Sunset over a Swamp
Installation. Propaganda newspapers.Mirror
Print-out on glass.The Art of the Regime
installation based on my photographsFlowers from the Winner
installation based on my photographsPole
Photograph. Fine art printing. Manipulation with colour. Size 50×70DESCENT INTO THE MARSH
Memories are limited by the length of our lives; each new generation takes responsibility for their preservation and for the cultural and social development of society. Through historical circumstances, into which we are born, and events, which influence us, we shape a new history. Post-Soviet Belarus has passed the generational threshold - 30 years - in a state of the mothballed state of irremovability of authority and continuous violence. During this time, a new generation has grown, united by the protests of 2020 and the returned idea of future.
Since the protests, the regime in Belarus has sought monopoly control over all public spheres and the process of presenting the country's history. Working with archives and topics of national culture poses security risks. Many cultural figures are in opposition to the regime, oppose the official ideology built on nostalgia for the Soviet Union, memorialisation of the Great Patriotic War (World War II), and constant russification of the country's population. Today there is another stage of rewriting history textbooks, crossing out important personalities, and degrading the education system. Without overt military action, Belarusian independent state, cultural institutions, as well as memory are being destroyed. As a result, many directions of contemporary art continue to exist only thanks to the initiatives of specific people and are not supported by the state (or even persecuted). Public presentation of this kind of alternative projects in the country is virtually impossible.
Günter Grass Gallery. Gdańsk, Poland
Sunset over a Swamp
It seemed to us in August 2020 that everything had changed; the people in the streets had changed and the state’s antiquated machinery was falling apart. We had no water, there were black-outs, and the underground was constantly breaking down. A rotten system was dying, everyone knew this too well. It was then that I started to build an archive of the propaganda press, believing these would the last papers printed by the regime. I planned to analyse them later.
There are no independent media in Belarus. They ceased to exist when Lukashenko gained power in 1994. By the end of 1994, Siarhiey Antonchyk, an MP in the Supreme Council of the Republic of Belarus, presented a report on corruption in the President’s circles. The report was not published but newspapers were issued with blank pages because the ban on printing it had been issued at the last minute. From that moment on, independent media were either liquidated or submitted to the control of the authorities and published only radical propaganda.
The installation makes references to the regime’s placing ornamental red and green flags along the streets of Minsk. The flag’s design was approved of during a rigged referendum, promoted by Lukashenko. This is not the national flag, there is no real idea behind it. It is a symbol of fear. The propaganda press is full of fear, hate and resentment.
Flowers from the Winner
One of the symbols of prosthesis were flowers. Even though criticism arose, suggesting that Belarusians should have taken up arms instead of offering flowers after the outbreak of full-scale war in Ukraine, these symbols were carefully chosen to reflect the majority's stance against violence. Lesia, as an artist, reconstructs this imagery, continuing the mythological narrative while altering the context in which these flowers appear. Through her work, she engages in myth-making that transforms the symbols associated with past political traumas, offering a new perspective, concern, and commitment to choices.
Pole
A photograph of a pole taken in Minsk on a summer Sunday in 2020, during a time of widespread protests against the regime. In the original image, the regime’s red and green flag is present—a symbol that adorned police vehicles and sites of violence and repression. I have manipulated the colors to heighten the sense of oppressive pressure. The object in the photo represents the system of state surveillance and control, capturing the quiet yet suffocating presence of power that overshadowed the lives of those experiencing these events.
Mirror
I made these screenshots in the summer of 2020 when the streets were full of people and anyone could view images streamed by the independent media, which had yet not been banned by the regime’s administration under the pretext of fighting extremism. The Internet signal was sometimes being disrupted, we could not see images but only hear voices – that we were tired with waiting and wanted to live in a normal state. In 9–12 August, the Internet was cut off in Belarus.
Günter Grass Gallery. Gdańsk, Poland
Gallery Mystetskyi Arsenal (Kyiv, Ukraine)
On August 15, 2020, cultural workers of Belarus held the action “The Art of the Regime” where they formed a chain of solidarity by the Palace of Arts and held up photos of protesters who had been beaten by the police on August 9–12. Artist Artem Pronin undressed to show the bruises and wounds on his body. After the action, the participants stuck the photographs on the billboard of Art-Belarus Gallery, whose collection had been seized even before the elections. One of paintings from the collection, Chaim Soutine’s “Eva” (1928), has become one of the symbols of the Belarusian protests.
On August 15, 2020, cultural workers of Belarus held the action “The Art of the Regime” where they formed a chain of solidarity by the Palace of Arts and held up photos of protesters who had been beaten by the police on August 9–12. Artist Artem Pronin undressed to show the bruises and wounds on his body. After the action, the participants stuck the photographs on the billboard of Art-Belarus Gallery, whose collection had been seized even before the elections. One of paintings from the collection, Chaim Soutine’s “Eva” (1928), has become one of the symbols of the Belarusian protests.
The cultural workers used the action to publicly express their disagreement with the current regime and to demand an end to police violence. This wasn’t the only act of collective resistance by the artistic community: two days before, artists held the action “Don’t Paint — Strike!” to protest against the results of the elections and to express solidarity with the strikes sweeping the country.
