TANYA PIONIKER x IGOR TSVETKOV
LOVE IS…(RED FLAG)
CONCEPT
The joint project of the artists’ duo "Love is…(a Red Flag)" is dedicated to the eternal topic of
love, and construction/deconstruction of the personal boundaries in relationships.
In this project we are trying to analyse what is the meaning of healthy/toxic relationships in modern world.
The project consists of ten images, which reveal the story. The project combines traditional mediums of both artists: graphic works and hand-drawn animation. Modern people live in physical world and digital space, so does our project, which simultaneously exists in two dimensions: offline (graphic works on paper) and online (digital animation).
The artworks are extremely personal and sensual as we are working not only as an artists’ duo, but also as partners. It makes the whole concept even more sharp as in this situation two artistic egos strive not only to coexist together peacefully, but to create a joint project about their relations — it certainly requires special efforts from both sides.
What is the difference between the concept of "red flags" in personal or public sense? Sometimes love seems to be a huge red flag. We feel so insecure and vulnerable as we are afraid to hurt or/and to get hurt as relationships are always about breaking the boundaries and invasion of other’s person privacy, consciously or unconsciously. The baggage of psychological trauma that persons carry out from the past sometimes may seem so heavy so we are not open to anything new and enjoy the state of just being alone, but it all changes, our barriers crumble, at that very moment we fall in love.
How is it possible to built strong relationships and find a perfect balance between the desires and
beliefs of you and your partner, a perfect balance between sensual and physical, social and
biological?
These are the questions we answer through our collaboration
ARTISTIC APPROACH
Within the framework of our collaboration we decided to combine graphic works on paper and hand-drawn animation techniques to create a series of ten artworks — each reflects a certain stage of relationships: from the state of fake joy of a person being alone to the complete unification of the persons to create a joint project. Such combination of artists’ techniques fits perfectly in the concept of the project — it reflects the idea of how we are moving towards each other, trying to combine our styles to create something new together — like it happens when we are trying to establish strong relationships.
The idea of the series "Love is…(a Red Flag)" comes from the chewing gum of the same name (produced in Türkiye), which was extremely popular in the post-Soviet space and Eastern Europe in 1990-s, where both of the artists originally come from. On the inserts of the chewing gum there were drawings, depicting various manifestations of the relationship between two main characters and containing a brief humorous definition of love. Chewing gum "Love is…» has a two-colour wrapper and two flavours that symbolise the "love of two fruits".
Chewing gums and their inserts were a truly collector’s item in 1990-s and could be even used as a kind of currency among children and teenagers. Such collecting culture has generated a lot of memes and made the "Love is…" chewing gum series truly iconic.
Nine combinations of the flavours are produced plus one single flavour — ten in total — which coincides with the number of the artworks in our project and the stage of relationships as in the list:
I. Chocolate — the fake joy of being alone;
II. Chocolate + Melon — first meeting, inability to control the situation, falling in love;
III. Banana + Strawberry — fixation on sex and on the physical aspect of love;
IV. Pineapple + Orange — return to the past relationships in thoughts / positive experience;
V. Pineapple + Coconut — return to the past relationships in thoughts / negative experience;
VI. Apple + Lemon — potential tension between partners, boredom, the Apple of Discord;
VII. Cherry + Lemon — conflict and disputes about what is natural/fake, beautiful/ugly, etc;
VIII. Lemon + Wild Cherry — talking and finding solutions, so everything fell into place;
IX. Peppermint + Menthol — general meaning for both partners is found, the connection has strengthened, we see our similarities, but also accept and respect our differences;
X. Cola + Lemon — unity, harmony, creation of the joint project (e.g. new life);
In our project we also turned to the aesthetics and tradition of botanical illustrations as well as medieval bestiaries: some aspects of the project are metaphorically reflected through the habits of animals, plants, insects and their interaction in nature.
As the project exists in two dimensions, physical and digital, it has two possible representation options: a classical gallery exhibition with physical graphic artworks and digital animation art presented on the screens. It is also possible to make an NFT collection and graphic works editions.
