Yuri Boyko: Open to Interpretation
Seven pigment prints from the “Desideratum” and “Salve” series
Curated by VC Projects
Exhibition dates: October 27 - November 12, 2022
Opening reception: Thursday, October 27th from 7 to 9 pm
El Nido by VC Projects, 1028 N. Western Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90029 | By appointment only
The exhibition captures three large-scale photographs of “Desideratum” and four works of “Salve” series in medium scale by Los Angeles-based artist, Yuri Boyko.
When I saw Boyko’s Salve and Desideratum series, I looked for clues to decipher the photographs. I didn’t trust my instincts to roam freely through each composition. Intellectually, I knew what these stark black-and-white images were sharing. Instead, I searched the web to find poetry verbalizing a translation. I came across Rilke’s In the Brink of the Night. For the most part, the poem didn’t fit, but there were a few words that did, “and whatever strays into things will seek the light that falls without end” After reading this line, I searched for validation in Boyko’s images and that Rilke’s words would fit my experience. But I stood stagnant, as this did not signify my journey. I returned to Boyko’s photographs a second time and found the courage to be in them. To be part of their universe and truly experience what was inside. I stood within the darkness of the images and dwelled within the loneliness. I felt the sorrow and the guilt. I also felt desperation and became vulnerable even for a few minutes. The feeling took me away to another space and time. Eventually, I returned to Boyko’s photographs and surrendered farther into each area to feel the walls, the model, and the timeliness.
Why did I search for a justification for my feelings through an external source? And why did I need to find a pseudo-interpretation to tell me how to understand these photographs? Yes, it was scary, because it makes you feel vulnerable and afraid. It takes you out of your comfort zone.
Did it matter that these images were shot at Salve Mater, Leuvenjoel, Belgium, in a former psychiatric center for women, which Queen Elisabeth of Belgium inaugurated in 1927 on the lands donated by Viscount de Spoelberch to the University of Leuven? And that the center had been run by the Sisters of Charity of Jesus and Mary from Ghent and was operational until the late 1990s?
In 2016, Boyko ventured to the compound to compose his photographs. He told me that originally he was thinking about employing a female model. But, once arrived on the location, he realized that a wide spread of urbex (exploration of derelict urban structures) nude imagery produced at the location would tilt the oeuvre into an overboard female submissive eroticism. He discarded the idea.
Luckily a young professional ballet dancer have agreed to work with him on the project.
The shots for ‘Desideratum’ were as challenging as the idea itself. A desideratum is something you desire or want, a must have. But once you have it, does it make you happy? An internal struggle of ‘need to have’ versus ‘want to have’ in the quest for happiness.
The series was shot on a traditional 4”x5” view camera. The one that you’ve seen in old movies where photographers were hovering under the cloth. An image on its back-glass viewer apart from the current cameras is upside down and flipped from right to left. A transformation into normal view happens in artist’s mind on the fly. Even though the staging for the shoot was done employing the artist as a model using a digital camera, most attention was paid to image composition and study of natural lightning throughout daytime. The 4”x5” view camera had a benefit not only of large negative real estate and compelling aesthetic of analog photography, but more than anything, it was a unique pace and sensation of a process of constructing images. It was much more thoughtful as only ten negatives (two per single cartridge of five) were available per session and the result will be known only after weeks upon returning stateside. In essence, despite all meticulous preparations and thorough understanding of location’s natural light, it was still a magic moment of creation, which would not reveal itself on the spot, no instant gratification, yet a solemn confidence that the process should yield desired results.
I didn't think that location mattered. In all my research, I found no words that would sum up Yuri Boyko’s photographs. I succumbed to the idea that there should be no judgment of me to tell a narration about these works, that they should be seen without warning of what was to be found. And if there was a statement, it would say, don’t think, just feel, go inside these pictures and hang around for a little while. “As each person’s life expresses their own timeline that ultimately defines a sense of personal discovery, development, growth, and wisdom through resilience.”
I worked with Boyko to come up with a name for the exhibition, and we decided on Open to Interpretation.
Yuri Boyko’s artistic practice focuses on the deconstruction of identity, exploring states of loss and triumph, pain and pleasure. He is eloquent when he speaks of the human condition. “Our disillusionment over unfulfilled desires, and our endless struggle to find harmony amid life’s many doubts, can reshape our understanding of the world, and lead to personal growth, transforming our lives.” The process of individuation is vividly expressed in his moody photographs that mingle the sacred with the profane. I shared Boyko’s clues, “Desideratum is an urge of unsubstantiated desire to have versus the actual necessity of possession and Salve is about recovering sensation, rediscovering experience, retrieving the unknown, regaining unconsciousness, and reclaiming oneself…”
But let’s not look for symbols to defend his statement, or look for other aspects in the composition to translate into words. Rather let’s listen to how these compositions make us feel instead. I have always hoped art would remain a vehicle authored by the maker to understand another person’s life or even a sense of empathy.
