Pablo Valbuena — Spectral Poetry — Module Of Temporality — Exhibition — Slash Paris

Past: February 17 → March 30, 2023

Spectral Poetry [Ukraine] is a project about poetry and architecture in the current context of war on the European continent.

Using light and sound, Spectral Poetry [Ukraine] projects the human presence of several Ukrainian poets on an architectural scale, on buildings that have been damaged by war.

The project stems from an invitation by Fabrice Bousteau (artistic director) and Don’t Take Fake (Ukrainian organization about urban culture) for the exhibition Module of Temporality, which will take place in Kiev between February and April 2023, where works donated by international artists linked to temporality and war will be exhibited.

The exhibition will travel to various locations in Ukraine and Europe throughout 2023 and will end with an auction to finance the restoration of works and cultural institutions.

Pablo Valbuena, 2023. Video simulation in different locations around Kyiv.

In collaboration with Ukrainian poets Ostap Slyvynsky, Iryna Tsilyk and Lyuba Yakimchuk.

Vue du lieu d’exposition Module Of Temporality, Kyiv, Ukraine

Spectral Poetry brings together poetry and architecture, using light and sound to create contemporary rituals. This project uses digital light to project the voice of Ukrainian poets onto sites damaged during the war initiated by Russia.

These interventions ritualize places affected by the war, functioning as transient memorials for those lost and displaced. They also preserve the memory of the wounds inflicted on the urban fabric and architectural heritage. The destruction of schools, libraries, cultural centres, theatres, religious places and residential buildings bears witness to the brutal social, civil and cultural aggression taking place.

To the question of whether culture is possible in times of war, Ukrainian writer and poet Serhiy Zhadan responded that culture is not only possible but more necessary than ever…

culture is what makes us human. When culture is absent and leaves a void, fear takes its place.

The voices of poets who are experiencing and writing about the war since its beginning in 2014 transform perceptually these spaces and buildings. Poets are especially sensitive to how we collectively create meaning and can detect changes earlier and more accurately.

Pablo Valbuena, Spectral Poetry [Ukraine] Study for intervention in Kyiv © Pablo Valbuena, 2023

In their hands, language becomes a tool of cultural and vital resistance. Ilya Kaminsky, quoting Zbigniew Herbert in Words of War, writes: a poet is like a barometer for the psyche of a nation. In Derrida’s words, these poets will be spectrally present in a diffuse temporality that is not past, but an absent present that can affect the future.

Spectral Poetry has several parts: the first one is this video as a sketch in motion, which explores locations and poems for a future on-site intervention to be realized soon around Kyiv. In a third phase, Spectral Poetry will take the form of a real-time online experience, virtually recreating war-damaged buildings and sites by digitally animating the voices of poets.

Poem in the video : Ворона, Колеса (Crow, Wheels) by Lyuba Yakimchuk with double bassist Mark Tokar.

Location: Car cemetery, Irpin, Ukraine.

Background photographs: Dmytro Malyshev. 360war.in.ua