A Silent Image of War by Oleksandr Serdiuk

Oleksandr Serdiuk. I don't have a home. I don't have a home. 140х110 см. 2022

Oleksandr Serdiuk is a well-known Ukrainian artist who was forced to move from Kharkiv to Western Ukraine because of the fighting. By the will of fate and circumstances, he ended up in Lviv. As soon as he recovered from the exhausting journey and the evacuation of his family abroad, he plunged into volunteer work. Together with Petro Antyp and a group of artists and cultural figures who had moved to Lviv, he founded the SaveCultureUa NGO, which is dedicated to documenting Russia's war crimes against Ukrainian cultural heritage, preserving artistic monuments, helping artists affected by the war, and providing the Ukrainian Armed Forces with everything they need.

Oleksandr Serdyuk in his own workshop in Kharkiv. Photo from the personal archive of the artist. 2020 р.

Despite his volunteer work, the artist continues to paint. One of the most expressive images created in the first months of the war is called "I Have No Home". The author does not impose his own interpretation of the plot on the viewer but gives the opportunity to independently comprehend and experience the action depicted on the canvas, based on his own experience, associations, and emotional state. After all, every Ukrainian has experienced and is still experiencing all the horrors of war in his or her own way: some from a distance, from abroad, some under occupation. And many Ukrainians did not experience it at all. That is why the artist depersonalises the main character of the work (although the figure of the author can be guessed in the silhouette). This is a generalised male image that lacks a face. It is not even a man in the flesh, but his shadow, only what is left of him, of his life and fate. It is as if the artist removes the skin from the material reality surrounding him, the whole world that is collapsing before his eyes. The boundaries of the objects are erased, the focus of the image disappears, and only a hint of the urban landscape of the once flourishing city remains, of which only ashes and ruins are left. Everything around is on fire, and a flying plane continues to sow the ground with bombs and missiles.

This work is not about a specific person, not about a specific city destroyed by a ruthless enemy. It is a generalised image of Ukraine burning in flames, an image of thousands of interrupted lives and destroyed families, dreams and hopes. That is why the artist tries to dissolve individual forms in a single spatial structure. Individual objects seem to shine through or overlap. In this way, the artist manages to achieve the unity of the image with the space. The active, pulsating orange colour in combination with black and purple of the impression aptly conveys the feeling of fire and smoke. The rhythmic alternation of colour planes, harmonious colours and shades, and compositional accuracy create emotional tension and give the work a dramatic sound.

Particular attention should be paid to an elusive at first glance, but eloquent detail that may have unconsciously become the artist's discovery. Recalling the prominent sculptor Oleksandr Arkhipenko and his invention of the counter form or "empty space" in sculpture, we understand that the absence of material, air cavities can also be an element of the composition. Looking closely at the left hand of the man depicted on the canvas, we see that the index and middle fingers are slightly apart, and they seem to be holding an object, obviously a cigarette, the image of which is completely absent from the canvas. In his work, the artist goes for generalisation. He does not describe the facial features, with barely noticeable tonal nuances he hints at the eye sockets, shades the chin and neck, and uses a single line to outline the details of the clothes, leaving the general outline of the figure somewhat blurred. And in this generalisation, he comes to the complete absence of the image of a cigarette in a helplessly lowered hand, but it is clearly visualised in the viewer's imagination. Thus, in this work, the artist managed not only to express his impressions of the horrors of the bloody and ruthless war that is taking place in Ukraine, but also to clearly draw a specific object in the viewer's imagination by the complete absence of an image, creating the illusion of a "zero image".

The artist himself describes the history of this work: "I left Kharkiv with my family on 24 February. Many friends, relatives and family members remained in the city. My parents stayed for another month in Saltovka (a district of Kharkiv that was constantly under fire and is now almost completely destroyed by the occupier - I. B.). It was unbearable to imagine that at any moment they could all be gone. My mind was full of thoughts, my soul was in moral decline. The only salvation was creativity.All that remained was to throw out all those emotions on the canvas that were no longer possible to keep inside." Thus, a work of extraordinary expressiveness was born, which deserves the close attention of connoisseurs of contemporary Ukrainian painting.

Ivan Bilan

Ph.D. in Art History,

Head of the Art-Module Art Association