Susan Sontag’s 1966 text, “Against Interpretation” encourages the viewer not to search for “a code to be broken, for example, X = A, in order to decipher the meaning” of each work. The American writer, philosopher, and political activist, also wrote: “The modern style of interpretation excavates, and as it excavates, destroys; it digs "behind" the text, to find a subtext which is the true one.”
Against Interpretation 1966, was written in my birth year, and fifty-five years later, and as the curator of this exhibition in 2022, who am I to judge my guest viewing and tell them how to think and feel? Because this won’t be your truth.
Just stay awhile in these images, and listen, open your heart and eyes and feel your way around them to come up with your own conclusion.
I decided the opening of the exhibition would be held at night and by candlelight. This was done to set a mood to experience the atmosphere and mysteriously find the images on the wall. This worked nicely. It opened up a wonderful testimony with each guest sharing their reflection on the exhibition. There was no need for me to interpret what was on display. I am confident Boyko will continue to develop ideas of individuation through the psychological dimensions of the figurative constructs of art.
Victoria Chapman
Curator | Founder El Nido art space
Yuri Boyko, “Desideratum II” 2016-2020, pigment print, 58 x 46 inches
“Sontag’s 1966 text written in my birth year, and fifty-five years later, and as the curator of this exhibition in 2022, who am I to tell you how to think and feel? And by what I tell you, that will ultimately be your truth in this work as well? ”
Yuri Boyko, “Desideratum I” 2016-2020, pigment print, 58 x 46 inches
Yuri Boyko, “Salve I” 2016, pigment print, 30 x 30 inches
Both of Boyko’s series, “Desideratum” and “Salve” was developed in Salve Mater, Leuvenjoel, Belgium, a psychiatric center for women, inaugurated by Queen Elisabeth of Belgium in 1927 on the lands donated by Viscount de Spoelberch to the University of Leuven. The buildings were designed by architect Josef Haché. The center was run by the Sisters of Charity of Jesus and Mary from Ghent and was operational until the early 2000s. It was abandoned for the next ten years and subsequently converted to condominiums.
“Salve II” 2016, pigment print, 30 x 30 inches
Yuri Boyko, “Salve III” 2016, pigment print, 30 x 30 inches
Yuri Boyko, “Salve IV” 2016, pigment print, 30 x 30 inches
Yuri Boyko, “Salve V” 2016, pigment print, 30 x 30 inches
All images are also available in 17 x 22 inches, Ed. 25 + 3 AP
Yuri Boyko is a multi-disciplinary artist residing in Los Angeles. He took up photography in early childhood with a simple Lomo camera and, encouraged by the family, had set up a portable darkroom in their urban apartment.
Yuri grew up in Kyiv, Ukraine, and attended the British Higher School of Art and Design, Department of Photography in Moscow, where his graduation work of seven large-scale B&W diptychs presented the constructivism treatment of a historic landmark.
His early work of video sequences and still images dealt with an infinitely repetitive circle of life stages. Later he worked on a series to transform temporary public art objects into permanent abstractions on the photographic surface, as well as on a study of visual perception modification by commonplace architectural elements and their color spaces. Subsequently, a large-scale collaborative project of life-sized prints addressed human self-conception in a sociological context and explored its radical change over time as well as its ever-present humanity.
During an artist residency in Spain, he created a body of work utilizing the deconstruction of shapes and colors of the Catalan flag ‘la Senyera’ as a continuous narrative element to present symbols and subtle abstractions of local customs and culture.
Yuri’s photographic series “A Light Divine”, “Transience”, “Salve”, photogravures “Veil”, and recent works “Desideratum”, “Departure and Arrival”, and “Meditation On A Tree” focus on the relationship of the conscious and the unconscious where an interpretation of the interplay between them is suggestive, yet invites a viewer to actively participate to draw their conclusions.
Yuri’s work has been shown in the US and Europe and is a recipient of the Site-Specific Public Art award at Zaha Hadid’s Napoli Afragola Train Station in Italy and the Art On The Outside award for public art in the City of West Hollywood. He was selected for the Short List of Artisti Primiati (Top Artist) at the V Biennale of Contemporary Art in Genoa, Italy, and artist residencies in Spain, Italy, and the USA.
Boyko received multiple grant awards and his work has been published in art magazines and publications in the USA, China, Italy, and Germany. He has been interviewed by French and Italian TV and radio channels.