ANYA BYALAYA
INDEPENDENT DESIGNER & ART DIRECTORABOUT
WOMEN IN THE NORTH
ABOUT: Visual identity, installation & zines for Ilmira Bolotyan and Olga Shirokostup’s project that was a part of the exhibition “The Observatory: Art and Life in the Critical Zone” in Södertälje Konsthall, Sweden.
MY ROLE: It’s an artistic research project based on a selection of archival materials (books, papers, scans, photos) from the personal archive of Evgenia Patsia (1945–2022), researcher, journalist and museum worker, and a video essay, who had worked for thirty years in the Museum-Archive of the History of Studying and Development of the European North, located in the town of Apatity on the Kola Peninsula. I helped the artists visualize the collected data and find a proper way to exhibit it.
Two zines for the exhibition were also designed by me:
“NOTHING CAN BEAT” by Ilmira Bolotyan & “THE WARMTH OF THE INVISIBLE SUN” by Olga Shirokostup
Ilmira reflects on how Soviet childhood experiences have prompted her to become interested in the narratives presented in the archive.
And Olga tells the story of Evgenia Patsia, a researcher and activist of the Kola North and about her personal interactions with Sámi colleagues