Instant soup and salo (2024)
Instant soup and salo is a multi-channel audiovisual installation that tells two parallel stories set in Ukraine after the Russian invasion: Oksana is a psychologist and dance teacher at what once was the Centre for Creativity, a community space in Kosiv, west Ukraine. Since the invasion, it has been repurposed as a hub for volunteers to make soup, salo (traditional Ukrainian dish) and camouflage nets for the front lines. Margarita is an artist working as a volunteer medic, evacuating wounded soldiers, civilians and animals, while still maintaining her practice as a painter. The multi-channel installation is a meditation on resistance, the role of art in extreme times, and the ways in which people try to make sense of war.
The collaborative practice of Marta Hryniuk and Nick Thomas is devoted to the radical potential of film and video. They pay attention to the themes of collectivity, a subjective relation to history, and possibilities for resistance. They seek out places and subjects which offer insights into ways of living ‘otherwise’, asking questions about freedom, agency and solidarity. They are interested in the utopian social projects of the twentieth century and their legacies, feminist and migration histories, and the ways in which individuals respond to historical forces.