Obliment 2: Archetypetonic : : May 31 & June 22, 2021 : : Centennial Monument, Chicago

Obliment 2: Archetypetonic : : Power plants ... mining and minting.
In the era of algorithmic desires, virtual mining and digital satisfaction we are turning to production of audiovisual content through unpacking of our cultural heritage > post-Soviet/ Euro-Asian/ … Russian American.
Musing with the idea of “power plants”, plants that define our identity : raspberry, mushroom, birch; in conjunctions with occasional animals and flowers; we are attempting to evoke utopian harmony that now exists in the snippets of meaning and in our associations with these natural entities. In symbiosis with another power plant's meaning is extraction of energy, electrification, a fundamental element of the new world. We are exploring the extends of our mythological awareness, attempting to mint archetypetonic entities coexisting in both our consciousness and unconscious, equally precious, still manifesting.
This performance took place in Chicago in two iterations: On May 31, and on June 22, 2021 by Illinois centennial monument in Logan Square.

Conceived in collaboration with Dani Chё.

Dani Chё, accordeon; Galina Shevhenko live video performance; Suvik Zvodinsky, base; Olga Goncharova, additional vocals; Roman Shevchenko-Kuznetsov, additional moves.

Erected in 1918, the Centennial Monument, embodies the quintessence of visual associations and symbiosis of Eurocentric aesthetics prevalent in American culture and its power mechanisms. American eagle tops the majestic doric column, casted in Tennessee marble and assembled to the scale of the colonnade of the Greek Parthenon. The column rests on the cylinder adorned with the base relief frieze that visualizes the narrative of cultural foundation and allegory of labor harmony between industry & agriculture and puts on the same line Greek gods, Native Americans, and American pioneers. The monument is designed by Henry Bacon, the same architect who did the Lincoln Monument in Washington D.C.; the sculpted base relief is by Evelyn Longman.