Lesia Pcholka, like many other artists, has changed the focus of her practice: in the tense situation photography and documentation of events are becoming important acts of resistance. The Belarusianauthorities are stripping journalists working for foreign media of their accreditations and prohibiting them from covering the events inthe country. Social networks are becoming a new outlet for protest. Echoing the action, documentary photographs are presented in an installation in the form of a solidarity chain aimed at drawing attention to the violence in the country and the legal default that continues in Belarus to this day.
︎︎︎ Auction item for the ABC Belarus birthday party, 2024
︎︎︎ EIKON art magazine 978-3-904083-16-4, 2023
︎︎︎ Dom Kultury „Słonecznik” wykład „Język represji jest ich językiem ojczystym”, 2022
︎︎︎ Magazyn SZUM. Review Ulica słabości: Lesi Pczołki w Gdańskiej Galerii Güntera Grassa, 2022
︎︎︎ KubaParis. Weakness Street, 2022
︎︎︎ Contemporary Art Library. Weakness Street, 2022
︎︎︎ Post.moma / On Forms of Political Organizing Illuminating the Future. Inga Lace, Aleksei Borisionok, Anna Chistoserdova, 2021
︎︎︎ BLOK magazine. The Most Memorable Year: Highlights of 2020, 2021
︎︎︎ juliet-artmagazine.com | Poetic Dissident. The Belarusian online video art exhibition of contemporary artists hated by the government of their country, 2021
︎︎︎ artslife.com | Dissenso poetico. La videoarte dà voce agli artisti vittime della repressione del governo bielorusso, 2021
︎︎︎ Magazyn RTV / 23.34, 2021
︎︎︎ Magazyn RTV / Pierwsze tygodnie współczesności, 2021
︎︎︎ No Time for Art? ARTISTIC PRACTICE AND VISUAL ACTIVISM DURING A REVOLUTION | Olga Kopenkina, Antonina Stebur, Aliaxey Talstou, 2020
︎︎︎ Hjärnstorm nr 142–143
︎︎︎ The Calvert Journal. Five months of unrest in Belarus, 2020
︎︎︎ internationaleonline.org arresting images arrested bodies / Aleksei Borisionok, 2020
︎︎︎ apostrophe.ua / The Art of Regime, 2020
︎︎︎ Fast Forward: Women In Photography. Instagram, 2020
︎︎︎ Your Art, 2020
︎︎︎ BBC.com / Belarus protesters battered, bruised but defiant after 100 days, 2020
︎︎︎ aroundart.org / Open Letter of Belarusian Cultural Workers, 2020
︎︎︎ magnumphotos.com / Magnum Flow, Rafal Milach, 2020
︎︎︎ BLOK magazine. Peaceful Resistance and the Power of Poetic Dissent, 2020
︎︎︎ e-flux.com / Open Letter of Belarusian Cultural Workers, 2020
︎︎︎ EIKON art magazine 978-3-904083-16-4, 2023
︎︎︎ Dom Kultury „Słonecznik” wykład „Język represji jest ich językiem ojczystym”, 2022
︎︎︎ Magazyn SZUM. Review Ulica słabości: Lesi Pczołki w Gdańskiej Galerii Güntera Grassa, 2022
︎︎︎ KubaParis. Weakness Street, 2022
︎︎︎ Contemporary Art Library. Weakness Street, 2022
︎︎︎ Post.moma / On Forms of Political Organizing Illuminating the Future. Inga Lace, Aleksei Borisionok, Anna Chistoserdova, 2021
︎︎︎ BLOK magazine. The Most Memorable Year: Highlights of 2020, 2021
︎︎︎ juliet-artmagazine.com | Poetic Dissident. The Belarusian online video art exhibition of contemporary artists hated by the government of their country, 2021
︎︎︎ artslife.com | Dissenso poetico. La videoarte dà voce agli artisti vittime della repressione del governo bielorusso, 2021
︎︎︎ Magazyn RTV / 23.34, 2021
︎︎︎ Magazyn RTV / Pierwsze tygodnie współczesności, 2021
︎︎︎ No Time for Art? ARTISTIC PRACTICE AND VISUAL ACTIVISM DURING A REVOLUTION | Olga Kopenkina, Antonina Stebur, Aliaxey Talstou, 2020
︎︎︎ Hjärnstorm nr 142–143
︎︎︎ The Calvert Journal. Five months of unrest in Belarus, 2020
︎︎︎ internationaleonline.org arresting images arrested bodies / Aleksei Borisionok, 2020
︎︎︎ apostrophe.ua / The Art of Regime, 2020
︎︎︎ Fast Forward: Women In Photography. Instagram, 2020
︎︎︎ Your Art, 2020
︎︎︎ BBC.com / Belarus protesters battered, bruised but defiant after 100 days, 2020
︎︎︎ aroundart.org / Open Letter of Belarusian Cultural Workers, 2020
︎︎︎ magnumphotos.com / Magnum Flow, Rafal Milach, 2020
︎︎︎ BLOK magazine. Peaceful Resistance and the Power of Poetic Dissent, 2020
︎︎︎ e-flux.com / Open Letter of Belarusian Cultural Workers, 2020