness or messages heard from friends in the army. 

The uncertain future is portrayed by Karina in an insightful way. “It is impossible to repair cracks in a dry layer” alludes to the feelings and doubts raised by news from the war front. The deliberate attacks on civilians during the ongoing Russian invasion in the Ukrainian territories bring us to the thoughts of social repressions in the Soviet Union. How long will the Russian military invasion continue? How to ensure that the memory of a distinct Ukrainian national and cultural identity survives?

Karina Synytsia – artist living and working in Kiev. In 2019 she graduated from the Kharkiv City School of Art with an engineering degree with the specialisation of painter-performer/painter-artist, art teacher. In 2023, she earned a bachelor’s degree in painting from the National Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture (NAFAA). The main medium of her work is painting. She also employs animation and uses objects in her work.  Karina frequently depicts the theme of landscape. For her, the typical landscape of her region is a tool which aids her in collecting metaphorical objects or images. She is a resident of Galeria Labirynt as part of the Lublin Station programme.