Lada Nakonechna. “Perspective.” 2010–2011. Graphite on wall

Job Description

The project was completed in three months in collaboration with the Leipzig International Art Program, and continues the artist’s series of works involving painting on the walls of specific spaces. But this time, Nakonechna’s goal was not to criticize the institution by adding drawings, but to support and extend its content and function. 

The interpretation by French philosopher Michel Foucault of the library as a “heterotopia,” where both time and experience have a different status than in other private and public places, illustrates the artist’s thinking. By painting the space, giving it additional and alternative exits and elements (additional landscapes with roads and hills on which shelves with books and flowers stand), she emphasizes the boundlessness of the space of knowledge expanding within the library premises. Some of the drawings are hidden behind real bookshelves — thus blurring the boundaries between the physical and the imaginary. 

The work was created in an open space during working hours: the artist worked during visitors’ visits. Thus, the artistic process was perceived as parallel to the process of cognition and contributed to expanding the boundaries of space and consciousness. Ultimately, the drawings were not fixed with varnish, as Nakonechna emphasized their temporariness and unobtrusiveness for library visitors. In this way, the artist raises questions about the documentation and duration of her own artistic practice within the walls of a particular institution, whose goal is to preserve and build a narrative.