Oleksandr Sirous. I Am Your Amplifier, 2024.

I Am Your Amplifier exhibition by Ukrainian RIXC residency new media artist Oleksandr Sirous opens with a special programme at the RIXC Gallery, Lencu iela 2, on Friday, September 13, at 18.00, exploring the complex networks of interaction between natural and technological actors in the ecosystem that is forming around the Kakhovka Reservoir after the dam collapse. Until its explosion on June 6, 2023, the Kakhovka reservoir was the main source of water supply for the southern part of Ukraine – the second largest and the sixth and last link in the Dnipro hydroelectric cascade.

At 16.00, the programme will be begin with guest lectures by Ukrainian artists and researchers on the ecological state of the Dnipro River, the Ro3kvit project's initiative to rebuild the areas destroyed by military aggression, as well as panel discussions on the artistic practise of the Ukrainian new media artists' collective Photinus during the war. At 18.00, the lectures will be followed by the exhibition opening featuring the presentation by Oleksandr Sirous, and the evening will conclude with an audiovisual TER.RAIN performance by Ujif_notfound and Oleksandr Sirus at 19.00 at the RIXC Gallery. 

During the opening programme, in a panel discussion from 16.00, researcher and artist Svitlana Usychenko and researcher Antoine Korchagin will present the Ro3kvit project, which brings together professionals from Ukraine and abroad to revitalise urban and rural areas in Ukraine and, in a joint initiative with Greenpeace, to reveal the challenges and ecological potential of the Dnipro river.

Artist Oleksandr Sirous will talk about the Ukrainian artists' collective Photinus and the activities of its members during the invasion, when its members are scattered in different countries and behind front lines. The talk will be joined online from Ukraine by Max Robotov, co-founder of the collective, as well as artist Ujif_notfound, who will present his unorthodox artistic work, also affected by the brutal politics of the aggressors.   

The programme will continue at 18.00 with the exhibition opening, when the artist Oleksandr Sirous will present the artwork created during the RIXC residency. This spring, part of the project has already been presented at the MEET Digital Culture Center in Milan, where the public could see the prototype and the stages of its development. The opening of the exhibition at the RIXC Gallery will mark the residency at Riga and present the final result of the art project, the I Am Your Amplifier installation.

The evening programme will continue at 19.00 by an audiovisual performance TER.RAIN by artist Ujif_notfound and Oleksandr Sirous, specially adapted for RIXC space. The performance is a tribute to the Ukrainian cities that have been destroyed by the Russian invasion and have become symbols of harsh loss, despair and injustice.

The I Am Your Amplifier exhibition will be on view at the RIXC Gallery until September 28, 2024, exploring modern robotic systems, such as swarms of drones and other autonomous technologies that have been introduced in Ukraine since the start of the full-scale invasion. They become part of a new symbiosis between natural and man-made actors, creating new types of communication and interaction within this system. This installation focuses on how modern technologies can become part of a new type of ecosystem, fostering collective thinking and organic evolution.

Oleksandr Sirous is a sound and media artist who works with big data sets and the principles of interaction and communication in web environments. He also creates complex simulation environments using AI. His background in animation and comics has influenced his practice, leading him to constantly seek a non-trivial approach to storytelling and composition in media works. Recently, due to his work with game engines, he has turned more and more to the culture of video games and various game mechanics and new rules of interaction, thus finding new approaches at the intersection of the already established approaches in media art and video games.

The exhibition is on view from September 14–28, 2024 at the RIXC Gallery, Lencu iela 2, Wednesday-Saturday, 12.00-18.00. Free entry.
RIXC Gallery provides free guided tours in Latvian and English, individually and for groups.

Contact: rixc@rixc.org, +371 67228478 (office), +371 25358541 (Līva Siliņa, RIXC information and PR coordinator)

Support: Riga City Council, State Culture Capital Foundation of Latvia.