'Volny Park. Zhukovsky Terminal' — Anya and Vitalik Cherepanov's experiment on creating an exhibition without authors' physical presence. It includes archival works and immersive video installations, based on recordings from the city's security systems. Exploring the phenomenon of ubiquitous surveillance, the artists reflect on the possible ways of interaction in the era of long-distance communication.
'Volny Park is about observing how different interests and wills interact across physical, mental, and digital landscapes,' says Cherepanov, 'a reflection on how to develop strategies for these interactions, allowing oneself to apply the self-will in public space, and learning to accept and recognise the will of others'. During the exhibition, the Park will transform into a three-story premise, with an entrance through a special terminal — a professor-paratrooper named Zhukovsky. He is the 'spirit of the place' and represents the key to access both ideas and works left behind by the artists. Zhukovsky's terminal processes, distributes and reflects on them, including every visitor of the Park in these processes.
The main theme of the project is the surveillance system, which is exposed in two large-scale video installations — 'Around Nizhny Tagil' and 'The Security guard in the Park'. The first one shows a chronicle of the artist's native city of Nizhny Tagil, filmed on a panoramic CCTV camera, where the pole is the only anchor in the world of dizzying nightlife lights. The second imitates Moscow's Sokolniki Park, decorated with illuminated garlands, in which the security guard who observes the order becomes an object of observation himself.
The project climaxes with the performative installation 'Vault' on the gallery third floor. It is a warehouse of the packed and unpacked works of art that have hovered in Russia since the artists' emigration. Together with the gallery staff, they are under the watchful eye of video security cameras that simultaneously broadcast the footage into the main exhibition. The viewers switch places with the security guard and oversee the daily routine of the art employees.
