Video: Danae. Installation by Vadim Zakharov at the Venice Biennale
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
The Russian Pavilion was also opened within the framework of the 55th Venice Biennale. Its central part is occupied by the installation Vadima Zakharova with the title "Danae", within which the audience (or rather, the spectators) can experience a real golden rain!
People familiar with ancient Greek myths probably remember the legend about the beautiful Danae, whose father imprisoned her in an underground copper house. But the deity Zeus, having learned about the beauty of the prisoner, entered her dungeon under the guise of a golden rain. And as a result of this connection, the hero Perseus appeared, who later killed his grandfather, as predicted in the prophecy.
This legend (in a peculiar form, of course) is told by Vadim Zakharov within the framework of his installation "Danae." a square hole in the lower exhibition space, around which an altar fence with knee cushions is built). Sinking on our knees and looking down, we can understand and feel that we are present at the unique process of the materialization of the myth. Through a huge hole in the floor we find ourselves in another semantic and poetic space, where “golden coins” fly from the pyramidal ceiling. Below we see women with umbrellas that protect them from the painful blows of coins. Only women are allowed to visit the lower hall. There is no sexism here - just following the “logic of the anatomical structure” of the myth. The masculine gets inside only from above, in the form of money rain. The lower level of the pavilion is the “cave-womb”, which still retains peace, knowledge and memory”.
However, the coins that fly from the top of the installation to the bottom are actually not gold. This is a special currency, each of which has the denomination One Danae (One Danae).
This money, as Vadim Zakharov says, is backed only by the artist's word of honor, and on each of them are written such eternal and meaningful words as “love”, “freedom”, “truth”, “unity”, etc.
The artist also invites visitors to join the embodiment of the ancient myth in real life and take some of these coins with them.
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