"Russia is a great inspiration": I create textile sculptures
Alice Gorshenina twenty four yearsShe lives in Nizhny Tagil and creates touching objects from textiles, in which the forms of the human body, face and eyes are often guessed. The artist's instagram deserves special attention - a kind of interactive art space in which she not only publishes photographs of her works, but also talks about her life, talks about art and reflects on the theme of her place in it. We talked with Alice about her life and work, as well as how to be an independent artist in the Internet era.
TEXT: Svetlana Paderina, author of the telegraph channel wannabeprada
Childhood
From childhood I quite seriously believed that I was born an artist. I was sure that this is a certain gene that I inherited from my dad. Dad used to draw. These were either graphic, fantastic plots, or oil painting, he wrote cosmos and dinosaurs. But never positioned himself as an artist. It's just that everyone always said that since dad can draw, then my sister and I, too. Like, this "skill" in our blood. Dad has not painted pictures for a long time, now he is a blacksmith, and I took his work as a memory of that artist’s fictional gene.
As far as I remember, people always said: "She is an artist." My elder sister and I, from birth, had a craving for drawing, well, in general, we were always doing something with her. We lived in the village of Yakshina of the Sverdlovsk region, and just imagine: morning, you go out into the yard, and there is only a swing and a clothes dryer, and behind the house is a field the size of three of our villages. This is the scope for fantasy. At such moments, people begin to do something new in order to somehow fill the emptiness in themselves and the emptiness around them.
In my childhood I was very impressionable and sometimes I was so imbued with other people's stories that I thought it was happening to me. Sometimes, she did not distinguish between dreams and reality in memories, did not understand whether it was in fact or a dream.
My childhood village is not beautiful pictures, where the whole family in old Russian outfits drinks fresh milk from a jug. This is a harsh place where people survived as best they could.
I keep one good memory: once on a winter night, grandmother woke me and my sister, we put on fur coats, felt boots and went outside. The road in the yard froze from the cold, we started to ride on it, and grandmother caught us on the run. And so she stopped and said to look at the sky - it was the purpose of our walk. Then I first saw Venus and various constellations. I was four years old.
But there are bad memories. In the summer, in the same village, I played with the local kids. We built something. I got so carried away that I didn't notice how everyone disappeared somewhere. It turned out that it was a conspiracy against me. The children came to me and told me to get out of here, that they no longer want to be friends with me. I remember, I did not clarify the reason, but silently went to play daddy's bus, or rather, it was just a bus shell, without wheels, seats, and other things — Dad was making something out of it. And here I am sitting in this iron box, trying to think of what I can play alone, when suddenly this whole gang of children comes to me, and they have nettles in their hands. I then got a big deal, they beat me with this nettle, I screamed, called for help, but no one helped. When they left, I got off the bus all in red spots and thought that each of them would regret that I was no longer their friend. Most likely, they did not regret and forgot me, but the model of attitude towards people "you still regret that you did this to me" remains with me to this day.
My mother insisted on moving to Nizhny Tagil, when I was about six years old, so that my sister and I had more opportunities. Still, my village from childhood is not beautiful pictures, where the whole family in old Russian clothes drinks fresh milk from a jug. This is a harsh place where people survived as best they could, where along with the beautiful fresh air and beautiful landscapes there was poverty and devastation.
School
During school years, I was looking for where to spend my time, and often recorded in different circles, and on my own. At the same time I went to dancing and karate, to singing and football, to the drawing circle and to basketball lessons, to athletics and to the circle of the young naturalist, and also to the theater. I was everywhere and immediately, I liked not to define myself as a person of one business. Perhaps now I act in the same way in the works. My activity weakened a little in the fifth grade when we moved to an unfavorable neighborhood. In the new school, I went to basketball by inertia, but they didn’t like me, because she was new, and this pressure had an effect. I stopped being active, tried to go home immediately after classes and didn’t appear in public much. I remember, I painted the wallpaper in our room with my sister, painted a large picture on the wall - the goddess Isis and the god Anubis. I then studied the culture of ancient Egypt. Dad came into the room, looked and took me to art school. There I studied for four years in parallel with the regular one. It was the best time at that time. There were amazing teachers, exciting interactive classes, sometimes in nature. People there seemed smarter, more cultured. The art school filled me with the knowledge I really needed.
Hudgraph
I received a higher artistic education, but I am sure that without him my work would be the same as now. Training in an art school is four years spent in a good atmosphere. Although not everything went smoothly and often had to struggle to remain itself, but I consider this to be an important life experience. I started to sew while studying, by chance. I got a piece of white sheet in my hands, and I sewed a small head of a creature with bright red cheeks out of it. I used to depict this character in my illustrations. But when I sewed it, some truth came down on me - why did I not do this before? These are pure emotions: I do not know how to sew, it is such a struggle with myself. I was seized by the process, I started to sew like crazy day and night, made the same larger head, then another, and when I sewed my head the size of myself, I began to look for other forms. Since then, textile is my main direction, but not the only one.
In 2015, as a student, I painted the fence of my native graphic artist. Now I try not to remember this story, but it all began with it. More precisely, it began what I did not want. I will not go into details, on the Internet there is information about the Seven Saints virgins of the hudgraph. In short, I drew seven holy women on the institute's fence, after which the whole city declared war on me. At that time, everything fell into place, friends removed me from social networks, and only a few people supported me, my favorite teachers and my parents. After this story, people learned about me, many people wrote to me from all over the world. But I was not happy because I was labeled as a rebel, an actionist, and I was just Alice, whom no one understood. All these years I have been actively invited to the exhibitions, because "this is the very same blasphemous girl." What am I? I exhibited to show that I was really different.
