MAYBE THERAPY?

performance 120 min, 2019, Paris (part of new project 2020)

The number of young people with mental disorders is growing annually worldwide. Today we see how the desire for a stable emotional state has become an impulse for the development of various types of therapies: from pharmacological and psychotherapeutic to physical and spiritual. Immersing myself in the material, I have noticed the studies in which religious discourse is compared with pharmaceutical and psychotherapeutic discourses. Similar comparisons are found, for example, in the works of the American sociologist Philip Reef and the French philosopher Michel Foucault. Continuing their line, the composition of the video (art therapy part - a music concert, an anonymous depressive club part - a messenger with stories and a mandala’s ritual) can be correlated with the principles of Christian doctrine: faith,  healing, miracle.

Shifting my focus to adolescents, for whom the issue of mental health and self-help is especially relevant, I explore the possibilities of creating communities that center around the concept of happiness / harmony in the face of today's political, economic and environmental crisis.

As part of the project, costumes for the characters were created in collaboration with Russian designers Stas Filkov “Kruzhok” and Chiveskella. Clothing is an additional marker of a community that can exist not only in a fictional application video, but also in real life: objects-crosses, reminiscent of both religious symbols and a medical symbol, as well as in the form of a capsule collection for the audience.

Separately, it is worth noting the musical composition in the video, specially written by the iconic techno musician Anton Kubikov.

performance 120 min, 2019, Paris (part of new project 2020)

performance 120 min, 2019, Paris (part of new project 2020)

performance 120 min, 2019, Paris (part of new project 2020)