8th Art Prospect
International Public Art Festival
Forms of Unity
September 23–26, 2021
The 8th Art Prospect International Public Art Festival will take place in St. Petersburg September 23–26, transforming the familiar urban landscape and filling streets, courtyards, parks, and other public spaces with works of contemporary art. For the second year in a row, it will be hosted at House of Culture Creative Cluster, which will display works by over 20 artists and artist collectives from Russia, Finland, Norway, Switzerland, and the US. Events will take place in a hybrid online-offline format, allowing viewers to experience works by artists from around the world despite current pandemic-related restrictions. Foreign artists’ projects, as well as interviews and discussions with them, will be available on Art Prospect’s website and mobile app.
The festival’s theme this year, Forms of Unity, comes out of the experience of life during a pandemic. As the last year has demonstrated, the challenges faced by humanity cannot be overcome in isolation; the individualism valued by the market economy does not meet the challenges of our time. As in other watershed moments, now is the time to unite, come together, and listen to each other.
“At this time in history when interaction is so limited, it is more important than ever to provide opportunities for transnational collaboration. We are working to promote dialogue in arts communities, including between international artists, which is why we are facilitating these kinds of collaborations. For example, U.S. and Russian artists have been creating their own ‘forms of unity’ for the festival—collaborating on public art works that will be displayed in September in St. Petersburg.”
Susan Katz, Art Prospect Festival Director
In addition to searching for new ways of relating, festival artists will explore the phenomenon of ‘houses of culture’ and their role in local communities. Through their artistic practices, artists will try to discover how houses of culture’s operations have changed since Soviet times, and how these organizations bring people together and provide support for them today.
Artists featured at the 8th International Festival of Public Art include Alexander Shishkin-Hokusai (St. Petersburg), Alexandra Abakshina (St. Petersburg), Anastasia Vepreva (St. Petersburg), Anna Martynenko (St. Petersburg), Anna Harsanyi/Anna Tereshkina and Nastya Makarenko (USA/Russia), Anu Pennanen (Finland), Vokrug Da Okolo (St. Petersburg), Gorod Ustinov (Izhevsk), Dagnini (Moscow), Joshua Goode/Deus ExCavator (Kerim Ragimov and Petr Shvetsov)/North-7 (USA/Russia), Dmitry Kavka (Moscow), Yeliz Palak (Switzerland), Clarinda Mac Low/Natalia Tikhonova (USA/Russia), Luisa Caldwell/Sasha Braulov (USA/Russia), Michael Meier/Christoph Franz (Switzerland), Marina Karpova (St. Petersburg), Marita Isobel Solberg (Norway), Masha Shprayzer (Moscow), Misha Gudwin (Moscow), No Excuse (Omsk), Olya Kroytor (Moscow), PARAZIT group (St. Petersburg), Peter Belyi (St. Petersburg), Techno Poetry (St. Petersburg), Elina Kulikova (Moscow), and Yan Posadsky (Voronezh).
About Art Prospect Festival
Art Prospect is an annual public art festival founded in 2012 by the nonprofit CEC ArtsLink. To date, it has featured more than 250 artists from 20 different countries and welcomed more than 30,000 visitors from St. Petersburg’s various neighborhoods. The festival has also been hosted in Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan), Baku (Azerbaijan), Tbilisi (Georgia), and Kyiv (Ukraine). In 2020, the festival took an online-offline form, bringing together artists and viewers from 13 countries.
Art Prospect 2021 is supported by the Ivan Gaza House of Culture, the Trust for Mutual Understanding, Pro Helvetia Moscow, OCA, FRAME, Kettering Family Foundation, and the U.S. Embassy in Moscow.
About House of Culture Creative Cluster
The Ivan Gaza House of Culture was originally built in the 1930s as a cultural and educational center for the workers of the Kirov Factory, which held political and economic significance for the whole country. Throughout the Soviet period, houses of culture educated and entertained citizens, hosting various theater, music, and dance ensembles, as well as art classes, clubs, and movie theaters.
This landmark building is now home to House of Culture Creative Cluster, which continues to play the important role of a neighborhood cultural cluster that brings together various art studios and classes, allowing local residents to continue their educations and shape culture. The cluster provides space for festivals, contemporary art exhibitions, cafes, restaurants, and design show rooms.
Festival Information:
Lizaveta Matveeva
Telegram: @lizavetamatveeva
Press Contact:
Sasha Karpova
+7 (921) 902-14-57