I settled in my workshop for a month and eventually let in there someone other than myself. It turned out that I was a virus that took over the room, since the works were everywhere, even inside the furnace.
Ural art community exists. But I never considered myself a part of this party, although there was a time when I really wanted to be one. Now I work with the Ural branch of the National Center for Contemporary Art, which surprises me, because I always thought that I was not in their taste. The NCCA publishes a series of zines about Ural artists - and I became one of the heroines of this project.
I organized all my first exhibitions myself. The most difficult thing in this business is to find the viewer. Find a room, make installation of the exhibition is not so difficult. I do not understand artists who cannot act independently, because these are your works, and it is logical that only you know how to present them. Therefore, I do not really like the exposure, in which I have little control. At first, I was a member of an art group. We organized exhibitions, inviting different authors to show who and what is in Nizhny Tagil, and at the same time presented our creativity. We had a couple of such exhibitions and decided that we get some kind of porridge, that we should concentrate more on ourselves. Then I wrote to all the galleries in different cities, and several galleries agreed to accept us. For example, we traveled to Tolyatti - at our own expense, with the trunks of our works. But these enterprises were meaningless - the exhibitions of three people who were united by nothing except friendship. Therefore we broke up. Then this story happened to the Seven Holy Maidens, and the need to offer myself was no longer there - they began to invite me.
Exhibitions
In 2017, the exhibition "Breast Journey". She was in my apartment. I wanted to make a completely independent exhibition, and I just looked at the walls of my apartment and realized that everything was ready. Transformed the space to let the viewer in, but so that you can live here and sleep. I think this is one of my best exhibitions, because it was alive, constantly transformed, I did new works and added them. And I had a spectator all the time (not only myself, my husband and my cats). Word of mouth worked: people found out that I had an exhibition and came to Tagil from other cities and even from other countries. It was an incredible time: the fact is that I was alone at home and lacked communication, and here I received guests, treated them to tea, we discussed art. I opened it at the end of July 2017, and completed it in March 2018, because I needed works for my other exhibition, Uralskin, in Moscow.
I have never had and never will have an agent. I have my head on my shoulders. If the artist uses the services of an agent, what does he have inside? Of course, we can say that the agent protects the artist from organizational issues and gives him the freedom to create. But the artist is not a flower that should not be disturbed, because there is a danger of disturbing his delicate spiritual organization. An artist is a person who carries his thought to people, and if some other person does it for him, then I have little confidence in such an artist. Although perhaps I am too strict. At one time I had the idea to create a blog, I even got a page on a toggle switch and made several posts, and then abandoned it. I do not go to do something all the time. Another thing instagram-storiz - is a format that does not oblige to anything, but he carries away the audience.
I dream, “when I grow up,” to live in a large painted tower. In a country I love no matter what
It is very difficult for me to part with my works. Because I know that no one will treat them the way I do. Sometimes I sell or donate my works, and then I see how people treat them disrespectfully, and there is a desire to take them back. But this is already impossible. Sometimes I make copies of works, then, of course, it is much easier to part. In general, I rarely sell works, I decided not to give them to anyone for a penny, so now many people refuse to buy, considering my prices to be too high. But I think that 20 thousand rubles for even a not very large sculpture or mask is negligible.
Friends told me about the residence of textile artists Green AIR in Norway, they said that I was obliged to file an application there. There was one difficulty with the application - it was necessary to send a description of the project that I want to implement at the residence, and I wrote to the organizers that my residence at the residence is my project. I wanted to deal with the issue of the influence of the terrain at work. For a long time I thought that the Urals had a certain influence on me and that in another place I would do other things. As a result of the trip, I realized that it was not, my thoughts were coming from inside, not from outside. My final work in the residence was similar to the finished exhibition, unlike other participants - they showed their work space and work in progress. I settled in my workshop for a month and eventually let in there someone other than myself. It turned out that I was a virus that took over the room, since the works were everywhere, even inside the furnace.
Russian
I see no reason to leave Russia. It's like in twenty years, to start looking for a new mom for yourself, because you don’t like something in yours. Yes, there are a lot of problems here, I really miss the culture. And it's not just about museums, theaters, and so on, I'm talking about the culture of behavior. Despite the shortcomings of the people who surround me, Russia is a great inspiration. Russian culture, which we diligently kill, very inspires me. And in her death, there is also some charm, all this elusive beauty of the villages and something truly Russian, what remains only in the old chests and dusty cupboards of our grandmothers. I dream, “when I grow up,” to live in a large painted tower. In a country that I love no matter what.
I would like to be less upset about any nonsense. I am too emotional and sensitive to everything and I dream of being colder so that it is easier to live. Sometimes I dream of being born again and never associating my life with art, becoming a saleswoman in Pyaterochka and thinking only about what to cook for dinner. Now in my head a lot of things, it is not always good. I dream of flying into space with the DearMoon project, I so much desire it that I can not sleep. And in such moments, I think, that would be something different. Yes, happiness in the absence of thoughts - and unhappiness in this too.
Photo: personal archive
