Pushkin House continues a series of charity screenings aimed at raising funds for Ukrainian artists and filmmakers who are now suffering from the military aggression of the Russian state. This time we will show three films by Mykola Ridnyi dedicated to his native city of Kharkiv, its spaces and inhabitants. The first two videos are part of the installation Shelter that was made in 2012-2013. It explores public and private underground spaces that acquired new meaning after the start of the armed conflict in the Donbas region in 2014. The third video NO! NO! NO! addresses the everyday life of young residents of Kharkiv, of which the war has become an integral part.
The screening will be followed by the recording of the online Q&A with Mykola Ridnyi from Thursday’s screening. Mykola is currently in Ukraine.
All proceeds from the ticket sales will go to Ukrainian volunteer initiatives helping with the distribution of food and accommodation to displaced people.
The screening will be available from 6pm Friday 18 March until 6pm Saturday 19 March. The link to the films will be sent out to all ticket holders on Friday morning.
Shelter
Ukraine. 2012-2013. 6 min.
The main object in this film is an underground shelter repurposed for a kind of school that delivers pre-service training. The main character, an elderly teacher, also an archetype of Soviet ideology, does not seem to care about the contemporary political situation, instead opting to stay true to his own principles that have been inculcated into him through military service. His students couldn’t care less about the patriotism promoted in the schoolbooks from their teenage years; instead, they reserve their passions for the shooting ranges, inspired by computer games and Hollywood action movies. During the Cold war the political propaganda of the USSR and US produced a social phobia connected to the threat of nuclear war and the cult of defence. In modern Ukraine, many fallout shelters from the past have since been sealed. A few have been converted to serve new functions, adapted to different needs through individual creativity, spurred on by an overall lack of facilities.
Still from Shelter, courtesy of Mykola Ridnyi.
Father's story
Ukraine. 2012-2013. 4 min.
Mykola Ridnyi asked his father to do a video tour of the cellar beneath the rural house in which his family used to live. A voiceover features Ridnyi’s father describing objects in the dark space such as jars with homemade vegetable preserves, glasses for moonshine, old newspapers with pictures of Lenin and the proletariat, all of which bring old memories to the surface about his parents and nostalgia for his Soviet childhood.
Still from Father’s Story, courtesy of Mykola Ridnyi.
NO! NO! NO!
Ukraine. 2017. 22 min.
The main characters of the film are young people from Kharkiv, a city located in the Eastern part of Ukraine. Reaching their early twenties coincided with the breakout of the war in the neighbouring region of Donbass. An LGBT activist and poet, a fashion model, a group of street artists, a creator of a computer game – all of them are artists or working in the creative industries, typical for a peaceful life in a big city. However, the proximity to the war affects each of the characters and their activities. The protagonists react and reflect political events through their specific relationships with the urban space and the reality of social media.
Still from NO! NO! NO!, courtesy of Mykola Ridnyi.
ABOUT THE FILMMAKER
Mykola Ridnyi (b. 1985, Kharkiv, Ukraine) is an artist, filmmaker, and essayist living and working in Kyiv. He graduated in 2008 from the National Academy of Design and Arts in Kharkiv. Since 2005, he has been a founding member of the SOSka group, an art collective which has curated and organised a large number of art projects in Kharkiv. Since 2017, he has been the co-editor of the online magazine Prostory. Ridnyi works across media ranging from site-specific installations and sculpture to photography and experimental films. His works have been shown in exhibitions and film festivals including Transmediale at HKW in Berlin (2019), 35th Kassel documentary film festival (2018), The Image of War at Bonniers konsthall in Stockholm (2017), All the World’s Futures at the 56th Venice Biennale (2015), The School of Kyiv – Kyiv Biennale (2015), and other venues.