The size of each physical graphic works is 41 x 31 cm. They are made on paper with watercolours, pencils, soft pastel, coal, ink and tracing paper.
I. CHOCOLATE
Stage of relationships: The fake joy of being alone
Motto: Love is…don’t give a shit about my face
The first artwork in a series, the only one with a single flavour, depicting a state of person being single.
The person has archived mental balance and enlightenment and now he is in a state of a child or a monk with an open third eye, with the help of which he observes what is going on in the society. The society here is represented in the form of an anthill and its inhabitants, where everyone minds their own business.
On the picture we see the life of the scout ant, who as well as the main character, operates alone
II. CHOCOLATE + MELON
Stage of relationships: first meeting, inability to control the situation, falling in love
Motto: Love is…a revolutionary situation
From the very first meeting, everything starts to change fast. As well as revolution, which always seems to happen unexpectedly, however a huge potential has already accumulated for it. Like revolutionary situation — nothing can continue to stay the same.
The feeling of falling in love penetrates a person’s heart like electric shock: looks festive and scary at the same time.
The revolutionary situation here is depicted allegorically in the wolf hunt scene — one of the wolves broke through the red flags and attacked the hunter.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
TANYA PIONIKER
b. 1994, in Moscow, currently lives and works in Berlin.
In 2013 graduated from the Institute of Contemporary Art Moscow (ICA, named after Joseph Backstein). Began her exhibition activities in 2011 with a solo show "Wordless Confession" (special project for young artists of CCA Winzawod, Moscow, curator Arseny Zhilyaev). In 2014 took part in the parallel program of Manifesta 10 (Generation "Start" project). In 2017 solo show "XVII" took place in VLADEY Space (Moscow). The third solo exhibition "New ABC-book" (Gogol center, Moscow) and the solo show of etchings "Seven" (JART Gallery, Moscow) were held in 2021. According to The Art Newspaper Russia in 2020 she has become №28 in the TOP-50 the most perspective artists rating. She took part in many group shows, including a large-scale exhibition of contemporary art "One Family" (Moscow, 2019).
In 2020, she was shortlisted for the ISCP residence (New York).
In 2022 has become a fellow of Weltoffenes Berlin annual program. In 2023 took part in Schloss Wiepersdorf (Germany, Brandenburg) cultural foundation fellowship program. The works were commissioned by ciconia x ciconia publishing house (Berlin): "Mannelig in Ketten", 2022 (with Ilya Danishevsky), "Leben mit einem Idioten", 2021 (with Viktor Jerofejew). Participated in various art fairs and auctions. Works make part of numerous private and public collections.
IGOR TSVETKOV
b. 1981, in USSR(Russia), artist and filmmaker based in EU (Germany/Latvia)
Participated in several projects and collaborations, such as the artistic universe “Dark Times” shown and collected as digital (NFT) and as physical artworks.
Project “Dark Times” also was presented at the exhibition “Rapture” at Gallerie Kuchling, Berlin (2023) in collaboration with Maksim Didenko. Igor Tsvetkov is the director editor and sound designer of the short surrealistic film “Rapture” created as a part of the exhibition.
Presented and curated by platforms such as superrare.com and foundation.app. Collected by many NFT collectors, including French director Quentin Dupieux.
• Selected projects and exhibitions:2023 Le Cirque des Mirages Feat. Arthur H - La Porte de l'Inconnu, music video, director of animation;
• 2023 Rapture. Gallery Kuchling, Berlin, Germany. (together with Maksim Didenko);
• 2023 Group show TezArt MTL. Montreal, Canada;
• 2022 Group show Guerre. Au 59 Rivoli, Paris, France;
• 2020 - 2022 play Wir. Deutsches Theater Berlin, video artist;
• 2021-2022 Cubists Torsos, collaboration with Dave Strick (Pixar);
• 2015 Solo show Pornographica. Bolderaja, Riga, Latvia;
• 2013 Solo show Cadavre exquis. Etagi, Saint Petersburg, Russia (curator Masha Godovannaya);
